Brewer's: Copper-nosed Harry

Henry VIII. When Henry VIII. had spent all the money left him by his miserly father, he minted an inferior silver coin, in which the copper alloy soon showed itself on the more prominent parts, especially the nose of the face; and hence the people soon called the king “Old Copper-nose.”

Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894
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