Rap (contracted from rappare, 'an Irish plunderer'), familiar in the phrase 'not a rap,' was a counterfeit Irish coin of the time of George I., which passed for a halfpenny, though not really worth a fourth of that value. There was also a small Swiss coin called rappcn, worth a centime.
Rap
Chambers's Encyclopaedia, Volume 8: Peasant to Eoumelia, p. 579
Source scan(s): p. 0590