Archaic
Units of Measure
| Italians still
have to put up with a few old or foreign units of
measure such as the “barrel” of oil and the
21-inch (pollice)
TV screen, and snobbish Italian Sunday-sailors
still speak of “knots”. Italy, however, was one of
the 18 original signatories of the Metric
Convention in Paris in 1875, so people here have
been “metrified” for a long time. That leaves a
few holdouts such as Yours Truly, the USA and
Burma. (I admit I have trouble thinking in
“millimeters of rain”. (I know, I know—I can’t
even spell
“meter”.) |
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This is
a French clock from 1800 with the old
12-hour system as well as
the new revolutionary system of metric time.
Unlike the meter, decimal
time never made it out of the Revolution.
To my knowledge, the new time measurement
made absolutely no inroads in Naples in
spite of the presence for nine years of the
French under King Murat
during that period. (Metric
time didn't fare much better in France,
either.) That's fine with me; imagine
referring to the film High Noon
as High
Five.
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With the adoption of
the metric system, dozens of delightful units of
measurement were put out to pasture (up on the north 40, I
think—that’s about 16 hectares!) in Europe. The
geopolitical crazy quilt that was the Italian peninsula
until unification into a single nation in 1861 had
correspondingly disparate systems of measurement. The units of measure used in the
Kingdom of Naples (or the Kingdom
of the Two Sicilies) were particularly rich; some
were old Roman holdovers, and others developed quite
pragmatically through the Middle Ages, being used right up
until unification. I was made aware of that the other day
when I came across a reference in an old document to the Teatro nuovo in Naples, built in
1724; the theater had boxes that were so-and-so-many
“palms” wide. I had to look it up. One “palm” was equal to
about 0.26 meters. Spread your adult fingers as wide as
you can; from tip of thumb to tip of pinkie is about
right. That’s why they called it a “palm”. (Horses are
still measured in the English-speaking world in “hands.”
Horses measure us in “hooves”.)
Here are some other
units of measure from the old Neapolitan system. The list
is not exhaustive and ignores the changes in unit value
from time to time and the fact that the same term might
have variations depending on how and where it was used (in
the same way as the English system speaks of “statute
mile” and “nautical mile” or “US gallon” and “imperial
gallon”).
- acino:
a measure of weight = about 0.45 grams (or
0.016 ounces). The word, itself, means a
single “grape”; thus, it was used for light
weights.
- barile
(barrel): a measure of liquid volume still
used to measure petroleum, although today's
Joe Six-Pack doesn’t know how much “one
barrel” is except that it probably looks
like a barrel. In old Neapolitan usage, one
barile
contained 60 caraffe. One caraffa
was about 0.72 liters (about ¾ of a
quart). (Today's 1 barrel of oil = ca. 160
liters = ca. 42 US gallons/ca. 35 imperial
gallons. And it depends on the brewery, but
Joe's surname in the metric system is about
two liters.)
- botte:
A maritime unit for tonnage of vessels. It
was based on the botte, a wine container.
Roughly, one botte = about 500 liters;
it contained 12 barili (see above).
For purposes of measuring wine or vegetable
oil, two botti
(i.e. 1000 liters) made up one carro
(wagon). One botte was subdivided into
the salma
and the staio
in the same way as English measurement still
speaks of gallons being divided into quarts
and pints. One salma was ca. 160 liters
and, itself, was subdivided into 16 staia.
- braccio
(arm): Unit of linear measurement = about
half a meter. There was also a longer
maritime braccio
equal to ca. 1.6 meters.
- miglio
(mile): a Neapolitan mile was 1,000 paces;
that is, 7000 palms or about 1850 meters
(ca. 6,070 feet, curiously close to the
English nautical mile of 6,076 feet).
- lega
(league): not common in Naples, but if found
it probably referred to the Spanish unit (legua)=
ca. 2.6 miles. The unit was abolished in the
Spanish empire (which Naples was part of) in
1568.
- canna:
The standard unit of linear measurement in
commerce (measuring textiles, for example)
and construction. It was just over 2 meters
and was divided into 8 palmi (see
above).
- cantaro:
Unit of heavier weight common in maritime
usage = about 90 kilograms (almost 200
pounds). It was divided into rotoli
(plural of rotolo, see below).
- libbra
and oncia
(pound and ounce): Units of weight. There
were 12 ounces in the pound. The subdivision
of the ounce was the trappeso.
- passo:
The pace. A unit of linear measurement =
about 7 “palms” (above); i.e., just under 2
meters. There was an older maritime passo,
somewhat smaller.
- piede:
Foot. Approx. one English foot or 1/3 of a
meter.
- rotolo:
Unit of weight, somewhat lighter than 1
kilogram or a bit more than 2 pounds.
- tomolo:
A unit of measure for dry volume such as
grain = ca. 55 liters (about one and
one-half bushels).
- trappeso:
The smallest unit of weight in the old
Neapolitan system and defined as the 1/1000
part of a rotolo
or 1/20 of the acino.
Currency:
- Carlino.
These were silver and gold coins minted for
the monarch, Charles of Anjou, starting in
1278 in Naples at the beginning of the
Angevin (from Anjou) dynasty. The coin
was called a “carlino, ” a diminutive of Carlo/Charles.
The silver carlino used by the
Bourbons in the 18th and 19th centuries was
one-tenth of a ducato. Smaller coins than
the carlino
were the tarì,
grano,
tornese,
and cavallo.
These were silver or bronze. At the time of
the unification of Italy (1861), the
Neapolitan ducat was the unit used to
convert to the new Italian currency. The
exchange was 4.25 lira to 1 ducat. (Very
roughly, that would be a unit of about 10
euros, today.)
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Finally, if “I love you a bushel and a peck…,” how much do
I love you in cubic furlongs?
You may not use a calculator.
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