(    i6o   )
 

CHAPTER  XV,

NOTES ON HINDU METROLOGY, INTENDED TO FACILITATE
THE UNDERSTANDING OF ALL KINDS OF MEASURE¬
MENTS   WHICH   OCCUR  IN  THIS   BOOK.

The Hindu   COUNTING is innate to man.    The measure of a thing

system of                                                     ..                            -i-i              i

weights. becomes known by its being compared with another
thing which belongs to the same species and is assumed
as a unit by general consent. Thereby the difference
between the object and this standard becomes known.

By weighing, people determine the amount of gravity
of heavy bodies, when the tongue of the scales stands
at right angles on the horizontal plane, Hindus want
the scales very little, because their dirhctms are deter¬
mined by number, not by weight, and their fractions,
too, are simply counted as so-and-so many/ifZus. The
coinage of both dirhams and fitlils is different accord¬
ing to towns and districts. They weigh gold with the
scales only when it is in its natural state or such as
has been worked, e.g. for ornaments, but not coined.
They use as a weight of gold the suvarna—i^ tola.
They use the tola as frequently as we use the mithkdl.
According to what I have been able to learn from them,
it corresponds to three of our dirhams, of which lo
equal 7 7nithkdl.

Therefore i tola = 2^^ of our mithkdl.

The greatest fraction of a tola is yV, called mdsha.
Therefore 16 mdsha—i suvarna.