A History of Troy Weight: Episode Three

Continuing the story of the History of Troy weight - here I look at the gradual rediscovery of a correct history, beginning with John Greaves' visit to Egypt around 1640. I sketch, on the basis of the evidence, who subsequently got the matter right, and why many others got it wrong.
I also begin to indicate how the whole story is framed within, not just general theories about what money is, but general theories about how understanding reality should be approached (and how those appointed to police thought itself got it wrong in the post-Keynsian era).

[@marchellabrahams]

I hope fervently that research of this calibre reaches the far wider audience that it deserves. I don’t know how to make that happen, and I wish I did. I loved the notion of your six-legged aunt: a proper, duodecimal relation to have! The importance of measurement cannot be overstated so please keep going; I for one am enjoying them and learning a lot. Thank you so much for your painstaking research. It is such a refreshing relief in these days of stale, sloppy, repetitive and derivative so-called learning. Phew, got that off my chest.

[@Troy-Weight]

Thanks Marchell. There is so much to say I doubt I will live to say it all. At the moment I am just hammering at some basics of the history and mathematics, while dropping hints about the deep politics. Along the way today I tried to bring in how there are “really” 256 (sterling) pennies in a (troy) pound. Seems to me because, to a great extent, the world of things is inherently binary. The switch from a 16 to a 15 ounce pound helpfully yields 240, with its diverse factorization.