just wondering was posted on December 8th, 2008 at 4.31pm and is filed under just wondering. This entry has 3 comments. You can follow any responses through the RSS 2.0 Feed.
Stuck in my Head
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It stands for “Lord Brittain’s Stool”, and dates back to the English physicist who standardized the weight of a pound by using averge weight of his own stool. Lord Brittain used the measurement in several essays but never explained the acronym nor how the weight of a pound was chosen. It wasn’t until his diaries were made public after his death that the truth was discovered, and by then the acronym was already in common usage.
December 8th, 2008 at 5:06 pm
It stands for “Lord Brittain’s Stool”, and dates back to the English physicist who standardized the weight of a pound by using averge weight of his own stool. Lord Brittain used the measurement in several essays but never explained the acronym nor how the weight of a pound was chosen. It wasn’t until his diaries were made public after his death that the truth was discovered, and by then the acronym was already in common usage.
December 8th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
Wow, Lord Brittain must’ve been a substantial man. One pound on average? Sheesh.
December 8th, 2008 at 6:07 pm
The abbreviation lb comes from the Latin word libra, meaning “scales, balances”, which also described a Roman unit similar to the pound.
(I stole that from Wikipedia).
I like Lord Brittain’s explanation better though.