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Posted 06/24/2015 7:41 pm
The "karat" measuring system only applies to gold, not silver, platinum or any other precious metal. The unit derives from the siliqua, an old Roman unit of weight (about 0.19 grams). "Siliqua" is the Latin name for the carob tree, specifically the seeds of the carob tree which were found to be fairly consistent in weight. The English word carat (sometimes spelled "karat" to distinguish it from the "carat" we still use as a unit of weight for gemstones) derives from "carob".
The base-24 system of purity for gold derived from the coinage reform of Roman emperor Constantine, which saw a new gold coin, the solidus, weighing 24 siliquae. As the Roman Empire devolved into the Byzantine empire and the gold solidus eventually became smaller and more dilute, it contained fewer and fewer siliquae of gold and merchants expressed this new gold fineness by the number of siliquae in the solidus: 21, 14 or whatever.
The base-24 system of purity for gold derived from the coinage reform of Roman emperor Constantine, which saw a new gold coin, the solidus, weighing 24 siliquae. As the Roman Empire devolved into the Byzantine empire and the gold solidus eventually became smaller and more dilute, it contained fewer and fewer siliquae of gold and merchants expressed this new gold fineness by the number of siliquae in the solidus: 21, 14 or whatever.
Don't say "infinitely" when you mean "very"; otherwise, you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite. - C. S. Lewis
