Technikatörténeti szemle 10. (1978)

A MÉRÉS ÉS A MÉRTÉKEK AZ EMBER MŰVELŐDÉSÉBEN című konferencián Budapesten, 1976. április 27–30-án elhangzott előadások II. - Zupko, R. E.: Angol súlyok és mértékek

differences. To insure the international uniformity of these weights and measures, Rome periodically sent copies of its physical standards to each province and it enforced their proper maintenance and use. Not until the dissemination of metric weights and measures over most of Europe during the nineteenth century would such a condition exist again. However, just as in Italy itself, provincial populations maintained indigenous systems of weights and measures. The people who cultivated farms or who tended their herds and flocks or who manufactured tools and other items on a small scale continued to employ weights and measures inherited from their ancestors. Many of these units survived the Roman period and evolved into the myriad of local systems so characteristic of pre-metric Europe. Britain was no exception. The Celts used their own weights and measures long before the Roman invasion and continued to use them long after the last of the legions departed. Even though no documentary evidence exists on the subject and no archaeological finds have provided us with any prototypes of Celtic weights and measures, they must have been similar to those employed in most pre-industrial societies. Undoubtedly, measurements were based on some simple or primary standards such as the span, step, pace, hand, palm, thumb, or finger or upon some arbitrarily defined standard such as a given number of grains. It is also safe to assume that each Celtic tribe had its own system of units, specially adapted to the particular needs of its people and to the resources found in any region. But regardless of how sparse or prolific these customary systems actually were, the Roman occupation had the profound effect of permanently localizing them. It was Roman metrology that was utilized whenever goods were exchanged in regional and interegionaltrade; whenever large construction projects were undertaken; whenever taxes had to be assessed on land and material possessions; and whenever coins had to be minted. And it is the Roman system of weights and measures that became the cornerstone for the future metrology of the British Isles. Roman institutions had evolved to meet the needs of a very complex, heterogenous civilization. Stretching from the Atlantic Ocean into the Slavic portions of Eastern Europe and from the German north to Central Africa, the Empire conducted its commercial, industrial, and agricultural pursuits over immense distances and among hundreds of divergent socio-economic groups. To maintain a population of almost 100,000,000 by the second century. Rome depended on the rapid transport of grain and other food staples over many sea and land routes and on the massive warehousing of foodstuffs to combat against the ravages of periodic famines and plagues. Her efforts in establishing an efficient postal service, a comprehensive bureaucratic network, a sophisticated legal and judicial system, and the ancient world's largest welfare program were also made imperative by her geographic and demographic dimensions. Roman metrology—so essential to this economic machine—merely reflected the variety and the complexity of this experience. These weights and measures dominated the British scene for four hundred years but they declined in importance and either ceased to be employed nationally or evolved along different lines locally after the fourth century because of the Germanic invasions and colonizations. In other wors, Anglo-Saxon and other Germanic institutions were incapable of sustaining them. In their former homeland along the North and Baltic Seas, as well as in their new British settlements, these people—when not engaged in war under local comitatus leaders—farmed small parcels of land in village