Chapter 26: On measures

1. Measure is the limiting of something in amount or time. It has to do with either corporeal substance or time. It has to do with corporeal substance as, for example, the length or shortness of men, pieces of timber, and columns; even the sun has a measure proper to its circle, which geometricians dare to inquire into. It has to do with time as, for example, hours, days, years; whence we say that we measure the feet of the hours.

2. But speaking in a limited sense, measure (_mensura_) is so named because by it fruits and grain are meted, that is, wet and dry measure, as _modius_ (peck), _artabo_ (three and half modi), _urna_ (pitcher), _amphora_ (jar).

10. _Modius_ (peck) is so named because after its own mode it is perfect. It is a measure of forty-four pounds, that is, of twenty-two _sextarii_. The cause of this number is derived from this, that in the beginning God made twenty-two works. For on the first day he made seven, that is, matter in the rough, angels, light, the upper heavens, earth, water, and air. On the second day, the firmament alone. On the third day, four things: the seas, seeds, sowing, and plantings. On the fourth day, three things: the sun and moon and stars. On the fifth day, three: fishes, and creeping things of the water, and flying creatures. On the sixth day, four: wild beasts, flocks, creeping things of the earth, and man. And in all twenty-two kinds were made in the six days. And there are twenty-two generations from Adam to Jacob, from whose seed sprang all the people of Israel, and twenty-two books of the Old Testament as far as Esther, and twenty-two letters of the alphabet out of which the doctrine of the divine law is composed. According to these precedents a modius of twenty-two _sextarii_ was established by Moses according to the measure of the holy law, and although different nations in their ignorance add weight to this measure or detract from it, still among the Hebrews it is kept unchanged by divine ordinance.

Chapter 27. Abbreviations for weights.

1. The marks for weight are unknown to most and thence they cause readers to err. So let us add their shapes and characters as they were set down by the ancients.[361]

[361] Twenty-one of these are named.