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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;EWC3, post: 3784898, member: 93416&quot;]Yes.&nbsp;&nbsp; Especially important in probate - the sharing out of a legacy etc, but of course in connection with a 12 ounce pound. As best I recall the Romans invented a 12 ounce pound, then it got carried on in Islam, Italy and England etc,</p><p><br /></p><p>However, just before the extract I quoted Horace talks about how in the old days pupils divided the As into 100 parts.&nbsp; The only way I can make sense of that is he is really thinking about the Greeks dividing the Attic Mina into 100 (drachms) and he is also thinking of the heavy old As weighing a libra, but erroneously thinking a mina was a libra.&nbsp; Anyone see a plan B on that?</p><p><br /></p><p>Speaking in general, my personal view, there are two very basic cultures with number, those who keep written records who tend to like decimal structures, and those who weigh real stuff who prefer binary (pounds and ounces).&nbsp; Duodecimal is a kind of compromise position…….</p><p><br /></p><p>The Eastern part of the Roman empire inherited decimal systems from Greeks, Phoenicians and Egyptians, and it seems to me never really threw them off.&nbsp; I think we start to see that decimal stuff creep back in for instance when Diocletian makes one new ‘real’ denarius (argentus) equal 100 old ‘book’ ones (hope I got that right).</p><p><br /></p><p>But we do find strong binary structures in Roman coins too:</p><p><br /></p><p>quadrans x 4 = as x 4 = sestertius x 4 = denarius&nbsp; (Augustus - I think)</p><p><br /></p><p>Perhaps the weirdest thing is that the Greeks, Romans and ourselves still use Babylonian base 60 for time, (hours, minutes, seconds) – no change for more than 4,000 years it seems.</p><p><br /></p><p>Any how, apologies if anyone saw the below before – but there is more stuff like this here:</p><p><br /></p><p><a href="https://www.academia.edu/s/db1878a859/puzzles-about-roman-weight-standards" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.academia.edu/s/db1878a859/puzzles-about-roman-weight-standards" rel="nofollow">https://www.academia.edu/s/db1878a859/puzzles-about-roman-weight-standards</a></p><p><br /></p><p>In case of interest - I just set up discussion session on the paper – link should be here:</p><p><br /></p><p><a href="https://www.academia.edu/s/db1878a859/puzzles-about-roman-weight-standards?source=link" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.academia.edu/s/db1878a859/puzzles-about-roman-weight-standards?source=link" rel="nofollow">https://www.academia.edu/s/db1878a859/puzzles-about-roman-weight-standards?source=link</a></p><p><br /></p><p>(Let me know if you try but this fails)</p><p><br /></p><p>Rob T[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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