The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the English Nation — Volume 03Hakluyt, Richard
History
The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the English Nation — Volume 03
Hakluyt, Richard
Discoveries in geography -- English; Voyages and travels
Yet you must consider that their great weight is not full with ours: for I
take not their great pound to be full 13 ounces, but aboue 12 I thinke it
be. But for your iust proofe, weigh 6 Rubbles of Russia money with our
pound weight, and then shal you see what it lacketh: for 6 Rubbles of
Russia is by the Emperors standerd, the great pound: so that I thinke it
the next way to know the iust weight, as well of the great pound as of the
small.
There is another weight needfull to be knowen, which is the weight of
Wardhouse, for so much as they weigh all their drie fish by weight, which
weight is the Baesemar, as they of Russia doe vse, notwithstanding there is
another sorte in it: the names of those weights are these: the marke pound,
the great pound, the weie, and the shippond. The marke pound is to be
vnderstood as our pound, and their great pound is 24 of their marke pound:
the weie is 3 great pound, and 8 weie is a shippound.
Now concerning their measures. As they haue two sortes of weights, so they
haue also two sortes of measures: wherewith they measure cloth both linnen
and wollen: they cal the one an Areshine, and the other a Locut: the
Areshine I take to bee as much as the Flanders ell, and their Locut halfe
an English yard: with their Areshine they may mete all such sorts of
clothes as come into the land, and with the Locut all such cloth both
linnen and wollen, as they make themselues. And whereas we vse to giue yard
and inch, or yard and handfull, they do giue nothing but bare measure.
They haue also measure wherewith they doe mete their corne, which they cal
a Setforth, and the halfe of that an Osmine: this Setforth I take to bee
three bushels of London measure. And as for their drinke measure, they call
it a Spanne, which is much like a bucket, and of that I neuer saw any true
rate, but that some was greater then other some. And as for the measures of
Wardhouse wherewith they mete their cloth, there is no difference between
that and the measure of Danske, which is halfe an English ell.
Concerning the tolles and customs of Russia, it was reported to me in
Moscouia, that the Turkes and Armenians pay the tenth penie custome of all
the wares they bring into the Emperors land, and aboue that they pay for
all such goods as they weigh at the Emperours beame, two pence of the
Rubble, which the buyer or seller must make report to the Master of the
beame: they also pay a certaine horse toll, which is in diuers places of
his Realme four pence of a horse.
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