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The width of the palm was a traditional unit in Ancient Egypt, Israel, Greece, and Rome and in medieval England, where it was also known as the hand, [2] [a] handbreadth, [3] or handsbreadth. [3] [b] The length of the hand—originally the Roman "greater palm"—formed the palm of medieval Italy and France.
Detail of the cubit rod in the Museo Egizio of Turin, showing digit, palm, hand and fist lengths. The hand, sometimes also called a handbreadth or handsbreadth, is an anthropic unit, originally based on the breadth of a male human hand, either with or without the thumb, [2] or on the height of a clenched fist.
Egyptian units of length are attested from the Early Dynastic Period.Although it dates to the 5th dynasty, the Palermo stone recorded the level of the Nile River during the reign of the Early Dynastic pharaoh Djer, when the height of the Nile was recorded as 6 cubits and 1 palm [1] (about 3.217 m or 10 ft 6.7 in).
Cun - width of the human thumb, at the knuckle; Dactylos - Ancient Greek finger breadth; Digit - length of a human finger Digitus - Ancient Roman digit; Etzba - fingerbreadth; Fathom - the distance between the fingertips of a human's outstretched arms; Finger; Fistmele - the measure of a clenched hand with the thumb extended; Gradus - Ancient ...
Detail of a cubit rod in the Museo Egizio of Turin The earliest recorded systems of weights and measures originate in the 3rd or 4th millennium BC. Even the very earliest civilizations needed measurement for purposes of agriculture, construction and trade. Early standard units might only have applied to a single community or small region, with every area developing its own standards for ...
palme – Palm, for circumference, 8.86 cm; kvarter – Quarter, 1 ⁄ 4 alen; fod – Defined as a Rheinfuss 31.407 cm from 1683, before that 31.41 cm with variations. alen – Forearm, 2 fod; mil – Danish mile. Towards the end of the 17th century, Ole Rømer connected the mile to the circumference of the earth, and defined it as 12000 alen.
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palm dichas or hēmipodion διχάς, ἡμιπόδιον: 8 daktyloi 154.1 mm (6.07 in) half foot lichas λιχάς: 10 daktyloi 192.6 mm (7.58 in) distance from thumb-tip to tip of outstretched index finger [2] orthodōron ὀρθόδωρον: 11 daktyloi 211.9 mm (8.34 in) straight hand's width spithamē σπιθαμή: 12 daktyloi