Exchequer Standards Explained

The Exchequer Standards may refer to the set of official English standards for weights and measures created by Queen Elizabeth I (English units), and in effect from 1588 to 1825, when the Imperial units system took effect, or to the whole range of English unit standards maintained by the Court of the Exchequer from the 1200s, or to the physical reference standards physically kept at the Exchequer and used as the legal reference until the such responsibility was transferred in the 1860s, after the Imperial system had been established.^[1]

The Exchequer standards made in the reign of Queen Elizabeth were not authorized by any statute. The standards were ordered by the royal authority, as appears from a roll of Michaelas terms in the 29th Elizabeth, preserved in the Queen's Remembrancer's Office, and containing the royal proclamation.^[2]

The Exchequer Standards were so called because their repository had always been the Court of the King's Exchequer.^[3]

Notably, Elizabeth I's redefinition of these standards instituted the English Doubling System, whereby each larger liquid measure equals exactly two of the next-smaller measure.

Historical development

1225–1265 The Great Charter (9 Hen. 3.)

The Great Charter of 1225 was the first legislative act in the English Statutes at Large, and is a repetition of Magna Carta by Henry III in 1300, although it is officially listed as act 9 Hen. 3.

With respect to Magna Carta requiring that there be one unified measure of volume, and another for length, thus unifying disparate measurement systems used to trade each different commodity, there is an argument made that this supposition is in error, and that it actually required these remain separately defined measures, but each be consistent across the kingdom:

The Rumford corn gallon of 1228, examined by the committee of the House of Commons in 1758, was found to be 266.25 cubic inches.

Corn

• The quarter of London

Ale

• The Ale gallon: of the same contents for liquid measure as the half peck was for dry

Wine

• One measure of wine was a gallon, not of the same cubical contents as the half-peck and ale gallon, but which, when filled with wine, was of the same weight as the half-peck, or corn gallon, when filled with wheat.

Cloth

• One breadth of cloth: two yards (ulna) within the lists

1266–1304 (51 Hen. 3.) Assize of bread and or ale

According to Secretary Adams,

Adams goes on to say (paraphrased and simplified):

• The act noted that thirty-two kernels of average wheat from the middle of the ear were equal in weight to the silver penny sterling, new from the mint, round and without clipping—22.5 Troy grains.
• It then defined that twenty such pence equal an ounce.
• It then defined that twelve ounces equal one pound (sterling?), which Mr. Adams stated was 5,400 Troy grains.
• It then defined that eight pounds (of fifteen ounces or 6,750 Troy grains; the commercial pound) equal a gallon of Gascoign wine, which was used to define the standard bushel. This wine was later called Claret or Bordeaux, and its specific gravity as compared with distilled water was 9,935 to 10,000, and weighed 250 troy grains per cubic inch. Mr. Adams continues his calculation to state that these eight pounds weighed 54,000 Troy grains, which divided by 250 gives a wine gallon of 216 cubic inches, which is very close to the Irish wine gallon (217.6 cubic inches) in effect in 1817. Yet when calculated based on the definition of the 63-gallon hogshead, Mr. Adams calculates the wine gallon to be 219.43 cubic inches.
• It then defined that there are eight bushels in a quarter (by weight, not volume). So a bushel, filled with wheat, would exactly balance a keg containing eight gallons of wine, deducting the tare of both vessels.
• Also, one eighth of this bushel, by volume, would be a vessel and called the ale gallon.

Thus, the key to the whole measurement system of 1266 was the weight of the silver penny sterling. This penny was of the Tower pound, which had been used at the London mint for centuries before the Norman conquest, and which continued as legal tender until 1527, when Henry VIII replaced it with the Troy pound. The Tower pound weighed Troy ounce less than the Troy pound (of the Troy pound). Its penny, therefore weighed 22.5 Troy grains.

There was also another pound used c. 1266; the commercial pound, which equaled fifteen ounces was used to measure wine and most other items of commerce.

1304–1494 (31 Edw. 1.?)

At this point, there is not yet any mention of the avoirdupois or troy weights.

1494–1496 (10 Hen. 7.)

King Henry VII had 43 copies of the Exchequer standards made and distributed to the principal cities of the kingdom, but these were later found to be defective, and remade in 1496.

1496– (12 Hen. 7.)

The Weights and Measures Act 1496 (12 Hen. 7. c. 5) redefined the volumetric measures based on the Troy weights, officially discarding (though perhaps not on purpose) the Tower pound and the commercial pound for defining all measures:

Mr. Adams explains that this act of 1496 made several errors including inverting the order of the old statutes, assuming that the penny sterling, described in the acts of 1266 and 1304 was the penny weight troy (which it was not because the coinage had been adjusted since), and a belief that it was the measure, and not the weight, of eight gallons of wine, which constituted the bushel. It is here that the Guildhall gallon of 224 cubic inches is created. The same act creates the gallon of 231 cubic inches,

1428 2 Hen. 6. c. 2

King Henry VI decreed the following, which adjusted the sizes of casks

Competing systems

By 1862, there were multiple competing and confusing systems of measurement in the United Kingdom, and suggestions for simplification and possibly even switching to the French Metric system.^[4]

Systems of length

• inch
• foot
• yard
  • mile (English: 1,760 yards; Scotch: 1,977 yards; Irish: 2,240 yards)
• Nautical
  • fathoms (man-of-war: 6 feet; merchant vessel: 5.5 feet; fishing smack: 5 feet)
  • knots
  • leagues
  • geographical mile: 1 th mile
• Surveyors' measures:
  • links
  • chains
  • rods
  • poles
  • perches

Systems of area

• land
  • acre (several in England, including Falmouth: 4,840 square yards; Preston: 10,240; elsewhere 9,000)
  • rood (several in England)
  • Scotch acre
  • Irish acre
• Cloth
  • yards
  • nails
  • ells (four different sorts)

Systems of weight

• Grains, computed cdecimally, used for scientific purposes.
• Troy weight, under 5 Geo. 4. c. 74, and 18 & 19 Vict. c. 72.
• Troy ounce, with decimal multiples and divisions, called bullion weights, under 16 & 17 Vict. c. 29.
• Banker's weights, to weigh 10, 20, 30, 50, 100, and 200 sovereigns.
• Apothecaries weight.
• Diamond weights and pearl weights, including carats.
• Avoirdupois weight, under 5 Geo. 4. c. 74, and 18 & 19 Vict. c. 72.
• Weights for hay and straw.
• Wool weight, using as factors 2, 3, 7, 13, and their multiples.
• Coal weights, decimal, under 1 & 2 Will. 4. c. 76, and 8 & 9 Vict. c. 101, Nos. 1, .5, .2, .1, .05, .025.
• stone (about 10 different definitions)
• hundredweight (100lbs, 112lbs, or 120lbs)
• pound (Dutch, troy, or avoirdupois)

Systems of volume

• Bushels (27 different ones, including 168 lbs., 73lbs., 80lbs., 60lbs., 70lbs., 63lbs, and so on)
• Hoghead (ale: 54 gallons; wine: 63 gallons)
• pipe of wine (port: 103 gallons; Teneriffe: 100 gallons; Madeira 92 gallons; Marsala 93 gallons)
• cubic inches

Modifications

• Addition of the Queen Anne Wine Gallon in 1707 (6 Ann. c. 27. s. 17.)

Definitions

• 23 Eliz. 1. c. 8 (1591)
• 35 Eliz. 1. c. 6 (1593)
• 35 Eliz. 1. c. 10. par. III (1593)

See also

• English units
• Winchester measure
• Imperial units

External links

• British Imperial System
• CALICO TO WHISKEY: A CASE STUDY ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE DISTILLING INDUSTRY IN THE NAAS REVENUE COLLECTION DISTRICT, 1700-1921
• Building With God
• Medieval Economic Thought
• Isn't a gallon, a gallon?

Notes and References

1. Web site: Weights and Measures: COPY of a Letter from the Comptroller-general of the Exchequer to the Secretary of State for the Home Department, dated 9th February 1859, and of the enclosed Copy of a Report from the Astronomer Royal, on the subject of Weights and Measures.. 13 September 2016. Decimal Coinage Commission. Great Britain. 1857.
2. Book: Questions Communicated by Lord Overstone to the Decimal Coinage with Answers. 1857. 8. 12 September 2016. Decimal Coinage Commission. Great Britain.
3. Book: Ricketts. Carl. Marks and Marking of Weights and Measures of the British Isles. 1996. Devon Design and Print. Taunton, Somerset. 0-9528533-0-2.
4. Book: Report from the Select Committee on Weights and Measures; together with the Proceedings of the Committee, Minutes of Evidence, Appendix and Index.. 4 August 1862. London. 13 September 2016. Great Britain Parliament. House of Commons. Ewart. William.