escudo

American  

[e-skoo-doh, es-koo-doo, es-koo-thaw] / ɛˈsku doʊ, ɛsˈku dʊ, ɛsˈku ðɔ /

noun

plural

escudos

1. a coin and monetary unit of Cape Verde, equal to 100 centavos.

2. a former coin and monetary unit of Angola, Guinea-Bissau, and Mozambique.

3. a former paper money and monetary unit of Chile, equal to 100 condors or 1000 pesos, replaced by the new peso in 1975.

4. any of various former gold coins of Spain, Spanish America, and Portugal.

5. a former silver coin of Spain, discontinued in 1868.

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escudo British  

/ ɪʃˈkuðu, ɛˈskuːdəʊ /

noun

1. the standard monetary unit of Cape Verde, divided into 100 centavos

2. the former standard monetary unit of Portugal, divided into 100 centavos; replaced by the euro in 2002

3. a former monetary unit of Chile, divided into 100 centesimos

4. an old Spanish silver coin worth 10 reals

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Etymology

Origin of escudo

1815–25; < Spanish: shield < Latin scūtum

Example Sentences

El águila dorada del escudo mexicano estaba bordada en la parte superior de la falda y los lados estaban adornados con piezas metálicas doradas como los trajes tradicionales de los mariachis.

From New York Times • Nov. 5, 2022

PORTUGAL, which for cognoscenti has long been a charming backwater, may be Europe's best bargain as a result of a 45% devaluation of the escudo in one year.

From Time Magazine Archive

On top of that, governments were forced to devalue the Spanish peseta, the Portuguese escudo and the Brazilian real.

From Time Magazine Archive

Its president, Karl Otto Pohl, and his cohort are still wrestling with an unfinished European Monetary System, involving commitments to support newcomers like the Greek drachma and the Portuguese escudo.

From Time Magazine Archive

The largest weight is the tàhel, which is the weight of ten reals of silver—or, as we say, of one escudo.

From The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55 1690-1691 Explorations by Early Navigators, Descriptions of the Islands and Their Peoples, Their History and Records of the Catholic Missions, as Related in Contemporaneous Books and Manuscripts, Showing the Political, Economic, Commercial and Religious Conditions of Those Islands from Their Earliest Relations with European Nations to the Close of the Nineteenth Century by Blair, Emma Helen