Would the "magic wand" of folklore be derived from the wand (metre) unit?
Thus a true magic wand would be a stick one metre long.
Dan
----- Original Message -----
From: "Han Maenen" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, 2005-06-04 04:49
Subject: [USMA:33098] Re: French foot
Dear Pat,
Thanks for this answer. I read about the 'yard and the hand' in W. Hallock
and H. Wade, Evolution of Weights and Measures and the Metric System, New
York 1906. I do not know on which page it was, but they too claim that the
Old-English weights and measures were largely decimal and they named the
'yard and the hand', which would have connected with the metric system, if
it had survived.
I think that the 'wand' survived for a time under the Normans, that when
the yard was established, the wand came to be known as the 'yard and the
hand', and then disappeared, either slowly or by being banned by law.
I also wonder how the Celts did their weighing and measuring before the
Germanic tribes arrived and
displaced the Celts.
Here sizes of fans are expressed in rounded metric sizes.
I think that fans were stated in hard inch-sizes for a long time, but that
they are now going to the nearest metric equivalent of their old sizes.
Fans stuck on processors or other chips are measured in millimetres.
The computer company Dell has started to give metric equivalents to inch
sizes for screens. Only 5 years to go....
I have voted for the EU constitution, which in my case was among other
motives, also a vote against groups like the TABD.
Best wishes,
Han
