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The dram (alternative British spelling drachm; apothecary symbol ʒ or ℨ; [a] abbreviated dr) [4] [5]: C-6–C-7 [6] is a unit of mass in the avoirdupois system, and both a unit of mass and a unit of volume in the apothecaries' system. [5] It was originally both a coin and a weight in ancient Greece. [7]
The grain was the legal foundation of traditional English weight systems, [5] and is the only unit that is equal throughout the troy, avoirdupois, and apothecaries' systems of mass. [6]: C-6 The unit was based on the weight of a single grain of barley which was equal to about + 4 ⁄ 3 the weight of a single grain of wheat.
English-speaking countries also used a system of units of fluid measure, or in modern terminology volume units, based on the apothecaries' system. Originally, the terms and symbols used to describe the volume measurements of liquids were the same as or similar to those used to describe weight measurements of solids [33] (for example, the pound by weight and the fluid pint were both referred to ...
In the Middle Ages, an English penny's weight was literally, as well as monetarily, 1 ⁄ 20 of an ounce and 1 ⁄ 240 of a pound of sterling silver. At that time, the pound unit in use in England was the Tower pound, equal to 7,680 Tower grains (also known as wheat grains). The medieval English pennyweight was thus equal to 32 Tower grains.
The scruple is 8 ⁄ 175 of an ounce (or 1 ⁄ 24 of a troy ounce), 1 ⁄ 3 dram, or 20 grains: [1] it is therefore exactly 1.2959782 grams. The Roman scruple was 11.875% smaller, therefore being exactly 1.14208078875 grams.
Troy weight, avoirdupois weight, and apothecaries' weight are all built from the same basic unit, the grain, which is the same in all three systems. However, while each system has some overlap in the names of their units of measure (all have ounces and pounds), the relationship between the grain and these other units within each system varies.
grain 1 62.210 mg 0.96004 gr 1.4 dolya: scrupul: скрупул: scruple 20 1.2442 g 19.201 gr 28 dolya: drahma: драхма: dram 60 3.7326 g 57.602 gr 7 ⁄ 8 zolotnik: unciya: унция: ounce 480 29.861 g 1.0533 oz or 460.82 gr 7 zolotnik: funt: фунт: pound 5760 358.328 g 12.640 oz or 5529.8 gr 84 zolotnik
† The fluid scruple has been properly defined on its own in the apothecaries' system as 1 ⁄ 24 fl oz, 1 ⁄ 3 fluid dram, or = 20 minims (≈ 1.23223 ml), and also 1 ⁄ 4 tsp. Mind that scruples and drams were pharmaceutical and intended to be specific and precise, whereas cooking measures tended to use what was on hand and/or actually ...