The AFU and Urban Legend Archive
Science
 weights measures




Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From: Geoff@vuepoint.demon.co.uk (Geoff Percival)
Subject: Re: A couple of questions...
Date: Thu, 5 Jan 1995 18:03:20 +0000

That may well be true in NZ, but here in the UK you can still get a stone of spuds - indeed, my local supermarket normally stocks them in stone and half-stone (7lb) bags.

I remember at school we learned the sequence of weights by chanting in unison:- 

16 ounces        - 1 pound
14 pounds        - 1 stone
 8 stone         - 1 hundredweight

20 hundredweight - 1 ton

Mind you, we also learned the sequence of length by chanting:-

12 inches - 1 foot
3 feet - 1 yard
5 1/2 yards - 1 rod, pole or perch
4 rods - 1 chain
10 chains - 1 furlong
8 furlongs - 1 mile
3 miles - 1 league

(the reference to 5 1/2 yards - 1 rod, pole or perch was later dropped, and the line then became 22 yards - 1 chain)

And, as I write this, a sense of my own antiquity overcomes me, as I realise that I am probably part of the last generation to know what to have used rods, chains, furlongs and leagues as real units of measure.


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