MEN AND MEASURES ------------------------------------------------------------------------ MEN AND MEASURES A HISTORY OF WEIGHTS AND MEASURES ANCIENT AND MODERN BY EDWARD NICHOLSON, F.I.C., F.C.S. SURGEON LIEUT.-COLONEL ARMY MEDICAL DEPARTMENT AUTHOR OF ‘A MANUAL OF INDIAN OPHIOLOGY’ ‘THE STORY OF OUR WEIGHTS AND MEASURES’ ‘FLOURETO DE PROUVÈNÇO’ ETC. LONDON SMITH, ELDER & CO., 15 WATERLOO PLACE 1912 [All rights reserved] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ERRATA. _Page_ 36 _Line_ 21 _For_ “×1000” _Read_ “×7000.” „ 136 „ 21 „ “grams” „ “grains.” „ 148 „ 27 „ “7925” „ “7625.” „ 154 _Lines_ 21, 22, 23 _delete_ “to.” „ 155 _Line_ 4 _For_ “feet” _Read_ “ells.” „ 195 „ 15 „ “17” „ “25.” „ 198 „ 19 „ “double” „ “halve.” „ 263 „ 13 „ “perches” „ “toises.” „ 295 „ 16 „ “apposes” „ “opposes.” „ 306 _Last line_ „ “our” „ “yours.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------ PREFACE This history is the development of a short story of the Imperial System of Weights and Measures published eleven years ago, but withdrawn when this fuller work took shape. To have made it at all complete would have required a long lifetime of research; to give and discuss every authority, to trace, even to acknowledge, every source of information would have unduly swollen the volume and slackened the interest of the narrative. I offer it with all its shortcomings as an attempt to show the metric instincts of man everywhere and in all time, to trace the origins and evolution of the main national systems, to explain the apparently arbitrary changes which have affected them, to show how the ancient system used by the English-speaking peoples of the world has been able, not only to survive dangerous perturbations in the past, but also to resist the modern revolutionary system which has destroyed so many others less homogeneous, less capable of adaptation to circumstances. E. N. _Feb. 1912._ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ TABLE OF CONTENTS