[Avodah] Half-Shekel found from the time of Bayis Sheni

[Zev Sero]

Micha Berger wrote:
> On Wed, Mar 19, '08 at 5:27pm EDT, R Gershon Dubin wrote to Areivim:
> : http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/125612
> 
> In that story, they say the sheqel weighed 13 gm. Given that it's missing
> a bit from wear, it's fair to assume a full sheqel was a shade more.
> Rashi holds a sheqel was only 11.76 gm, and the Rif, 14.16 gm. The
> evidence seems to confirm the Rif.

AIUI, many shkalim have been found over the past 200 years or so, and
they tend to be in the 13-14 gram range.


> The Rambam writes (Sheqalim 3:2) that a sheqel is 320 grains of barley.

The shekel of Moshe's time was 320.  The Shekel Tzori of Chazal was 384.


> Similarly, a site dedicated to British Weights and Measures
> <http://home.clara.net/brianp/weights.html> writes:
>> The basic unit of weight in the British system is the grain - originally
>> based on the weight of a grain of barley (but note that money was based
>> on the grain of wheat - and that three grains of barley weigh the same as
>> four of wheat). This grain is the troy grain - there is no other weight
>> of the same name.

Something I just read implies that wheat grains are slightly bigger
than barley, not smaller.  I'll have to follow that up.


> So, given that a grain is a remarkably constant unit of measure, I figured
> the Rambam's grains would be similar to the British unit "grain", also
> based on barley -- 64.79891 mg.

The Rambam's grains are 1/64 of a dirham, and his dirham was definitely
no bigger than the Ottoman dirham of 3.2 g (and there is some reason to
believe it was a bit smaller), which makes a grain no more than 50 mg.

Probably more later.

-- 
Zev Sero               Something has gone seriously awry with this Court's
zev at sero.name          interpretation of the Constitution.
                       	                          - Clarence Thomas