![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Sep. 26th, 2010 06:59 pmHappiness is an afternoon listening to jazz in good company followed by a good dose of nineteenth century French books. My favourite of the books was put out by M. Fort, aine* of St-Pons, upon the request of the Prefect following advice from the Commission of Weights and Measures. The book was published in Thermidor an XIII. The Napoleonic weights and measures stuck, but fortunately the datings system didn't. 'Thermidor' is a frightfully ugly name for a month, I've always thought.
What this book gives me, listed beautifully (with explanations of how to calculate across systems, for those who are arithmetically challenged) is a list of the ancient weights and measures for the whole region and also for specific places. Saint-Guilhem-le-Desert is one of the places, and the few lines devoted to its seteree, setier, muid and charge d'huile explains vast amounts about its produce and trade and links in the region. In other words, it gives me a bunch of understanding of how my town fitted into the region. I also have information on cannes, pans, menus, toises, pieds, pouces, lignes (which can be squared and cubed - a cubed line is 0.000000011 of a square metre, in case you were wondering), quintals, livres, onces, grosses** and grains.
I am almost well-informed.
*add the accents mentally, if you would be so kind - I'm not sure how to create them on LJ
**I love it that there is a measurement that is 'gros'. I can see myself walking into a shop and calmly ordering 3 bigs of something.
What this book gives me, listed beautifully (with explanations of how to calculate across systems, for those who are arithmetically challenged) is a list of the ancient weights and measures for the whole region and also for specific places. Saint-Guilhem-le-Desert is one of the places, and the few lines devoted to its seteree, setier, muid and charge d'huile explains vast amounts about its produce and trade and links in the region. In other words, it gives me a bunch of understanding of how my town fitted into the region. I also have information on cannes, pans, menus, toises, pieds, pouces, lignes (which can be squared and cubed - a cubed line is 0.000000011 of a square metre, in case you were wondering), quintals, livres, onces, grosses** and grains.
I am almost well-informed.
*add the accents mentally, if you would be so kind - I'm not sure how to create them on LJ
**I love it that there is a measurement that is 'gros'. I can see myself walking into a shop and calmly ordering 3 bigs of something.