Gold weights

Museum number:
5-10594
Permalink:
ark:/21549/hm21050010594
Accession number:
Acc.4036
Description:
Goldweight, brass, lost wax cast; flat rectangular with a raised perimeter and two diagonal lines connecting the opposite corners, 9.2 gm. weight called suru/ piresuru. The everyday businessman's weight for the amount of gold dust used as money in much of West Africa from the 1400s through the 1800s.
Donor:
Franklin H. Williams
Collection place:
Ghana
Verbatim coll. place:
Ghana; Ashanti
Culture or time period:
Ashanti
Object type:
ethnography
Object class:
Gold-weights
Function:
7.3 Weights, Measures, and Computing Devices
Accession date:
June 1985
Department:
Africa (except Ancient Egypt)
Images:
Hearst Museum object titled Gold weights, accession number 5-10594, described as Goldweight, brass, lost wax cast; flat rectangular with a raised perimeter and two diagonal lines connecting the opposite corners, 9.2 gm. weight called suru/ piresuru. The everyday businessman's weight for the amount of gold dust used as money in much of West Africa from the 1400s through the 1800s.
Legacy documentation:
Documentation associated with Hearst Museum object titled Gold weights, accession number 5-10594, described as Goldweight, brass, lost wax cast; flat rectangular with a raised perimeter and two diagonal lines connecting the opposite corners, 9.2 gm. weight called suru/ piresuru. The everyday businessman's weight for the amount of gold dust used as money in much of West Africa from the 1400s through the 1800s.

Tools