The Hocking sentinel. [volume] (Logan, Ohio) 1871-1906, 1884-08-14
INVENTION OF SCALES.
Weights and Measures of the An.
clients.

In the ancient Egyptian belief tn,
hearts of all the deal were weighed be
fore Osiris in the Hall of Perfect Jus.
tice, and a papyrus representing the
ritual for the dead. preserved in the
British Museum. pictures the ceremo
ny of the weighing ''for good or evil, u
and incidentally affords an excellent
view of the scales of early Egypt. In
these scales the balance beam is nei.
ther suspended by the center, as Ia the
modern form. nor after the form of the
steelyard, but is arranged with shift
ing fulcrum, the adjustment of which
shows the difference between the
weights of two objects. The weights
were of metal in the form of rings, and
1t may be said in general that this was
the prevailing type of all early weights.
These scales, it will be observed, are
by no means of the simplest form, or
that which would naturally first sug-
gest itself to mankind. and this fact
argues the employment and gradual
improvement of weighing apparatus
long anterior to the date of this papy-
rus 135O B. CO.. We have no knowl-
edge of their earliest invention or
forms. The discovery of their uses has
been attributed to many geniuses, and
doubtless with something of truth in
the individual cases. Piiny credits
them to Phidon of Argos, Gellius says
that Palamedes invented them. and .
host of writer's following in their wake,
each crowns his own particular in
ventor with the honor. Among others
Juno pours out the urn. and Vulcan
claims
The sc:iles as the Just product of his
flames.
But certain it is that they have been
known and tried from time immemo-
rial. Their known existence, however,
dates back very far. and puts to the
blush the fictitious origins attributed to
them. When in 1850 B. C. Abraham
weighed out 400 shekels of silver as the
consideration for the first real estate
transfer of which history makes men
ton. he used them, and they arc fire.
quently referred to in the Bible, in
Zachariah, Leviiicus, etc. The earliest
scales were temporary, simply a beam
balance in stirrup, the weights being
arbitrary and varied, though, rs above
stated, usually in the form of metal
rings. In ancient Egypt they were
strictly under the superintendence of
the priesthood. and SO continued until
that people came under Roman sway.
They were kept in the public markets,
as was also the practice in Greece and
modern E E-ypt. The larger scales were
constructed on the same principle of
the beam and stirrup, with the addi-
ton of a fiat board or platform sus-
pended from each end of the beam by
four ropes or chains.
In all scales accuracy and the quail
ty of turning under the slightest possi-
bic inequality in balancing the weights
are the highest desideratum, and SO
great has been the perfection obtained
by means OF knife edges and agate
planes in some of the finer scales that
the declaration to Shylock that
If the scale turn
But in the estimation OF u hair,
TnOu diest.
would be robbed of its terror. The |
English mint is said to possess a scale |
which turns at 1-90O0OO0 OF the |
capacity.
In all ages the scales have been the |
emblems of justice, and it is to be hop
ed that the latter has kept pace with
the Improvements of its emblem
Call Smith in the Industrial World.