THE EARLY WEIGHTS AND MEASURES OF MANKIND.
The Early Weights and Measures of Mankind. By Sir Charles Warren. (Palestine Exploration Fund. 7s. 6d.)— Mankind's earliest standards of mensuration were based on the human body. " The natural standard of length, used from the earliest times, is the height of a man, or the stretch of his arms from middle finger-tip to middle finger-tip, called a fathom." The cubit was a quarter-fathom, and the modern English foot is the sixth part of a fathom. Naturally this IMO a changeable standard, which varied from tribe to tribe. The modern metre, as a given fraction of the earth's diameter, is a more definite unit : and even that may one day be replaced by a standard based on some physical constant, such as the length of a particular wave of light. In this extremely learned discourse on early weights and measures Sir Charles Warren has performed a task which will be of the greatest assistance to all students of early history.
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