piastre
Britishnoun
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(formerly) the standard monetary unit of South Vietnam, divided into 100 cents
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a fractional monetary unit of Egypt, Lebanon, and Syria worth one hundredth of a pound; formerly also used in the Sudan
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another name for kuruş
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a rare word for piece of eight
Etymology
Origin of piastre
C17: from French piastre, from Italian piastra d'argento silver plate; related to Italian piastro plaster
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
If Hosni Mubarak has passed his alleged $70bn through British banks, the Egyptians won't see a piastre of it.
From The Guardian ● Feb. 7, 2011
Today the improved flow has so increased the supply of goods coming into Saigon that it has driven down the black-market rate of the piastre from 173 to 145 to the dollar.
From Time Magazine Archive
The 100 piastre bill is worth five dollars.
From In Pastures New by George Ade
Your comrades have not left me a piastre.
From The Castle of Andalusia A Comic Opera, in Three Acts by John O'Keeffe
Here and there we stooped to inspect, and we bought a water-jar for a piastre—an Egyptian piastre, which is really money and worth exactly five cents.
From The Ship Dwellers A Story of a Happy Cruise by Albert Bigelow Paine
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
