Coins of the Swiss franc
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The coins of the Swiss franc are the official coins used in Switzerland and Liechtenstein. The name of the subunit is centime in French and internationally, Rappen in German, centesimo in Italian, and rap in Romansh.
There are coins in denominations of 5 centimes, 10 centimes, 20 centimes, 1⁄2 franc (50 centimes), 1 franc, 2 francs, and 5 francs.
All coins have the legend of either Helvetia or Confœderatio Helvetica, the Latin name of the Swiss Confederation, along with the year number.
The 5, 10, and 20 centimes coins show a head of Liberty in profile, designed by Karl Schwenzer (1879). The 1⁄2, 1, and 2 francs coins show a standing figure of the national personification Helvetia, designed by Albert Walch (1860).
The 5 francs coin on the obverse shows a portrait of an "alpine herdsman" (Alphirte), designed by Paul Burkhard (1922), and on the reverse the federal coat of arms;
additionally it has the inscription Dominus Providebit embossed on the edge.
The original series of coins introduced in 1850 consisted of nine denominations.
To this were added three denominations of gold coins, 10, 20, and 100 francs, between 1897 and 1925, following the standards of the Latin Monetary Union.
The 1 and 2 centimes coins were retired from circulation in 2007 and 1978, respectively.
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This entry incorporates text from “Coins of the Swiss franc” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.