Swedish word of the day: krona
Krona is one of the first Swedish words you'll come across, whether you live in the country or are just visiting as a tourist, as it's the name of Sweden's currency. Where does it come from?
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Krona is the Swedish word for crown, as well as the name of Sweden's currency, shortened in Sweden to kr, or outside Sweden as SEK. The plural is kronor.
You may sometimes see prices in kronor followed by a colon and a hyphen, like this: '10:-'. Originally, there would have been a number of öre (a hundredth of a krona) after the colon, for example 10:90 indicating ten kronor and 90 öre, but in practice the öre figure is falling out of usage.
There are no öre coins left – the 50 öre coin was abolished in 2010 – and prices in öre are often rounded to the nearest full krona instead when paying in cash.
Sweden isn't the only country to use kronor as currency. Iceland has the króna (krónur in plural), and Denmark and Norway have the Danish and Norwegian krone (or kroner in plural).
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It's not a coincidence that they all use the krona, either. Sweden, Norway and Denmark (and Iceland, which at that point was part of Denmark), did at one point have a Scandinavian monetary union, leading from the 1870s until roughly the time of the first World War. Each country issued their own currency, while accepting the other countries' currencies as legal tender.
Prior to this, Swedes used riksdaler, Danes used rigsdaler and Norwegians used speciedaler, which were all based on silver Reichsthaler (literally: realm or reich dollar), defined as 25.28 grams of fine silver. The switch to the krona was a switch from a currency based on silver to one based on gold, with one gram of fine gold equivalent to 2.48 kronor.
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The Czech republic also uses crowns (koruna), and other countries which have used the crown previously include Estonia (kroon), Hungary (korona) and Slovakia (koruna).
Crowns have also existed as denominations of other currencies, like the British crown, which used to be worth five shillings or a quarter of an old pound.
Aside from the name of the currency, krona can also refer to a crown worn on the head, the state (one example of this is Kronofogden, the Enforcement Agency, which literally translates as Crown Bailiffs), a coin worth one krona, and the "heads" side of a coin (the "tails" side is klave, an old tool used for restraining cattle which looked similar to the shield on the back of a coin).
The word krona comes from the Latin word corona, which originally referred to a laurel wreath presented to athletes, later evolving to mean the word for a crown or garland.
The name of the coronavirus also derives from the Latin word corona, more specifically due to the fact that it looks similar to the solar corona, or the outermost layer of the sun's atmosphere, when the virus is examined through a microscope.
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Example sentences:
Min kompis frågade om jag vill köpa hennes klänning för 200 kronor. Är det ett bra pris?
My friend asked if I want to buy her dress for 200 kronor. Is it a good price?
Svenska kungar och drottningar har inte burit krona sen 1907.
Swedish kings and queens have not worn crowns since 1907.
Villa, Volvo, Vovve: The Local's Word Guide to Swedish Life, written by The Local's journalists, is available to order in English or German. Head to lysforlag.com/vvv to read more about it.
It is also possible to buy your copy from Amazon US, Amazon UK, Bokus or Adlibris.
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