Page:Origin of metallic currency and weight standards.djvu/254

 Boeckh himself seems instinctively to have felt this difficulty. For whilst he took Babylonia as the birthplace and home of all the ancient systems, nevertheless he held that contemporaneously there must have existed a connection between Egypt and Babylonia in remote antiquity, from which alone certain agreements and relations between the measures and weights of Egypt and Babylonia were capable of explanation. The primitive measures of length are undoubtedly by the consensus of mankind based upon the parts of the body, such as the finger, the thumb, the foot, the arm, or both arms fully extended, standards common to Egyptians and Chaldaeans alike. Whilst at a later stage in the history of all civilized peoples efforts have been made to obtain more accuracy in these standards, which of necessity have produced certain local and national divergencies, yet inasmuch as all alike started from these standards which have been supplied by nature, it is obvious that many striking similarities and relations will always be found when any comparative study of different systems is attempted. The same principle of course holds good for weight-standards. According to our argument there was a common animal unit existing in Assyria and Egypt, which was represented by a metal unit, prevailing alike in both regions possibly with certain modifications. Egypt and Assyria starting with this common unit, each in their own fashion constructed their distinctive national systems, and we need not be surprised if at a later period under certain political conditions certain parts of the system of one of these regions are found exercising some influence upon that of the other.

We shall now briefly state the Egyptian weight-system. In the oldest Egyptian documents two weights continually occur, the Kat (Ket or Kite) and the Uten (Ten or Outen). Already in the third millennium before Christ the precious metals were in full use in Egypt, and copper likewise was employed in the purchase of articles of small value. Although very large amounts are recorded, yet they had devised no larger unit than those mentioned.