Early Irish law Early Irish law, historically referred to as (English: Freeman-ism) or (English: Law of Freemen), also called Brehon law, comprised the statutes which governed everyday life in Early Medieval Ireland. They were partially eclipsed by the Norm ...

texts record a wide variety of

units of measurement A unit of measurement is a definite 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 quantity of that kind can be expressed as a multi ...

, organised into various systems. These were used from

Early Christian Ireland Early may refer to: History * The beginning or oldest part of a defined historical period, as opposed to middle or late periods, e.g.: ** Early Christianity ** Early modern Europe Places in the United States * Early, Iowa * Early, Texas * E ...

(Middle Ages) or perhaps earlier, before being displaced by

Irish measure Irish measure or plantation measure was a system of units of land measurement used in Ireland from the 16th century plantations until the 19th century, with residual use into the 20th century. The units were based on " English measure" but us ...

from the 16th century onward.

Length

A ''troighid'' ("foot") was the length of a man's foot, divided into twelve ''ordlach'', "thumb-lengths". These figures assume a man's foot to measure . A ''magh-space'' was a unit set at the distance from which a cock-crow or bell could be heard. Other units such as ''inntrit'' and ''lait'' appear in documents; their value is uncertain, perhaps being equivalent to 1 and 2 ''fertach''s respectively. ''Ancient Laws of Ireland'' reads ''ceithri orlaighi i mbais, teora basa i troighid'' (4 thumb-lengths in a palm, 3 palms in a foot). and "Catalogue of the Irish manuscripts in the British Museum v.1" gives ''ceithri gráine an t-órdlach'' (4 grains in the thumb-length). ''Stair Ercuil ocus a bás: the life and death of Hercules'' mentions ''ceim curadh'' (warrior's paces).

Area

The basic unit of area was the ''tir-cumaile'', "land of three

cows Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, cloven-hooved, herbivores. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus ''Bos''. Adult females are referred to as cows and adult mal ...

", as it was an area of land that was at some point worth three cows. It is sometimes erroneously interpreted as the area needed to graze three cows, but it is far too large for that; in modern Ireland, a cow grazes on about 0.4 ha, so twenty or more could graze a ''tir-cumaile''. Ireland in total covered about 870,000 ''tir-cumaile''.

Capacity

hen Hen commonly refers to a female animal: a female chicken, other gallinaceous bird, any type of bird in general, or a lobster. It is also a slang term for a woman. Hen or Hens may also refer to: Places Norway *Hen, Buskerud, a village in Ringer ...

's eggshell was used as a standard unit, roughly 55 ml.

Mass

The Manners and Customs of Ireland lists two types of ''unge'': ''unge mór'' at 20 pennyweights (31.1 g) and ''unge beg'' at 10 pennyweights (15.6 g). A ' (

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile me ...

scruple) was used for measuring gold weight and was equal to a quarter-ounce (7 g).

Time

night Night (also described as night time, unconventionally spelled as "nite") is the period of ambient darkness from sunset to sunrise during each 24-hour day, when the Sun is below the horizon. The exact time when night begins and ends depends ...

(''oídhche'') was used as a measure for time in preference to a day. As was normal for Islam and Jews and in line with the Bible (It was evening and morning of the first day), the Irish held that a new day began at sunset, not at sunrise, so that a Wednesday night would precede the day of Wednesday.

References