1. The Channel Islands

These measures are the connecting links between those of old France, through Normandy, and those of England, especially in land-measures. Normandy had a system of measures kept in fair unity by the English dukes of Normandy.

‘Thanks to their firm administration the English system was generally marked by a scientific regularity which, notwithstanding its complication, is in remarkable contrast with the barbarous French system.’^[33]

For England had already, at the Norman Conquest, a good system in which weight, wine-measure, corn-measure, and linear measure were co-related; albeit this co-relation, under the influence of the royal mint pound, was forgotten for many centuries, and is indeed scarcely known at present.

But Northern France and Normandy had no such co-related system. Southern France had an excellent system, indeed that of Marseilles was perfect; while Paris, taking its measures from the South, destroyed their co-ordination and was careless of their standards.

None of the Paris series had any simple relation. So it was in Normandy, where the systems of North and South were mixed with Teutonic measures.

The original Norman perch, like that of England,

probably Rhineland feet, but perches of 20, 22 and 24 Paris feet, often of reduced Paris feet, superseded it. The Acre was always 4 VergÉes or roods, nearly always of 40 square perches, and divided into quarters.

The charuÉe, caruÉe or ploughland was usually 60 Normandy acres, divided into 12 bouvÉes or oxgangs, each of 5 acres or 20 vergÉes.

Corn-measure had for principal unit the Bushel, 8 of which made a Quarter, a quarter of a horse-load or, if large, of a cartload. The bushel was, or appeared usually to be, a multiple of the Pot; this led to divergencies according to the number of pots taken; yet it seems probable that the Pot was itself a fraction, an eighth, a tenth, a twelfth, or a sixteenth of some bushel either wine-measure or corn-measure.

While the weights and measures of Paris had established themselves in Rouen and Caen, local measures more in agreement with Norman customs were in general use. Thus the Paris bushel = 793 cubic inches was scarcely used. A typical Norman measure was the Boisseau Étalon de l’abbaye de JumiÈges, containing, as nearly as I could measure, 1648 cubic inches. Now this is very approximately a cubic foot of the reduced Paris 11-inch standard usual in Normandy, akin to the 11-inch foot of Jersey. This cubic foot was very nearly the Roman cubic foot or Quadrantal; for the reduced Paris foot, = 11·72 English inches, was very nearly the same as the quarter of the aune, which was 4 Roman feet very approximately.

There was another standard Bushel—the Boisseau Étalon de la Ville de Bolbec—containing, as nearly as I could measure, 2534 cubic inches.

There is also a peculiar measure for apples, the barattÉe or churnful, usually of 25 pots.

In Normandy as in the rest of France weights were not related to measures. It was always known what was the usual weight of corn in the bushel; thus the Paris bushel was supposed to hold 20 French pounds of wheat.

Some heavy pounds, brought possibly by the Normans, disappeared gradually before the Paris Troy pound. Wool-weight brought from England was used; the sack being 36 stone of 9 French pounds or about 350 averdepois pounds.

Such was the system of measures and weights used in Normandy, and surviving there in great part. The slightly differing systems of the Channel Islands are simply variants of this system, a rough sketch of which I have given by way of introduction to them.

Jersey and Guernsey (the latter including Alderney and Sark in its government) are each practically autonomous. The Islanders keep their Norman laws, customs and dialects, and retain their systems of measures, weights and currency. These are being gradually modified by increased intercourse with England; and French influence tries hard, especially in Jersey, to introduce the metric system.

Linear and Land Measures

1. Jersey.—For ordinary linear measures the English standards are used, the yard and the pied du roi; that is the English foot. There is also an ancient ell of 4 feet.

For land measure the Jersey foot is 11 English inches (but divided into 12 land-inches); and 24 of these feet make a perch = 22 English feet. This peculiar standard is evidently an adaptation of the Norman custom (which prevailed in France) of making 24 short feet of either a quarter aune, or 11 pouces, the perch or verge, which became officially the perche d’ordonnance of 22 French feet.

The Jersey VergÉe or rood is 40 square perches = 0·44 acre.

2. Guernsey.—The linear measures are based on the English standards. They were, in 1611:

The perch or verge is 21 feet; probably an approximate adaptation of the common perch of 20 French feet = 21·3 English feet. It is the same as the Irish and Lancashire rod.

The verge or rood is 40 square perches = 0·4 acre.

The acre-unit is not used now in either island.

The bouvÉe (bovate) of 20 vergÉes, and caruÉe (carucate) of 12 bouvÉes remain only in manorial records.

Measures of Capacity

1. Jersey.—The standard ordered in 1754, and confirmed in 1771, is the Cabot, defined as containing 10 Pots.

The Pot contains 123·56 cubic inches = 0·445 Imperial gallon. It does not correspond directly to the Paris pot = 111 cubic inches or 0·41 gallon, nor apparently to the various Normandy pots, of which that of Caen, about Paris standard, is the type. It is simply one-tenth of the Cabot.

The Cabot, a common name in Normandy for a corn-measure, is for wheat and for wine, cider, &c. A larger cabot, for barley and other light grain, is one-third larger, containing 13-1/3 pots; another, for coal, contains 14 pots. Lime and charcoal are measured by the cask of 120 Pots, i.e. 6 bushels of 20 pots. For a double cabot is usually called a bushel.

The Cabot = 1235·6 cubic inches, and containing 4·456 gallons, coincides nearly with one-eighth of the Paris Setier = 4·29 bushels, and also with the Panau or Eimino, 1/8 of the Marseilles Cargo of 4·34 bushels.

It is divided into 6 Sixtonniers.

For wine, cider, &c., it is divided into gallons (double pots, 1/5 cabot), pots, quarts and pints.

A double cabot is the bushel. The duodecimal division of the Paris Setier and the division (in the corresponding wheat-water series) of the Quartant into 9 veltes, prevent the relations of the Jersey measures with those of Paris being clearly seen. But the relations with the Marseilles standards, corn and wine, from which the Paris standards were taken, are evident. It will be seen in the chapter on the Old Measures of France that the Paris Setier was derived, through the Marseilles Cargo, from the Egyptian Rebekeh, which is the cubed cubit of Al-Mamun.

The Cabot has been stated (Ansted, ‘Channel Islands,’ 1862) to contain 43 lb. 7 oz. of water. On this estimate = 4·344 gallons, it is exactly the Marseilles Eimino.

N.B.—The Escandau is the Panau diminished in wheat-water ratio. The Jersey pot is the fluid measure in wheat-water ratio with 1/8 cabot.

There seems no doubt that the cabot is the eighth of the setier (and of the Cargo), slightly variant, as the Jersey pound is a variant of the Paris pound.

There is also a measure for apples = 3·77 bushels or 30 gallons. The ordinary barattÉe (churnful) of apples in Normandy is 25 pots = 10 gallons.

The larger Cabot for barley and other grains except wheat was to be = 1-1/3 of the wheat cabot, that is 13-1/3 pots; it was therefore = 5·933 gallons, very nearly 3/4 an imperial bushel = 1647 c.i. Was it fixed at this size to hold approximately the same weight of barley, &c., as the smaller cabot held of wheat, or was it the Boisseau de JumiÈges = 1648 c.i. approximately? That I cannot say. But the question is of some importance historically, for Guernsey adopted a bushel of about this capacity, the lineage of which is a matter of considerable interest.

2. Guernsey.—In 1582, also in 1611, the Guernsey bushel was ordered to be 16 inches diameter and 8 inches deep; it was to hold 13 pots and a quart. The pot was not defined: at the end of the seventeenth century it is recorded to be equal to 121 cubic inches. On this basis the bushel should be 1633 cubic inches, but according to the dimensions ordered it contains only 1608 cubic inches. This is evidently one of the cases where the wish to order a measure of simple dimensions has caused the standard to deviate practically from its calculated value. There is considerable doubt as to the capacity of the pot, the original standard of which is not extant. But from the definition of the Guernsey bushel as 13-1/2 pots of approximately 121 cubic inches, it would seem that this was considered as roughly equivalent to the 13-1/3 pots, each 123-1/2 cubic inches, of the Jersey barley-bushel = 1647 c.i.

The bushel is divided, on its calculated capacity of 13-1/2 pots, = 1631 c.i., into

The Denerel is thus, probably by mere coincidence, exactly the old corn-gallon, and the bushel is 6 corn-gallons.

The word Denerel means ‘standard’ in the sense of the standard coin or pattern piece, the Denerial or Deneral, to which the French moneyers had to strike deniers or silver pence. We may confer with this term the Marseilles Escandau, meaning ‘standard,’ a measure = 3·54 gallons, the basis of a whole system of measures.

But if the bushel were based on another measure than the obsolete pot—on a standard still extant in the Sheriff’s Office, the

it would be of larger capacity. For the Quinte, I found when I measured it in 1885, is approximately 54·7 cubic inches, and it is stated to contain fully 32 ounces of water. As it happens to be equal to a fifth of the imperial gallon, the Denerel should be equal to an imperial gallon, and the bushel to 6 gallons.

There are two other bushels:

The Coal-bushel (1611) of 18-1/2 inches diameter, by 8 deep, then stated to be equal to 16-3/4 pots (an evident mistake, in Roman numerals, for 17-3/4 pots) and containing an English corn-bushel.

The Barley-bushel, 1625 and 1673, to contain 17-1/2 pots; of such size that it should hold, striked, as much as the wheat-bushel held when heaped. Its calculated capacity is 2117·5 c.i. = 7·63 gallons.

Wine-Measures

These have assimilated themselves in the course of trade to those of the countries of exportation, but the fluid measures of the islands still subsist for cider and other liquors. The Jersey gallon is, or was, 2 pots = 247 c.i. The Guernsey gallon is, or was, 1/8 of the bushel = 252 c.i. or perhaps 2 pots = 242 c.i.

Both are somewhat over the old English wine-gallon.

Weights

The Jersey pound, = 7561 grains, is 7 grains over the old French pound; 104 pounds make a cwt. = 112·3 lb.

The Guernsey pound, = 7623 grains, differs by only 2 grains from the Amsterdam pound; 100 Guernsey pounds = 108·9 lb.

There is a tradition that this pound was originally 18 ounces of Rouen weight, reduced in 1730 to 16 ounces. But it is not 16 ounces of any weight but that of Amsterdam. It may have been originally 16 ounces of some heavy pound with an ounce of about 530 grains, akin to the Austrian and Russian ounce; then converted into 18 lighter ounces, and afterwards 16 ounces were taken for the pound. In the seventeenth century it is recorded as being 18 ounces of 471 grains, which is approximately the Paris standard = 472·1 grains. In 1730 it was ordered to be of 16 ounces, but of what standard there is no evidence. And in the nineteenth century it is 16 ounces of 476·6 grains, almost exactly the Amsterdam standard. It looks as if the change in 1730 was to 16 ounces of another standard, Amsterdam Troy, instead of French Troy.

I have given some space to these Channel Island measures, so interesting as a survival of Norman measures and as a link between the measures of old France and of England. The peculiar monetary system of Guernsey will be given in Chapter XIII.

2. South Africa (Cape Colony)

Here we find two systems, those of Holland and of England, used according to public convenience, and combined as far as possible. The linear standard is Rhineland; the foot = 12·356 inches. The rod is 12 Rhineland feet; the English mile is reckoned as 426 rods.

The land-unit is the Morgen = 2·12 acres, of 600 square rods.

Weights are now Imperial; with a cental-cwt., and a ton of 20 centals or 2000 lb.

For corn measures, Imperial and Dutch measures are combined in the Mud of 3 bushels or 4 Schepels.

For fluid measure the unit is the Anker = 7·95 gallons, a lower standard than the Amsterdam anker = 8·5 gallons, probably through the influence of English measure. The Legger (leaguer) is 126·6 gallons, in 4 Aam, 16 Anker and 80 Velts. This gives the Velt somewhat a lower standard than in Java, where the legger = 127·34 gallons, and the velt = 1·59 gallons.

3. India

Of the measures and weights of India, a country containing one-fifth of the population of the world, divided into many nationalities, only a slight sketch can be given, and that chiefly of the measures used in British India as distinguished from the tributary states. The measures of the Aryan population of Hindustan, and those of the Dravidian peoples of peninsular India, are different; moreover the influence of the Moslem conquerors, Mogul and Pathan, of the Portuguese in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, of the English in more modern times, has modified these measures.

As in other Eastern countries the linear unit is usually a cubit, the hÁstha or hÁth, divided into 24 digits. Traces of the Egyptian increased cubit are to be found. In a classical work on architecture, the MÁnasÁra, the HÁstha, of 24 digits for timber, is increased to 25 for temples, to 26 for houses, to 27 for municipal buildings and land. The addition of 3 digits to the 24 of the Egyptian common cubit would give 27 digits, approximately equal to the 28 smaller digits of the royal cubit.

In Southern India the cubit is sometimes the muyangÁl (muyam, cubit; kÁl, leg), the length from the knee to the ankle.

In Malabar the unit is the Kol = 28-1/4 inches as used for timber; but for land it seems to have increased to 30 inches.

The kol was probably 3 spans or half-cubits of 9·41 inches.

A guz brought by the Moslems, = 33 inches, has established itself in Bengal. It was probably 3 BelÁdi feet of 10·944 inches.

The Portuguese Covado of 3 spans = 27·17 inches, usually taken as 27 inches, has established itself in Western India. It is divided into 48 digits, of which two-thirds, i.e. 32 digits = 18 inches, are the usual cubit; 1/8 of this = the English nail.

All these measures appear to have been modified by the English foot and inch.

Native itinerary measures are rough and variable; the Koss of 100 fathoms is the usual standard.

Land-measures are of course very variable.

12 guz, usually = 33 feet, make a cord or chain, and 5 cords make a Jarib = 10 rods. A square jarib = 100 square rods, is the usual Bigha of Northern India = O·625 acre.

Another unit is the Mah of 100 rods 12 × 12 feet = 1600 square yards, about half the above bigha.

Land-units, like most other units, can be divided into 16 annas, so that the anna of the bigha is 200, that of the Mah is 100, square yards.

In Madras the unit of land measure is the KÁni (cawny) = 1-1/3 acre of 24 grounds = 6400 square yards. So there appears to be a common unit of about 1600 square yards, with its anna or sixteenth = 100 square yards or 10 yards square.

Five kÁni make a VÉli, the usual extent of arable land which can be cultivated for rice or other wet crops by a peasant with a yoke of oxen.

Everywhere there are seed-measures of land, as in other countries.

Weights

These are derived from a coin-weight basis, the silver rupee-weight or Tola in most parts, the golden pagoda-weight or Varahan in the south of India. In each case 80 of these coin-units made a SÉr. (See Indian Coinage, in Chap. XIII.)

The Bombay sÉr was based on another gold coin, the tanc (gold) of a little over 68 grains, 72 of which = 4900 grains.

The Bengal sÉr is, curiously enough, = 2 Cologne pounds of 7200 grains. It is divided into 16 chittaks or double ounces of 5 tolas. The tola is divided into 12 mashas (= 15 grains) of 8 rÁti (the red seed of Abrus precatoria): 40 sÉr make a mÁnd = 82·28 lb.

This sÉr (Ang. seer), the Government standard, is really a Troy weight. The rupee of different standard in the three presidencies was fixed in 1833 at 180 grains, 3 drachms of the Troy ounce; this being so, the sÉr of 80 rupees weight is = 30 Troy ounces and the mÁnd of 40 sÉrs is = 1200 Troy ounces or 100 Troy pounds.

About 1870-72 the metric propaganda was epidemic among Indian Government Engineers; light railways were made on metre-gauge, and a nearly successful attempt was made to get the sÉr fixed at one kilogramme. An Act was about to be passed to this effect when the death of Lord Mayo stopped it, and the Act fell through.

The Bengal sÉr and mÁnd^[34] are the usual weights for official purposes. Some other sÉrs are used, often of low standard known as Kucha sÉrs (unripe, half-baked) in regard to the pukka (ripe, full-measure) sÉr of 80 tolas.

The Madras mÁnd was = 24·68 lb.; 20 mÁnd = 1 kÁndi, 493·7 lb.; but English trade considered the mÁnd as 25 lb. and the ‘candy’ as 500 lb.

Madras had also a weight called the VÍsham (Ang. Viss) of 120 tolas = 5 of its sÉrs, or 3·086 lb. divided into 40 pollams.

Capacity

To this Madras weight corresponds the AdangÁli, dangÁli or puddi, or measure containing a vÍsham of grain, and therefore a pound-pint measure = about 3 pints. It is the usual measure of the daily grain-wage of agricultural labourers.

Similarly in other parts of India, the sÉr measure contains a sÉr weight of the usual food grain.

The measure is usually heaped, and whether sÉr or dangÁli it delivers approximately either a sÉr or a vÍsham of the usual grains, rice, wheat, millet, pulse, &c. It is a pound-pint measure, avoiding the use of the balance. The Madras Government wanted to fix the dangÁli at 100 cubic inches, but this would have been useless as not delivering a vÍsham. The necessary capacity to deliver a vÍsham of water is found by 3·086 lb. × 27·725 to be 85·76 cubic inches. Increased in the Southern water-wheat ratio of 1:1·22, we have 104·62 cubic inches as the true dangÁli measure. So Government allowed 104-1/4 cubic inches, and this was about the capacity of a dangÁli 8 inches high by 4 inches diameter, often a section of bamboo cut down to the proper capacity.

In Madras, the dangÁli, puddi or measure is then = 104-1/4 c.i. divided into 8 ollocks; and 8 dangÁli = 1 MercÁl; 424 mercÁls, = 120 Bengal mÁnds, made a Garce, which is a Government measure for salt = 4·4 tons.

The cubic measure used in Southern India for dry goods, such as lime, is the Parah = 5 mercÁls = 5 × 8 dangÁli, or 4000 cubic inches at 100 c.i. to the dangÁli: but 4184 c.i. at the customary capacity of that measure; so the parah is = 15 gallons.

The Bombay parah = 4-1/2 gallons.

The Ceylon parah = 5·6 gallons; 8 parah = 1 amÓmam = 5·6 bushels.

To the amÓmam of grain corresponds the amÓmam of land, which, at 2 bushels seed to the acre, = 2·8 acres. By measurement it is 2·74 acres.

4. Burma and the Straits

In Burma, as in the ancient Eastern Kingdoms, there was a common cubit and a royal cubit. The former, = 19-1/2 inches, was of 24 digits, in 3 taim or handshafts; the latter = 22 inches. Here we have repeated the two Hindu hÁstha of 24 and 27 digits; the royal cubit being almost exactly 27/24 of the common cubit.

The basis of weight is the Tikal (shekel), = 252 grains (= 1 cubic inch of water), divided into 4 moo, = 63 grains, and 16 gyi of 15-3/4 grains (corresponding to the Indian masha), of 8 rati.

100 tikal = 1 piet-tha = 3·6 lb., corresponding to the Indian vÍsham.

The principal measure of capacity is the teng or basket, somewhat less than a bushel; it contains 16 piet of rice = 57·6 pound-pints.

The tikal of Siam = 234 grains; 80 tikal = 1 catty = 2-2/3 lb.; 50 catty = 1 pikal, = 133-3/4 lb., or about 2 bushels of rice.

The Pikal (i.e. man’s load) of Singapore (and of China) = 133-1/3 lb., is of 100 catty; the catty = 1-1/3 lb. of 16 taels = 1-1/3 oz. The tael is of 10 mace; the mace is a Chinese coin-weight = 58-1/3 grain, the representative of the Greek and Asiatic drachma in the Far East.

The pikal of Java = 135·63 lb., similarly divided.

The hyak-kin or pikal of Japan = 132-1/2 lb. It is also of 100 catty or kin = 1·325 lb. of 16 × 10 momme, the latter a weight equivalent to the mace = 58 grains; and 10 × 10 momme make another unit, the hyaku-me = 5797 grains.

I refrain from doing more than giving a glance at the weights and measures of the Far East; suffice it to say that most of them have every appearance of being Arabic in origin.

5. Canada and Mauritius

Canada

The Imperial system is used, but the Cental replaces the long Cwt. and its stone divisions.

In the old French districts of Quebec certain old French measures are lawful: the Paris foot, the perch, usually of 20 feet, the Arpent of 100 perches.

The Minot, of 3 boisseaux = 1·073 bushel, is still used.

Mauritius

This island, formerly a French colony, retained the old French measures and weights: the Paris foot, the Toise, the Mille of 1000 toises = 1·21 mile, the Perch, usually of 18 feet, the Arpent of 100 perches, the French livre, the corn-setier, the wine-setier or Velte = 1·639 gallon.

The Metric system was substituted in 1876, notwithstanding that ‘the feeling of a great portion of the community was so strongly against it that in 1882 it was thought to be not improbable that the British Imperial weights and measures might be reverted to’ (‘Merchants’ Handbook,’ by W. A. Browne, 1899). It is added that this antagonistic feeling gradually died out, but evidence on this point would be desirable.