Indian Antiquary Vol 60

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Charles E A W Oldham, S Krishnaswami Aiyangar, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarka
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 210

182
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
[OCTOBER, 1931
.. 23.2
Port.
10.
Authority. Pulicat
Nunez : Schorer has 24.2. Nizâmpatam .. .. 27.2
Schorer. Masulipatam .. .. 26 (just over) The southern maund, as I shall call it, thus ranged from 23 to 27 lb.; and, as with the fairsala, there was only a single unit at each port, except in the case of Surat, in the extreme South of Gujarat, where the Gujarat maund of 33 lb. was used alongside of the southern maund. Surat was thus the meeting place of two different maunds, in the same way as Bhatkal was the meeting place of the maund and the fårsala.
These data make it easy to interpret the other literature of the period. As examples, it will suffice to take Barbosa, Garcia da Orta, and Linschoten.
Barbosa gives (ii, 232) the 'new' and 'old' Portuguese scales, and equivalents for the bahir and farsala used in India.' In the old scale the arratei or pound contained 14 ounces ; it was already obsolescent, the pound of 16 ounces having come into general use. The quin. tal contained 128 arratels. The Indian' bahar contained 20 farsala : the farsala contained 22 arratel 6} oz. (new weight), or 226 lb. This is clearly the farsala of Cananor and Calicut, given above, and we know that Barbosa spent much of his service on this part of the coast. Here as always, Barbosa uses the name India ' in a very narrow sense to denote only the West Coast, south of Bhatkal (vide the notes on i, 163, 188).
Barbosa gives also (i, 157) the weights of the kingdom of Gujarat and Cambaya, and here the editor was misled. He started from the fact (ü, 232) that in India'a bahar was equivalent to 4 old quintals; and he applied this equation to Barbosa's statement that in Gujarat the candy "weighs 4 quintals more or less, according to the place, as in some cases they are greater." In other words, he assumed that the bahar of India ' was the same as the bahar or candy of Gujarat, which lay far outside Barbosa's India, and he deduced a maund of 22.4 lb., which he noticed was low. The true reading is that the candy of Gujarat contained 4 quintals, which must be taken as 'new, because the 'new' quirtal was the ordinary one, and this gives & Gujarat maund ranging round 26 lb. with local variations.
In the same note, the editor assumed that Garcia da Orta, in 1563, was using 'old' arratels, when he 10 put the Cambay maund at 26 arratels. There is no reason, however, to assume that the arratels in question were anything except the new' arratels, which by this time held the field; and the figure 26,, taken as & round number, agrees with all the other information of the period. The same writer (p. 433) gives the Did maund as 27 arratels, which, taken as a round number, grees with the official figure given above. The only other equation which I can find in this bcok is the statement (p. 236) that somewhere in the Deccan, i.e., inland, 6 maunds were equal to 6 Portuguese arrobas, or quarters of 32 arratels, making the maund 263 arratels, or just under 27 lb. This is one of several indications that the southern maund was used inland as well as on the coast.
Linschoten 11 must be taken as a good authority for Goa, where he lived for several years before 1590, holding a responsible position in the household of the Archbishop. He is habi. tually careful to specify the scale he uses, weight of Portugal, weight of China, and so on. He tells us (c. 35) that in Goa the ordinary Portuguese scale was usual ; "but they have also another weight called Maund, which is 12 pounds, with which they weigh butter, honey, sugar, and various things sold by weight. They have also & weight used for pepper and other spioes called bahar, equivalent to 31 quintals, Portuguese weight."
The Book of Duarte Barbosa. Ed. M. Longworth Dames, Hakluyt Society, 1918-21, dted below as Barbosa.
10 Garcia da Orta. Colloquies on the Simples and Drugs of India. Tr. Sir C. Markhim. London, 1913; p. 342.
11 The Voyage of J. H. van Linschoten to the East Indies. Ed. A. C. Burnell and P. A. Tiale. Hakluyt Society, 1884.