Measures

## *NUMBER*

Due to the overwhelming dominance of the Aurian Empire in trade on Karandia their number system has become dominant. The system is a monetary on a base 10.

10 copper pennies to the silver mark
10 silver marks to the gold cellen
10 gold cellens to the platinum imperial
1000 platinum imperials to a mithril coin (Mithril is typically not wasted on coins these days but a crude unmarked coin-sized piece would be of this value.)

It should be noted that cellens are small and light coins. Gold coins in other states can carry far more value.

Due to this coinage system, number is based on tens, hundreds (Also called centuries) and thousands. Though ‘score’ for twenty is also popular.

## *TIME*

Typically measured in:

* 60 second minutes
* 60 minute hours
* 24 hour days
* 9 day weeks
* 7 week months/seasons (63 days)
* 6 month/season years (378 days)
* 10 year decades
* 100 year centuries
* 1000 year millennia

## *WEIGHT*

People tend to use these measures only for trade such as business and crafting. For the weight of a person or building or such like normal people would use comparison instead. 'He weighs as much as a young horse'etc.

* thousandweight
* hundredweight
* tenweight
* a weight (This is roughly half a kilogram)

## *TEMPERATURE*

Is usually described only in vague terms such as hot and cold. It is also common to use imprecise comparative terms: 'as cold as a mountain wind', 'it is like Sunsal today.'

Those that measure temperature in detail base it from what they call COLD BASE which is the coldest temperature so far that has been measured using magic. These terms are only used by the most highly educated scholars, clerics and mages and the like. They would be meaningless to a farmer or local town scribe.

200 CB (Meaning 200 from COLD BASE is when ice melts)
300 CB (Meaning 200 from COLD BASE is when water boils vaporising into steam)

## *LENGTH*

Usually measured in:
Thumbs (roughly 2cm)
5 Thumbs to the hand (roughly 10cm)
10 hands to the stride (Roughly 1m)
1000 strides to the span (Roughly 1km)
4 spans to a league (This word varies depending on locality and is completely different at sea) – roughly 4km on land. 8 spans at sea.

## *AREA*

Areas smaller than a postlot are described in 2 dimensions IE The shield was large and rectangular. Maybe five hands across by fifteen hands down.
The scholars use the length terms and call them ‘area’. They could describe the same shield as ‘seventy five hands area’.

Postlot (roughly equivalent to half an acre or just over 2000m squared) based on the original postings put into rented fields.
Fieldlot = 5 postlots (Roughly 10000m squared)
Landtare = 5 fieldlots (roughly 25 acres or 100000 m squared)
Landhold = 10 landtares (roughly 1000000 m squared or 1 km squared)
Leaguehold = 1 league area (This is supposed to be equivalent to 16 landholds or 16 km squared).

## *VOLUME*

Only scientific or highly educated people deal in volume on Tal. Mages, clerics and great scholars. If a regular man describes a room in such detail he will use lengths. So he would say, ‘It was two strides high, six wide and four long.’

The scholars use the length terms and call them ‘volume’. They could describe the same room as ‘forty-eight strides volume’.

## *CAPACITY*

Liquids are described in:

* drops
* spoonfuls
* cups
* 4 cups is considered roughly to be a bottle
* 8 bottles is a trough
* 20 troughs to the barrel

Note that these vary significantly across Tal Bottle is the base denominator and an Aurian Trade Bottle would hold just over one litre. A Danaspree bottle however is only .75 of an Aurian one and in Errantlund a bottle is almost twice as big as an Aurian Trade Standard Bottle. International trade has standardised this to an extent. For example Elygian bottles that are only a tenth the size of Aurian ones are used for expensive commodities such as oils, perfumes and kjak (A potent spirit made from beans). Commodities like milk, water, wine, grain and slurry however are more usually moved in Spreean or Aurian Barrels. The equivalence of bottle to barrel has now been standardised between the countries. So 160 Aurian Bottles makes an Aurian barrel and 160 Elygian bottles makes an Elygian Barrel.