Almost all traditional units of measurement are rather imprecise by modern standards. In the English system a yard is the distance from the nose to the end of the thumb (with the neck straight). A fathom is the length of rope from hand to hand. A mile is 1,000 double strides (about 5 feet) of a Roman legionnaire. ...
... If someone is buying silk from a mercer and serge de Nimes from a second mercer, each at a different price per yard, the difference lengths of their respective arms is not important.
Yigal is of course that each individual arkwright would measure 300 cubits somewhat differently if they were building a chest / box / ark. However, so long as only one master arkwright is doing the measuring it does not matter. Even if one side of the ark is a few barleycorns (1/3rd of an inch) longer it has no impact on its performance. Nowadays we find this sort intuitive engineering unacceptable but until rather recently it was the norm.I disagree. Yes, measurements to thousandths of inches are recent, but even ancient architecture, engineering such as bridges etc depended on reasonably precise measurements, not just the kind of intutuive measurement based on an individual's body size.
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