Civilization One: The World is Not as You Thought it Was by Christopher Knight, Alan Butler Page A
Authors: Christopher Knight, Alan Butler
Tags: Civilization One
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cubes’. In any case, even if the cubes had existed, they would have been very few in number and cannot reasonably be expected to automatically turn up in the archaeological record.
Our research has shown that the Megalithic people of the area around the British Isles used a unit of length that implies that they could have and probably did use the equivalent of the imperial pound and pint. Now, using the same model we had discovered that the people of ancient Mesopotamia used units of length, weight and capacity that have a remarkable correspondence to the metric system. How could this be?
The recorded origins of the units within the imperial system are just about impossible to trace but the metric system was designed ‘from the ground up’ by a team of scientists working in France during the late 18th century. The chances of the pound and the pint surviving for thousands of years seem remote, but did the French deliberately copy the Sumerian units?
Comparison of the Megalithic and Sumerian systems of geometry and the consequences for weight and capacity units.
C ONCLUSIONS
The Sumerians/Babylonians used a system of mathematics that used base 60, which is the reason why we still have 60 seconds to the minute and 60 minutes to the hour. They also invented the 360-degree circle, which was also subdivided into minutes and seconds. In addition, they used a standard unit of length that is believed to be 99.88 centimetres – almost exactly equivalent to the modern metre.
The Sumerians’/Babylonians’ double-kush of 99.88 centimetres was reproduced by means of swinging a pendulum with a beat of one second 240 times to define a unit of time they called a ‘gesh’.
The Sumerians/Babylonians also developed an elaborate system of ritual timekeeping based on the movements of the Moon with 360 days per year, 360 hours per month and 360 gesh (240 seconds) per day.
From their unit of length the Sumerians derived units of weight and capacity that are incredibly close to the kilo and the litre. To all intents and purposes it is fair to say that the metric system was in use more than 3,000 years before the French invented it.
1 Stecchini, L. C.: www.metrum.org/measures/index.htm
2 Fryman-Kensky: In the Wake of the Goddesses. Fawcet Columbine, New York, 1992.
C HAPTER 5
The Rebirth of the Metric System
The age of great Megalithic building began before 3000 BC and many of the major sites had been abandoned by the middle of the 3rd century BC . The last remnants of the Megalithic builders seem to have disappeared by about 1500 BC , which means that they certainly overlapped with the Minoan culture that clearly used the same 366 method of geometry. From the Iron Age until the rise of the Roman Empire, much of what is now the British Isles and France was inhabited by the Celts. There is no record of whether the Celts inherited any of the weights and measures that had been used by the Megalithic builders but it is not unreasonable to consider that the old units may have survived in an original or in a modified form.
French weights and measures
Only with the spread of the Roman Empire did these far western regions of Europe gain a recognizable uniformity in terms of weights and measures. Rome held sway over Gaul (France) and Britain until the beginning of the 6th century AD when the Roman legions were recalled and the area fell into that historically murky period known as the ‘Dark Ages’. The withdrawal of the legions led to a power vacuum in both Britain and Gaul which, through the peculiar set of circumstances prevailing, gave way to feudalism, a system under which international trade was not especially desired or encouraged. However, if any country was going to prosper and grow strong, a degree of cross-border cooperation was inevitable. The process was helped somewhat by the development of important sites of commerce, particularly in the area of northern France which eventually became known as Champagne.
In the 12th and
Our research has shown that the Megalithic people of the area around the British Isles used a unit of length that implies that they could have and probably did use the equivalent of the imperial pound and pint. Now, using the same model we had discovered that the people of ancient Mesopotamia used units of length, weight and capacity that have a remarkable correspondence to the metric system. How could this be?
The recorded origins of the units within the imperial system are just about impossible to trace but the metric system was designed ‘from the ground up’ by a team of scientists working in France during the late 18th century. The chances of the pound and the pint surviving for thousands of years seem remote, but did the French deliberately copy the Sumerian units?
Comparison of the Megalithic and Sumerian systems of geometry and the consequences for weight and capacity units.
C ONCLUSIONS
The Sumerians/Babylonians used a system of mathematics that used base 60, which is the reason why we still have 60 seconds to the minute and 60 minutes to the hour. They also invented the 360-degree circle, which was also subdivided into minutes and seconds. In addition, they used a standard unit of length that is believed to be 99.88 centimetres – almost exactly equivalent to the modern metre.
The Sumerians’/Babylonians’ double-kush of 99.88 centimetres was reproduced by means of swinging a pendulum with a beat of one second 240 times to define a unit of time they called a ‘gesh’.
The Sumerians/Babylonians also developed an elaborate system of ritual timekeeping based on the movements of the Moon with 360 days per year, 360 hours per month and 360 gesh (240 seconds) per day.
From their unit of length the Sumerians derived units of weight and capacity that are incredibly close to the kilo and the litre. To all intents and purposes it is fair to say that the metric system was in use more than 3,000 years before the French invented it.
1 Stecchini, L. C.: www.metrum.org/measures/index.htm
2 Fryman-Kensky: In the Wake of the Goddesses. Fawcet Columbine, New York, 1992.
C HAPTER 5
The Rebirth of the Metric System
The age of great Megalithic building began before 3000 BC and many of the major sites had been abandoned by the middle of the 3rd century BC . The last remnants of the Megalithic builders seem to have disappeared by about 1500 BC , which means that they certainly overlapped with the Minoan culture that clearly used the same 366 method of geometry. From the Iron Age until the rise of the Roman Empire, much of what is now the British Isles and France was inhabited by the Celts. There is no record of whether the Celts inherited any of the weights and measures that had been used by the Megalithic builders but it is not unreasonable to consider that the old units may have survived in an original or in a modified form.
French weights and measures
Only with the spread of the Roman Empire did these far western regions of Europe gain a recognizable uniformity in terms of weights and measures. Rome held sway over Gaul (France) and Britain until the beginning of the 6th century AD when the Roman legions were recalled and the area fell into that historically murky period known as the ‘Dark Ages’. The withdrawal of the legions led to a power vacuum in both Britain and Gaul which, through the peculiar set of circumstances prevailing, gave way to feudalism, a system under which international trade was not especially desired or encouraged. However, if any country was going to prosper and grow strong, a degree of cross-border cooperation was inevitable. The process was helped somewhat by the development of important sites of commerce, particularly in the area of northern France which eventually became known as Champagne.
In the 12th and
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