Again, whilst no trace has as yet been found of obols at all in the archaic shape of rods, or anything approaching it, we find in Sicily at Agrigentum _litrae_ which are in form distinct survivals of an earlier stage when the litra, like the obol, was a rod or bar of copper. These are very strange looking lumps of bronze made in the shape of a tooth with a flat base, having on one side an eagle or eagle’s head and on the other a crab, while on the base are marks of value ⸬, ⸪, : (_tetras_, _trias_, _hexas_). The _uncia_ is almond-shaped with an eagle’s head on one side, and a crab’s claw on the other[422]. As we found the Chinese knife shrinking up into a shorter and thicker mass until at last it only survives in the round _cash_, so in all probability we here find the Sicilian litra in its mid course from its original full size and shape to that of the ordinary round copper coin of a later age. That the shape of the original copper unit of the Italians was that of a rod or bar we shall now proceed to demonstrate in the case of the Roman _as_. _The Italian System. Bronze._ As the cow formed the highest unit in the monetary system of ancient Italy, so the lowest unit employed was a certain amount of copper called an _as_. We have already found the cow serving the same purpose in Sicily (as late as the time of Dionysius forming the rateable unit at Syracuse). The systems of Further Asia, where the buffalo stands at the head of the scale and the hoe or a piece of raw metal of a certain size stands at the bottom, form a perfect analogy in modern times. As far as its value and divisional system go, we have identified the Sicilian litra with the ancient Hellenic obol or rod, and we have in turn discovered a very close resemblance between the divisions of the litra and that of the _as_. I now propose to examine into the original nature of this denomination, and the form of the object to which it was applied. This will have been effectually accomplished, if I can succeed in establishing the proposition _that the as was primarily a rod or bar of copper, one foot in length, divided into 12 parts, called inches (unciae), thus coinciding with the Greek obol in form, as also in its duodecimal division_. We must, as a preliminary, note carefully several most essential facts connected with the _as_: (1) The term _as_ (as used in respect of metals) is never employed for either gold or silver, but is appropriated to _bronze_ exclusively; (2) it is not the Roman unit of weight, for that is expressed by the general term _libra_, a word exactly corresponding to the Greek _Talanton_, since it means both the _weight_ and the _scales_; (3) the _as_ is not confined to weight, but is also employed as the unit of linear measure equal to the foot, and also as the unit of land measure equal to the _jugerum_ or acre. The following table exhibits the subdivisions of the _as_: