Ancient Weights

The identification of weights and weight-regulated artefacts is of primary importance for confirming the existence of European Bronze Age value ratios and exchange systems. Until recently, however, no such Bronze Age artefacts had been identified in Britain. Here, statistical analysis identifies-for the first time-Middle and Late Bronze Age balance weights and weight-regulated gold objects from Britain, Ireland and Atlantic France. These finds allow for new interpretations concerning modes of exchange and their significance in Atlantic Europe, further underlining a Continental-and possibly Mediter-ranean-influence on Britain during the late second and early first millennia BC.

In this article, I am tracing the early history of the use of sealing in the Aegean and Western Anatolia and this is followed by a similar analysis of weights.
The intention of this undertaking is:
1. to demonstrate that we have archaeological evidence of seal use in the first half of the third millennium through a small number of seal impressions on clay lumps which were intended to seal something, probably in a similar way as we know occurred at sites such as Lerna in the second half of the third millennium BC,
2. to use this and the increasing evidence of the later third millennium to argue that seal use became an important part of the economic organisation of the EBA societies in the Aegean,
3. to establish that the first evidence for the use of weights started during this same broad period of time in the earlier third millennium BC,
4. to emphasise the fact that both economic strategies are frequently found together at EBA settlements.

One can well defi ne the basic forms of materiality of an object by its dimensions or
its size and weight. Weight, in particular, is crucial for the determination of the
value of goods in most economic transactions. Even in modern technological and
market economy society, there are circumstances under which weight itself is not
routinely controlled. This form of “loose materiality” of things largely depends on
another way of defining the proper quantity to be involved in economic processes,
that of “ portioning .”
The portioning process will be investigated using ethnoarchaeology, here
assumed as the study of living contexts, and activities, in order to explore their
material correlates (Longacre 1991 ). Furthermore, terms and definitions from
Michael Schiffer’s “behavioral archaeology” have been borrowed (Schiffer 1976 ;
Schiffer (ed.) 1995 ). While the case study is of affluent contemporary Italian society,
a significant input for its implementation comes from ongoing research into past
Bronze and Iron Age Mediterranean use of weight as a more or less precise descriptor
of the quantity of exchanged and used metals.

Balance weights have not received much attention
within the archaeology of ancient Egypt. Weights
dating from the Middle Kingdom are mainly flat
and rectangular; the common unit is called dbn and
weighs c. 13–14 grams. The metrological system
changed in the New Kingdom to a dbn of c. 90–95
grams, subdivided into ten qdt. Not only the system
but also shape and material were subject to change
as weights dating to the New Kingdom are often
sphendonoids and frequently consist of dark iron oxide
as a distinctive material, not used in Egypt for weights
before the Second Intermediate Period. As such shapes
and material were common for weights in Syria and
Mesopotamia since the Early Bronze Age, it is a likely
hypothesis that the fundamental change in Egypt can
be linked to the rule of the Hyksos. This assumption
is further supported by the fact that the dbn of the
New Kingdom, divided by twelve, corresponds with
the ‘Syrian shekel’ of c. 9–9.5 g. This weight unit
was widely used in the eastern Mediterranean and
facilitated international trade in the Late Bronze Age.
Excavations at Tell el-Dabʿa/Avaris produced about 50
weights dating to the Second Intermediate Period and
the early New Kingdom. They are made of iron oxide,
are often sphendonoids and confirm the use of shekel
weighing system, both ‘Syrian’ and ‘Mesopotamian’
(c. 8.1–8.5 grams). One assemblage, consisting of two
sets of weights, derived from a richly furnished tomb
in Area A/I, dating to the Hyksos period (Stratum D/3,
Middle Bronze Age IIB–C). As the tombs of this area
remained unpublished, they are introduced entirely
within the scope of this article. The weights from Tell
el-Dabʿa contribute to the understanding of the time
of the Hyksos as a period in which many innovations
reached Egypt from the east, and consisted not only
of tools for warfare (e.g., chariot, composite bow), but
also of tools for trade.

Surely, ‘money is one of the most timeless, all-pervading, and arbitrary inventionsin human history’ (Haselgrove and Krmnicek 2012, 235), yet it is possible to differentiate three different stages of monetary use and the estimation of value. Exchange is considered as the key to assessing the precise value of commodities. Hence it is of primary importance to understand how exchange was conducted. During the first stage, which began at an uncertain date within the Stone Age, various substances were considered as valuables and could have functioned as some form of currency, yet their range was limited by many factors, not least by social constraints. This was still very much the case during the Copper Age, even if metals now offered new and fantastic possibilities for defining value and creating money. On present evidence it cannot
be established whether objects standardised by size (aes formatum) existed on a large scale at this period. A relationship between value and mass was apparently not yet established. Only in the Bronze Age did the invention of weights and scales enable such a nexus, marking the second stage. This step created a highly precise medium for exchange, as a method of payment and a standard of value. Metal was clearly now a currency. These innovations were more revolutionary than the appearance of coins in the Iron Age, the threshold of the third stage of fundamental monetary developments.

La mesure est un fait social et un objet historique dont l’étude relève de l’histoire des savoirs et des techniques, de l’histoire économique, mais aussi de l’histoire institutionnelle et politique, car pour être opératoires, les mesures doivent être communes à des groupes, aux différentes échelles des sociétés ou des territoires. L’étude de la mesure et de ses usages dans l’Antiquité ne peut se passer de la documentation archéologique, dont cet ouvrage collectif, issu d’une journée d’études organisée par la Société Française d’Archéologie Classique le 17 mars 2012, présente quelques aspects (poids, tables de mesure, monnaie, amphores, épaves de navire, monuments d’architecture).

Auteurs des contributions : Véronique Chankowski et Claire Hasenohr, Carla Cioffi, Kahina Rezkalla-Boussaid, Stefano Camporeale, Frédérique Duyrat, Pierre-Louis Gatier, Gérald Finkielsztejn, Yvon Garlan, Emmanuel Nantet, Jean-François  Bommelaer. Le sommaire est téléchargeable ici.

This article analyses a selection of texts from Emar (modern Tell Meskene) in order to illuminate Late Bronze Age trade and financial activities run by private investors and travelling merchants in Northern Mesopotamia and the Levant. In the first part of the article, two cases of redemption of indebted merchants show how capital-lenders secured their investments through personal and real-estate guaranties. The second part of the article examines the various weight standards used by merchants in international trade activities, and shows how this metrological multiplicity is reflected in the figures recorded in the texts.

Résumé
L’étude de la métrologie pondérale ibérique, initiée au début du XXe siècle, a eu pour ligne directrice la recherche de standards et de systèmes dérivés des modèles méditerranéens en vigueur à la même époque ou antérieurement. Le lot de dix poids de balance de la tombe 200 d’El Cigarralejo permet d’aborder cette métrologie par sa construction arithmétique. Il est ainsi possible d’identifier un étalon proche de 20-21 g autour duquel s’organisent des fractions et des multiples. La construction arithmétique du lot permet, en combinant les poids entre eux, d’obtenir une suite ininterrompue de multiples jusqu’à 24 fois l’étalon. La comparaison avec les sites alentours laisse envisager l’utilisation d’un modèle commun pour une partie des poids mais présentant des variantes qui semblent indiquer une utilisation extérieure au cadre commercial.

Abstract
The primary aim of the study of Iberian metrology, which began at the start of the 20th century, was to investigate the standards and derivative systems of the Mediterranean models in use in that period or earlier. The discovery of a set of ten weights for scales at tomb 200 in El Cigarrelejo allows us to approach the metrology through arithmetic construction. In this way it is possible to identify a standard measure of around 20-21g, around which fractions and multiples are organised. The arithmetic construction of the set allows us, by combining the weights among them, to produce an uninterrupted sequence of multiples up to 24 times the standard. Comparisons with nearby sites allow us to hypothesise that a standard model existed for some of the weights, but variations are also present, which would seem to suggest non-commercial usage.

This article, written in honour of Professor Dominique Charpin in his Festschrift, is a reasoned synthesis of the use of diorite and its involvements in Mesopotamian royal ideology in the light of cuneiform sources, in the land of Sumer and Akkad in the Third and Second Millennia BCE. After an introduction devoted to the discovery of this hard black stone by modern scholars, it explores the definition of the diorite (means of recognition and occurrences), the characteristics, properties and functions of the diorite as strong and powerful stone, and, finally, some reflections of the use of diorite in a chronological, commercial and cultural way.

If you are interested in this study, please contact me by email.

This article concentrates on animal husbandry of the Bronze and Iron Age. It is understood as the motor of economic prosperity and social standing and – in the form of mobile pasture feeding – resulted in networks exceeding the local context. Alongside data from bioarchaeological and archaeobotanical analyses, archaeological evidence for places of herdsmen and sacrificial sites indicate an accompanying economic topography. Some Younger Iron Age market and meeting places demonstrate that cattle was taken to these locations, sold, slaughtered there or consumed at certain occasions. Bronze Age and Early Iron Age finds of balances reveal that the technical and most of all social conditions for holding markets were already existent in pre-Celtic times. Therefore, it was possible to trade animals, their meat as well as milk, cheese or leather in appropriate distribution centres or Bronze and Iron Age markets. The economic importance of animal husbandry was accompanied by political processes and resulted in the accumulation of social prestige.

Cet article se concentre sur l’élevage du bétail à l’âge du Bronze et du Fer, considéré comme le moteur de la prospérité économique et de la réputation sociale des communautés agricoles, et qui a produit des réseaux supralocaux sous la forme de l’élevage en pâturage mobile. Les indications d’une topographie économique d’accompagnement sont des données issues d’analyses bioarchéologiques et archéobotaniques ainsi que des références archéologiques aux stations pastorales et aux sites sacrificiels. Certains marchés et lieux de rencontre de la fin de l’âge du Fer montrent que le bétail y était amené, négocié, abattu ou mangé en certaines occasions. Les découvertes de balances de l’âge du Bronze et du début de l’âge du Fer prouvent que les conditions techniques et surtout sociales de maintien des marchés étaient déjà établies dès ces époques préceltiques. Les animaux, leur viande ainsi que le lait, le fromage ou le cuir peuvent donc avoir été négociés dans les centres de distribution correspondants ou sur les marchés des âges des métaux. Le rôle économique de l’élevage s’accompagne de processus politiques et donne lieu à l’accumulation d’un prestige social.

Abstract: The administration of the rights of weights and measures in the councils of the kingdom of Galicia in Early Modern History became not infrequently the focus of disputes between administrators and administrators, basically because of the different burdens that the former had to satisfy the latter. However, he also confronted the latter, often several jurisdictional lords, because in the same way that they fought in a general way for the stately spaces also fought specicifically for the ownership of one of the rights that this public responsibility entailed: the one of weights and measures.
Keywords: History of the Administration, Historical Metrology, weights and measures, Kingdom of Galicia, Early Modern History

Resumen: La administración de los derechos de pesos y medidas en los concejos del reino de Galicia en la Edad Moderna se convirtió en no pocas ocasiones en el foco de disputas entre administrados y administradores, básicamente por las distintas cargas que los primeros debían satisfacer a los segundos. Pero también enfrentó entre sí a estos últimos, a menudo varios señores jurisdiccionales, pues de la misma forma que luchaban de manera general por los espacios señoriales también luchaban de manera particular por la titularidad de uno de los derechos que conllevaba dicha responsabilidad pública: el de pesos y medidas.
Palabras clave: Historia de la Administración, Metrología Histórica, pesos y medidas, Reino de Galicia, Edad Moderna.

Roma parish in the centre of Gotland, Sweden, was the point of assembly for the island’s highest political and judicial body – the Gutnal Thing. By scholarly tradition it has been attributed to the area around Roma Abbey, founded by the Cistercian order in the middle of the 12th century. Beginning in 1990, rich Viking Age finds have been recovered during metal-detector surveys in the field of Guldåkern, north of the Abbey. The composition of finds lacks parallels on the island and includes a very high number of weights. This paper compiles and discusses these weights in comparison with other Scandinavian finds and relates them to the site and the Gutnal Thing as a social and physical institution.

This article deals with problems related to the use of different weight systems in international relations during the Late Bronze Age. Three case-studies have been chosen: the compensation for the murder of foreign merchants in Ugarit (" the Karkemish shekel "); the reimbursement of a debt at Emar (" the big weight of the country of Subaru "); the tribute of the king of Ugarit to the king of Hatti (" the heavy Hittite shekel ").

Предметом изучения стал разновес, найденный в 2017 г. Он был отлит из бронзы. На нем различимы крест и обозначение веса — «ΓΒ». Так что есть все основания атрибутировать его как гирьку в 2 унции. Однако процесс ее изготовления не был завершен. Гурт гирьки не был отшлифован, на ее сторонах отсутствуют следы инкрустации серебром. Вернее всего, разновес был забракован после первого же взвешивания. Ведь он весит значительно меньше стандарта. Полагаем, что изучаемый разновес был изготовлен на месте, вполне возможно — на территории Гурзуфа. Ведь трудно себе представить, что бракованную, неоформленную должным образом гирьку привезли из другого центра. Это обстоятельство позволяет сделать исторический вывод. Допускаем, что Горзувиты были достаточно важным торговым центром региона, для потребностей которого было налажено производство разновесов.

The object of this study is the Byzantine bronze weight found in 2017. The cross and the weight designation “ΓΒ” are visible. Therefore, there is every reason to identify it as a two-ounce weft. However, the process of its production was not completed. The root of the weaver was not polished, there are no traces of silver inlay on its sides. Most probably, the weight was rejected after the first weigh-in, because it weighs considerably less than the standard. We think that the studied weight was made on the spot, quite possible on the territory of Gurzuf. It is hard to believe that a defective, unformed properly dumbbell was brought from another center. This circumstance allows us to make a historical conclusion. We admit that Gorzuvitas’s importance as a regional trading center was relatively high—at least, sufficiently for establishing production of weights for its needs.

As one of the largest mounds of the Gallipoli Peninsula, Maydos Kilisetepe is situated on the coast of the European side of the Çanakkale Strait in the Eceabat province -Northern Aegean (Turkey) (Figure 1). Some important data regarding the Dark Ages and Late Bronze Age has been gathered in the excavations started in 2010. The paper presents preliminary analysis of the investigation of textile tools excavated in the Late Bronze Age (LBA) contexts of Maydos Kilisetepe. In Northern Aegean, spindle whorls and loom weights are the most remarkable findings associated with textile activities throughout the Bronze Age. The aim of this paper is to focus on spindle whorls and loom weights discovered at the site and to put forward their Aegean Connections. The above-mentioned textile tools have some similarities that indicate contact with the Aegean, Western Anatolia and the Balkans. The presence of the loom weights indicate that the warp-weighted loom was used in the textile production. The whorls from the Late Bronze Age settlement, which were used to get the desired yarn thickness and quality, have several shapes, types and weights. It is possible to say that the weaving production at the site was carried out for domestic purposes as a daily activity on a small scale during the Late Bronze Age.
Keywords: Late Bronze Age, Spindle Whorl, Loom Weight, Maydos Kilisetepe, Troad, Textile Production 

Önemli Not: Bu Makale 2013 yılı'nda Moskova'da düzenlenen Symposium on Mediterranean Archaeology  (SOMA ) Sempozyumu'na sunulmuş ancak 2014 Aralık 'ta basılan bildiriler kitabında -unutulduğu için-  basılamamıştır. Bu nedenle Trakya Üniversitesi Edebiyat Fakültesi Dergisi'ne gönderilmiştir. Bu açıklama hakem süreci sonunda kimlik bilgilerim eklenirken tekrar unutulduğu için buraya sonradan eklenmiştir. İlgililerin bilgisine sunarım.

"Volume measurement by photogrammetry. Applications for the weighing metrology studies", 1st International Conference on Metrology for Archaeology, Benevento, Italy, October 22-23, 2015, volume 1, p. 197-202.
http://www.metroarcheo.com/files/MetroArcheo2015_Proceedings.pdf
The fieldwork of the weighing metrology studies faces issues concerning the conservation of the artefact. More specifically for the European Protohistory, for which the metrological standards and systems are not identified by the texts, the weights studies leave out the broken ones, difficult to integrate.
The method presented here is intended to remedy this issue proposing a way to calculate the volume of an object with a non-intrusive measurement and permitting later a numerical restitution of the morphology and mass of the original object.

This paper analyses weights from the site of Birka, the main centre for trade in the Lake Mälaren Valley during the Viking
Age, as well as its successor, the medieval town of Sigtuna, with the purpose of identifying which weight system
was employed for trade in the area and period. The results show that the system was a local variant (the Baltic Sea
system) of the contemporary weight system of the Caliphate. Further, the paper deals with the reasons for implementing
this system and why it remained in use in Sigtuna even after trade had shifted to areas where other weight systems
were decreed. We propose that the increased trade with Western Europe in the late 10th century to a large extent was
conducted via the Western Slavonic region, which would, at this time, still have employed the Baltic Sea system, and
further that direct trade with monetary economies such as the Holy Roman Empire and England would have given little
incentive for change.

Zur Metrologie von Birka und dem frühen Sigtuna –
Instrumente des Handels im Gebiet des Mälarensees (Schweden) zur Wikingerzeit
Dieser Aufsatz befasst sich mit den Gewichten von der Fundstelle Birka, dem wichtigsten Handelszentrum im Gebiet
des Mälarensees und -tals zur Wikingerzeit, sowie von ihrem Nachfolger, der mittelalterlichen Stadt Sigtuna. Es
wird untersucht, welches Gewichtssystem für den Handel in dieser Region und in dieser Epoche verwendet wurde. Es
zeigt sich, dass die Gewichte eine lokale Variante (das Ostsee-System) des zeitgleichen Gewichtssystems des Kalifats
darstellen. Weiter behandelt dieser Beitrag die Gründe für die Verwendung dieser Gewichtseinheiten und warum sie
noch in Sigtuna gebraucht wurden, nachdem der Handel sich schon in Regionen verlagert hatte, wo andere Gewichte
vorgeschrieben waren. Wir schlagen vor, dass der im späten 10. Jahrhundert angestiegene Handel mit Westeuropa
hauptsächlich über die westslawischen Gebiete abgewickelt wurde, die zu diesem Zeitpunkt immer noch das Ostsee-
Gewichtssystem verwendeten. Außerdem gab der direkte Handel mit den auf Münzwirtschaft basierenden Regionen,
wie mit dem Heiligen Römischen Reich und mit England, wenige Anreize für einen Wechsel.


À propos de la métrologie de Birka et du début de Sigtuna –
outils d’échanges dans la vallée du lac Mälaren (Suède) à la période Viking
Cet article traite de poids découverts dans le site de Birka, le site d’échanges le plus important de la vallée du lac Mälaren
à la période Viking et de son successeur dans le temps, la ville médiévale de Sigtuna. Les poids ont été analysés dans le
but d’identifi er le système pondéral utilisé dans la région à cette époque. Les résultats indiquent que le système de poids
était une variante locale (le système de la mer Baltique) du système contemporain du califat. L’article traite également
des raisons pour lesquelles le système a été implémenté et maintenu à Sigtuna alors que le commerce s’était déplacé
dans d’autres zones utilisant d’autres systèmes pondéraux. La théorie proposée est que l’augmentation du commerce
avec l’Ouest européen à la fi n du 10e siècle s’est opérée via les régions slaves occidentales, qui employaient toujours à
l’époque le système de la mer Baltique et que le commerce direct avec par exemple le Saint-Empire romain germanique
et l’Angleterre n’aurait eu un attrait que limité pour le change, dans la mesure où il s’agit d’économies monétaires.
Traduction: L. Bernard

The ancient Near East has left us a sizeable body of written documents, of which the archives about metal make up a not inconsiderable part. Metal was a rare material, and its circulation gave rise to detailed book-keeping. To an administrator in antiquity it was not the object’s appearance that primarily mattered, so much as its mass. The important thing was to be able to note the weight of the metal changing hands. The texts from the ancient city of Mari in Syria, dating from the 19th and 18th centuries BC, provide us with some particularly interesting certifications. Among the 15,000 to 20,000 tablets discovered, at least a thousand of them have to do with accounting for metal. But, despite this plentiful documentation, it is hard to correlate the written data with the objects coming from the archeology digs. Indeed, the great majority of archeology studies, one finds, are based on typological analysis and so do not take weight into account as a datum (besides objects made of precious materials or a few extraordinary discoveries). The point is not to deny the contributions of typology, essential as it is for the scientific analysis of artefacts, but rather to draw attention to the benefits of collecting one objective piece of information: mass. The information would be the more worthwhile for not entailing damage to the object. This would enable us to compare the written sources with the archeology data, and perhaps then to identify and date objects with more confidence.

The lead objects with Greek monetary types are more and more documented. This study aims to offer them a general frame of thinking, at a moment when several recent publications identify them, rather ex abrupto as test-pieces. As a matter of fact, these lead pieces with monetary types may have had various purposes: coins (official [and not necessarily only in a context of emergency], unofficial [ancient imitations and modern forgeries] or votive), tokens, seals or weights. The hypothesis of test-pieces is not absolutely discarded but, in most cases, it does not fit with
practical facts (we give a catalogue of all these alleged test-pieces). In several cases, we prefer to see them as simple fantasies, which were not obtained anyway from the die itself.