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Shekel came into the English language via the Hebrew Bible, where it is first used in Genesis 23. The term "shekel" has been used for a unit of weight, around 9.6 or 9.8 grams (0.31 or 0.32 ozt), used in Bronze Age Europe for balance weights and fragments of bronze that may have served as money. [2]
The Babylonian system, which the Israelites followed, measured weight with units of the talent, mina, shekel (Hebrew: שקל), and giru, related to one another as follows: 1 shekel = 24 giru; 1 mina = 60 shekels (later 100 zuz) 1 talent = 60 mina
The shekel and mina ("profane" or "sacred") were units of both weight and volume. A shekel or mina weight was equal to the weight of that volume of water. Note that the values given for the mina do not match the definitions. 1 shekel = 8.3 ml (approximately 1 cubic aiwas). 1 profane mina = 50 shekel = 500 ml (approximately 27 cubic aiwas).
Leimma = 24 ⁄ 25 conversion from decimal to a sexagesimal number system; Diesis = 15 ⁄ 16; Euboic = 5 ⁄ 6; One official government standard of measurement of the archaic system was the Cubit of Nippur (2650 BCE). It is a Euboic Mana + 1 Diesis (432 grams).
The German historian Friedrich Hultsch calculated a range of 36.15 to 37.2 kg based on such estimates as the weight of one full Aeginetan metretes of coins, and concluded that the Aeginetan talent represented the water weight of a Babylonian ephah: 36.29 kg by his reckoning (the metretes and the ephah were units of volume). [29]
From earliest Sumerian times, a mina was a unit of weight. At first, talents and shekels had not yet been introduced. By the time of Ur-Nammu (shortly before 2000 BCE), the mina had a value of 1 ⁄ 60 talent as well as 60 shekels. The weight of this mina is calculated at 1.25 pounds (0.57 kg), or 570 grams of silver (18 troy ounces). [1] [2]
Obverse of a Judean silver Yehud coin from the Persian era (.58 gram), with falcon or eagle and Paleo Hebrew inscription "יהד" "Yehud" ().Denomination is a ma'ah. A gerah (Hebrew: גרה, romanized: gêrāh) is an ancient Hebrew unit of weight and currency, which, according to the Torah (Exodus 30:13, Leviticus 27:25, Numbers 3:47, 18:16), was equivalent to 1 ⁄ 20 of a standard "sacred ...
Larger units preserved in stone standards were developed that were used as both units of mass and of monetary currency. The pound was derived from the mina (unit) used by ancient civilizations. A smaller unit was the shekel, and a larger unit was the talent. The magnitude of these units varied from place to place.