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

It consisted of 12 ounces, each ounce of 24 scruples and each scruple (scrupulum) of 2 obols. In the mints the pound again consisted of 12 ounces but the ounce was divided into 6 sextuale and the sextula or nomisma into 24 siliquae. It should be noted that the weight cited for the silver denarius constitutes the mean of a number of extant denarii and is currently the most generally accepted figure. The weights for the ounce and pound are in direct correlation to this mean. 7 Considerably larger than its Roman prototype, the North German foot has been calibrated at 13.2 BI inches or 335 mm. Based on these equivalents, the thumb or 1

/,

2 foot was 1.1 BI inches (27.9 mm); the palm or '/

4 foot, 3.3 BI inches (83.8 mm); the cubit, 26.4 BI inches (670 mm); the elne, 52.8 BI inches or 4.4 BI feet (1.34 m); and the rod, 16.5 BI feet (5.03 in). 8 All of these weights are expressed in troy grains. Actually the Saxon pound—called the tower pound after the Conquest—contained 7680 wheat grains which are converted to the troy barleycorn scale as follows: 32 wheat grains = 22.5 barleycorns. Therefore, (1) 32x20 pennyweights X12 ounces = 7680 wheat grains; or, (2) 22.5x20 pennyweightsX12 ounces = 5400 troy grains. The Offa penny, thus, weighed 32 wheat grains and the ounce of 20 pennyweights was 640 wheat grains. • In a decree issued sometime during the seventh or eighth decade of the tenth century, Edgar the Peaceable ruled that "...the measure of Winchester should be the standard for his realm" (...et una mensura, sicut apud Wincestram). Since Winchester was the capital of Edgar and other Anglo-Saxon kings after the Heptarchy and the Bretwalda system had been replaced by a territorially unified, if not politically solidified, English state in the early ninth century, it is perfectly reasonable that its metrological system should be considered as the model for the English domain. It is also a well known fact that Winchester housed the Saxon standards (see especially "Seventh Annual Report of the Warden of the Standards on the Proceedings and Business of the Standard Weights and Measures Department of the Board of Trade for 1872—73," in Reports from Commissioners (London, 1873), Vol. 38, p. 47 and W.H. Prior, "Notes on the Weights and Measures of Medieval England," in Bulletin du Cange (1924), Vol. 1, pp. 82—84). But was Edgar referring to the measure of Winchester as a system of units of measurement or as a particular physical standard or set of standards ? G. T. McCaw, using some of the findings of H. W. Chisholm, a former director of the British Standards Institution, wrote that the yard or gird of the Saxon kings was kept at Winchester and he indirectly implied that his was the measure referred to in Edgar's statement. (Since it has never been found and since no actual description of its physical appearance was ever made, one can only assume, judging by linear standards of a later medieval period, that it was an elongated, four-sided, lead or iron bar that indicated a specific length in one of two ways. It was either one yard long from end to end or it was slightly larger with two lines marked near each end, the space between them representing one yard. Even though the practice of stamping standards with the seal or mark of the monarch is not documented before the reign of William I, it would not be unlikely that some kind of seal was placed on this standard.) McCaw also remarked thet there were other standards deposited at Winchester as early as the reign of Alfred the Great or about the year 850 (G. T. McCaw, "Linear Units Old and New", in Empire Survey Review (1939—40), Vol. 5, p. 254). John O'Keefe stated that Edgar kept his standards, which included a corn bushel, at Winchester, and O'Keefe inferred that the King was thinking of these when the issued his decree (John O'Keefe, The Law of Weights and Measures (London, 1966), pp. 7—8). (As regards this bushel there is no documentary or archeological proof of its existence. Its name never appears in any Anglo-Saxon manuscripts. Neither does the name of any other capacity measure. Besides, the etymological derivation of,.bushel" suggests an Old French or perhaps even a Norman origin and it is highly unlikely that a measure so named would have been so commonplace as to suggest a state standard before the advent of the Normans.) Bruno Kisch has shown that in the Streeter Collection at Yale University there is an eighth or ninth century weight which is made of lead and covered with an ornamental surface of gilt brass. (A standard made of more than one metal is indeed rare in English history.) He also reports that, probably due to Roman influence (accruing either through Roman trade or the occupation itself), disk weights were used in England during the pre-Norman period in addition to the traditionally English bell-shaped weights (Bruno Kisch, Scales and Weights: A Historical Outline [New Haven, 1965), p. 101]. (It may be speculated that in the latter situation, such weights were fractions and/or multiples of the Saxon pound.) F. G. Skinner mentions that weights on a 48 grain basis for series of 3, 5, 6, and 12 units (that is, from 144 up to 576 grains) have been found in the graves of two money-changers in Kent. These discoveries