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Message:: [QUOTE="The Eidolon, post: 7861727, member: 102103"]I think the Spanish tradition of dividing money into eighths persisted after decimalization, with the decimo serving a similar role to the old real.So 2½ and 1¼ centavos would have been natural divisions.  Even in the Western US, the division of dollars into eighths persisted for a long time.Here's Robert Louis Stevenson on it:  "In the Pacific States they have made a bolder push for complexity, and settle their affairs by a coin that no longer exists – the bit, or old Mexican real. The supposed value of the bit is twelve and a half cents, eight to the dollar. When it comes to two bits, the quarter-dollar stands for the required amount. But how about an odd bit? The nearest coin to it is a dime, which is, short by a fifth. That, then, is called a short bit. If you have one, you lay it triumphantly down, and save two and a half cents. But if you have not, and lay down a quarter, the bar-keeper or shopman calmly tenders you a dime by way of change; and thus you have paid what is called a long bit, and lost two and a half cents, or even, by comparison with a short bit, five cents." Robert Louis Stevenson, Across the Plains, 1892. [ATTACH=full]1354794[/ATTACH][/QUOTE]