The dwindling use of cash in Norway may leave the country’s new King Haakon VIII as the first Norwegian monarch in a thousand years who’s not depicted on a Norwegian coin. The central bank has acknowledged that it has no plans to issue new coins following the recent death of Haakon’s father, King Harald V.
That can amount to forgetting Norwegian history, claims Arne Riise, an avid coin collector and director of Oslo Myntgalleri. He stresses how all kings since Olav the Holy in the 1100s have been portrayed on coins, and the late King Harald V’s portrait has been on today’s 10- and 20-kroner coins for than 30 years.
“It would be a shame if they (Norges Bank) end this tradition,” Riise told business news service E24.
The bank responded that the need to produce new coins is under constant evaluation, regarding demand for coins and the supplies of them in circulation. If more become needed, “the question of designing them will be evaluated in the normal manner.”
NewsinEnglish.no staff
