Page:The New Latin Primer (Postgate).djvu/217

Rh trīcēnsimō prīmō or ., 253 B.C. as.

Note.—A year A.D. may be turned into the corresponding year by adding 753 to its number, a year B.C. by subtracting its number from 754.

§ 461. The basis of the Roman system of weights was the lībra or pound, and of the coinage the ās or pound of copper. Each contained 12 unciae ounces or twelfths, and there were separate names for the different fractions of a pound as follows (arranged, with the exception of quīncunx, in ascending order):

uncia, tum sextāns, quīncunx, quadrānsque triēnsque, sēmis, septunx, bēs, dōdrāns dextānsque dĕunxque.

uncia $1⁄12$, sextāns $1⁄6$ or $2⁄12$, quadrāns $1⁄4$ or $3⁄12$, triēns $1⁄3$ or $4⁄12$, quīncunx $5⁄12$, sēmis $1⁄2$ or $6⁄12$, septunx $7⁄12$, bēs $2⁄3$ or $8⁄12$, dōdrāns (for dē-quadrāns a fourth off) $3⁄4$ or $9⁄12$, dēxtāns (for dē-sextāns a sixth off) $5⁄6$ or $10⁄12$ dĕunx (lit. an uncia off) $11⁄12$. These words were not limited to the divisions of the pound or the ās, but were used to express fractions generally. Thus hērēs ex trientĕ heir to a third (of the estate).

Two assēs and a half (sēmis), generally abbreviated IIS (HS), made a sēstertius sesterce (also called nummus); and this was used in reckoning sums of money as follows:
 * 1) Up to 2,000, Cardinal Numbers were used, as ceutumcentum [sic] sēstertiī 100 sesterces.
 * 2) Above 2,000 and up to a million, the Neuter Plural sēstertia was used to give the thousands, as trīgintā quīnque sēstertia 35,000 sesterces.
 * 3) For a million and above. Numeral Adverbs were used. Thus 4,000,000 sesterces is expressed by quadrāgiēns centēna mīlia sēstertium (or 40 times 100,000 sesterces), more shortly quadrāgiēns sēstertium, or, if the sense is clear, even quadrāgiēns. If the sum was written in figures, thousands were denoted by a line over the figure, and hundreds of thousands by top and side lines. For example, 2,235,417 sesterces is IIS |$\overline{XXII}$|$\overline{XXXV}$CCCCXVII vīciēns ducenta trīgiutātrīgintā [sic] quīnque mīlia quadringentī decem at septem nummī.

A sesterce was worth about 2d., and 1,000 sesterces may be reckoned as £8 10s. So the above sum is about £19,000.

For further information on the Roman Calendar, coins, weights, and measures, etc., see Roby, Lat. Gr., Vol. I., Appendix D; or Gow’s Companion to School Classics, §§ 86–97.

§462.