Re: Accents
| From: | Lars Henrik Mathiesen <thorinn@...> |
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| Date: | Wednesday, January 9, 2002, 12:14 |
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> Date: Wed, 9 Jan 2002 14:49:07 +1100
> From: Tristan Alexander McLeay <anstouh@...>
>
> Didn't we just establish that a pound was 454 g? Sounds like a nice
> approximation to me.
That's only on that largish island off the coast of Belgium. Before
the adoption of metric weights and measures (which generally happened
in the last half of the nineteenth century), each European country had
its own pound, foot and mile. In some places there may not even have
been a common national standard before metrification.
Anyway, the Danish pound happened to be something like 500.2 grams, so
the word pund just continued in use for half a kilogram --- it may
even have been official up to the middle of the last century. But it's
rare now to find a shop assistant who will sell you three quarter
pounds of mincemeat without checking back how many grams that is.
Lars Mathiesen (U of Copenhagen CS Dep) <thorinn@...> (Humour NOT marked)
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