Hist. [repr. OE. þrimsa, þrymsa, late altered form of trim(e)sa, trym(e)sa, genitive pl. of trimes, trymes, *trims (nom. pl. trimsas, trymsas), ad. L. trēmis, the third part of an aureus; also a weight, a drachma: cf. OHG. ‘drimisa, trimisa = dragma.’ (Both in OE. and OHG. assimilated to þrí, drî, three.) The genitive pl. is frequent in OE. Laws, etc., after a numeral, and has been erroneously taken by 17th c. antiquaries, and from them by later writers, for a nominative singular.]
An erroneous name for the OE. trimes or trims, a coin (or money of account) representing the Roman trēmis, the value of which varied in OE. times and is uncertain; also, as a weight, a drachma.
In early times the Merovingian gold tremis had circulation in England, where a few are said also to have been struck in the early 7th century; but in the 10th c. the name appears to have been applied to a small silver coin of similar size; perhaps in some districts to the sceatt; see quots.
a. 954. Norð-leoda laga, § 1, in Schmid, Gesetze, 396. Norð-leoda cynges gild is xxx þusend þrymsa [v.r. þrimsa]. § 3. Biscopes and ealdormannes viii þusend þrymsa.
c. 950. Lindisf. Gosp., Matt. xvii. 27. [Staterem, gl. þæt wæs feor trymes vel viii [Rushw. Gosp. scilling, Ags. Gosp. ænne wecg, Hatton Gosp. ænne peniʓ].
1614. Selden, Titles Hon., II. ii. 204. A Thrymsa was a third part of their shilling; not three shillings as some much mistake.
1706. Phillips (ed. Kersey), Thrimsa, an old German Coin, valued at the third part of a Shilling, or Four Pence.
1720. J. Johnson, Canons Eng. Ch. (Laws Ethelstan an. 926 No. 2). In Mercia the common Man’s Weregild is 266 Thrymsa, this is 200 Shillings.
1754. Hume, Hist. Eng. (1761), I. App. I. 100. His weregild … was by law thirty thousand thrimsas, near 1,300l. of present money.
1860. Hook, Lives Abps. (1869), I. v. 243. A bishop was on the same footing as an ealdorman, reckoned at eight thousand thrymsas.
1875. Jevons, Money, viii. 7. The mark, the ora, and the thrimsa were other moneys of account used by the Anglo-Saxons.
