Before

metrication Metrication or metrification is the act or process of converting to the metric system of measurement. All over the world, countries have transitioned from local and traditional Unit of measurement, units of measurement to the metric system. This ...

, the traditional system of measurement used in

Thailand Thailand, officially the Kingdom of Thailand and historically known as Siam (the official name until 1939), is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. With a population of almost 66 million, it spa ...

employed

anthropic units The term anthropic unit (from Greek ''wikt:άνθρωπος, άνθρωπος'', 'human') is used with different meanings in archaeology, in measurement and in social studies. In archaeology In archaeology, ''anthropic units'' are strata or de ...

. Some of these units are still in use, albeit standardised to SI/metric measurements. When the Royal Thai Survey Department began

cadastral survey Cadastral surveying is the sub-field of cadastre and surveying that specialises in the establishment and re-establishment of Real estate, real property boundaries. It involves the physical delineation of property boundaries and determination of dim ...

in 1896, Director R. W. Giblin,

F.R.G.S. The Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers), often shortened to RGS, is a learned society and professional body for geography based in the United Kingdom. Founded in 1830 for the advancement of geographical scien ...

, noted, "It so happens that 40 metres or 4,000 centimetres are equal to one ''sen''," so all cadastral plans are plotted, drawn, and printed to a scale of 1:4,000. The square ''wa'', ''ngan'' and ''rai'' are still used in measurements of land area. The ''baht'' is still used as a unit of measurement in gold trading. However, one ''baht'' of 96.5% gold bullion is defined as 15.16 grams rather than the generic standard of 15 grams. The ''baht'' has also become the name of the currency of Thailand, which was originally fixed to the corresponding mass of silver.

List of units

References

{{systems of measurement

Customary units of measurement

Units of measurement A unit of measurement, or unit of measure, is a definite magnitude (mathematics), magnitude of a quantity, defined and adopted by convention or by law, that is used as a standard for measurement of the same kind of quantity. Any other qua ...

Culture of Thailand