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Grooves or lettering round the rim, invented against coin clipping.
Also known as: Reeded edge, Ridges on the edge of a coin, Grooves round a coin
The ridges on a coin's edge are a security feature four centuries old. Shaving silver from a plain-edged coin was undetectable and endemic; an edge that is visibly interrupted is not, which is why the pattern survives on coins made of base metal that nobody would shave.
A pattern of fine grooves, or lettering, applied to the edge of a coin during striking.
Contexts: History
Introduced against clipping — shaving metal from the rim of a precious-metal coin — which was undetectable on a plain edge and widespread enough to debase whole currencies.
from the seventeenth century
Retained on modern base-metal coins for a different reason: the edge is an accessible tactile difference, which is how a blind or partially sighted person tells two similar-sized coins apart.
A band of fine parallel grooves running around the rim of a disc, at right angles to the faces, or raised lettering in the same position.