PALMUS
PALMUS (also
palma,
Plin. Nat. 7.28), properly the width of the open hand, or, more
exactly, of the four fingers, was used by the Romans for two different
measures of length; namely, as the translation of the Greek
παλαστή, or
δῶρον in old Greek, and
σπιθαμὴ
respectively. In the former sense it is equal to 4 digits, or 3 inches, or
1-4th of a foot, or 1-6th of the cubit, (Varro,
R. R. 5.1;
cf.
Col. 5.1; Frontin.
Aq. 24.)
This was the only sense in Latin of the best age, but a later sense appears
(first in ecclesiastical writers, Jerome,
Ezech. 40,
&c.), in which palmus=
σπιθαμή, a
span of 9 inches. It is a mistake to suppose that this measure existed
earlier in Latin as “palmus major.” The Romans had no special
word in earlier times for
σπιθαμή, but
expressed it as
dodrans ( 3/4 of a foot):
“ternas spithamas, hoc est ternos dodrantes” (
Plin. Nat. 7.26). In the passage sometimes
quoted from Varro,
R. R 3.7, the ordinary palmus of 3 inches
is meant. (Hultsch,
Metrologie,
p. 15, note.)
[P.S] [G.E.M]
