The units of length seem to have originally been anthropic based on various parts of the human body although these were standardized using cubit rods strands of rope and official measures maintained at some temples. Then when it was realised that several people wanted to measure at the same time they would line up slaves in order of foot size etc and pick several slaves whose feet were the same size.
Human Body
Ancient measurement using body parts. Your forearm from elbow to fingertip. Using your body to estimate length your hand. From nose to finger tip. The ancient chinese system completely separated from the mediterranean european history of metrology is that of ancient china yet the chinese system exhibits all the principal characteristics of the western. Each persons body part differed from another persons body part. Quinaria the cross sectional area of a pipe created from a flat sheet of lead 5 digits wide stremma the amount of land a person can plow in a day.
It employed parts of the body as a source of unitsfor example the distance from the pulse to the base of the thumb. Your forearm is about 15 feet 46 centimeters. For an average adult male at least average as of a couple of millennia ago a cubit works out to about 18 inches 457cm. At first the poor guy whose body was decided to be used for measurement would have his arm foot etc amputated and that would be passed around. Egyptians mainly used their cubits to measure objects. Ancient people measured objects using different body parts.
Ancient measurement of length was based on the human body for example the length of a foot the length of a stride the span of a hand and the breadth of a thumb. There were unbelievably many different measurement systems developed in early times most of them only being used in a small locality. The ancient egyptian units of measurement are those used by the dynasties of ancient egypt prior to its incorporation in the roman empire and general adoption of roman greek and byzantine units of measurement. This is called non standard measurements. Eight body based units of measurement before we had precise standardized units of measure such as meters and feet lengths and even ocasionally volumes were reckoned based on the average dimensions of human body parts. An average foot is about 12 inches long.
At some point years ago i picked up the seemingly useless piece of information that an ancient unit of measurement called the cubit was the distance from the elbow to the tip of the middle finger. The distance between your nose. The width of your palm is about 4 inches 10 centimeters. Following alexander the greats conquest of persia and subsequent de.
Gallery of Ancient Measurement Using Body Parts
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