Indian Science and Technology in the Eighteenth Century: Some Contemporary European Accounts c23.s5.t3.2

c23.s5.t3.2

As they have no standard measure their fingers, their span, and their arm are substituted by which a piece of stick is measured which they use in practice; neither is the division of the cubit necessary though the large one is supposed to be divided into six parts and the small one into five, of four fingers each—as the measurement is invariably ascertained by their fingers; the length of these parts is on an average 3.20 English inches.