Gram

This article is about the unit of mass. For other uses of "g" "gram" and "gramme", see Gram (disambiguation).
Gram

The mass of this pen cap is about 1 gram
Unit information
Unit system SI derived unit and CGS base unit
Unit of Mass
Symbol g 
Unit conversions
1 g in ...... is equal to ...
   SI base units    10−3 kilograms
   CGS units    1 gram
   U.S. customary    0.0353 ounces

The gram (dated British English spelling: gramme;[1] SI unit symbol: g) (Greek/Latin root grámma) is a metric system unit of mass.

Originally defined as "the absolute weight of a volume of pure water equal to the cube of the hundredth part of a metre, and at the temperature of melting ice"[2] (later 4 °C), a gram is now defined as one one-thousandth of the SI base unit, the kilogram, or 1×10−3 kg, which itself is defined as being equal to the mass of a physical prototype preserved by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures.

Symbol and abbreviations

The International System of Units (SI) unit symbol for the gram is "g" following the numeric value with a space, as in "640 g". It is not "gr" (which is the symbol for grains),[3]:C-19 "gm" (easily mistaken for "mg", milligrams) or "Gm" (giga-metre).

History

The word gramme was adopted by the French National Convention in its 1795 decree revising the metric system as replacing the gravet introduced in 1793. Its definition remained that of the weight (poids) of a cubic centimetre of water.[4][5] French gramme was taken from the Late Latin term gramma. This word, ultimately from Greek γράμμα "letter" had adopted a specialized meaning in Late Antiquity of "one twenty-fourth part of an ounce" (two oboli),[6] corresponding to about 1.14 (modern) grams. This use of the term is found in the carmen de ponderibus et mensuris ("poem about weights and measures") composed around 400 AD.[lower-alpha 1] There is also evidence that the Greek γράμμα was used in the same sense at around the same time, in the 4th century, and survived in this sense into Medieval Greek,[8] while the Latin term did not remain current in Medieval Latin and was recovered in Renaissance scholarship.[lower-alpha 2]

The gram was the fundamental unit of mass in the 19th-century centimetre–gram–second system of units (CGS). The CGS system co-existed with the MKS system of units, first proposed in 1901, during much of the 20th century, but the gram has been displaced by the kilogram as the fundamental unit for mass when the MKS system was chosen for the SI base units in 1960.

Uses

The gram is today the most widely used unit of measurement for non-liquid ingredients in cooking and grocery shopping worldwide.

Most standards and legal requirements for nutrition labels on food products require relative contents to be stated per 100 g (3.5274 ounces) of the product, such that the resulting figure can also be read as a percentage by weight.

Conversion factors

Comparisons

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ The date and authorship of this Late Latin didactic poem are both uncertain; it was attributed to Priscian but is now attributed to Rem(m)ius Favinus/Flav(in)us.[7] The poem's title is reflected in the French phrase poids et mesures ("weights and mesures") in the title of the 1795 National Convention decree, Décret relatif aux poids et aux mesures that introduced the gram, and indirectly in the name of the General Conference on Weights and Measures responsible for the modern definition of the metric units.
  2. ↑ In the Renaissance, the carmen de ponderibus et mensuris was received as a work of the 1st-century grammarian Remmius Palaemon edited in 1528 by Johann Setzer of Hagenau, together with works by Celsius, Priscian and Johannes Caesarius; Aurelij Cornelij Celsi, De re medica, libri octo eruditissimi. Q. Sereni Samonici Praecepta medica, uersibus hexametris. Q. Rhemnij Fannij Palaemonis, De ponderibus [et] mensuris, liber rarus [et] utilissimus

References

  1. ↑ "Weights and Measures Act 1985 (c. 72)". The UK Statute Law Database. Office of Public Sector Information. Retrieved 2011-01-26. §92.
  2. ↑ Décret relatif aux poids et aux mesures, 1795
  3. ↑ National Institute of Standards and Technology (October 2011). Butcher, Tina; Cook, Steve; Crown, Linda et al. eds. "Appendix C – General Tables of Units of Measurement" (PDF). Specifications, Tolerances, and Other Technical Requirements for Weighing and Measuring Devices. NIST Handbook. 44 (2012 ed.). Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Commerce, Technology Administration, National Institute of Standards and Technology. ISSN 0271-4027. OCLC 58927093. Retrieved 30 June 2012.
  4. ↑ "Décret relatif aux poids et aux mesures du 18 germinal an 3 (7 avril 1795)" [Decree of 18 Germinal, year III (April 7, 1795) regarding weights and measures]. Grandes lois de la République (in French). Digithèque de matériaux juridiques et politiques, Université de Perpignan. Retrieved November 3, 2011.
  5. ↑ Convention nationale, décret du 1er août 1793, ed. Duvergier, Collection complète des lois, décrets, ordonnances, règlemens avis du Conseil d'état, publiée sur les éditions officielles du Louvre, vol. 6 (2nd ed. 1834), p. 70. The metre (mètre) on which this definition depends was itself defined as the ten-millionth part of a quarter of Earth's meridian, given in traditional units as 3 pieds, 11.44 lignes (a ligne being the 12th part of an pouce (inch), or the 144th part of a pied.
  6. ↑ Charlton T. Lewis, Charles Short, A Latin Dictionary s.v. "gramma", 1879
  7. ↑ Knorr, Wilbur R. (1996). "Carmen de ponderibus et mensuris". In Hornblower, Simon; Spawforth, Antony. The Oxford Classical Dictionary. (3rd ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 292. ISBN 019866172X.
  8. ↑ Henry George Liddell. Robert Scott. A Greek-English Lexicon (revised and augmented edition, Oxford, 1940) s.v. γράμμα, citing the 10th-century work Geoponica and a 4th-century papyrus edited in L. Mitteis, Griechische Urkunden der Papyrussammlung zu Leipzig, vol. i (1906), 62 ii 27.
  9. ↑ "Circulating Coin Designs". Japan Mint. Retrieved 7 March 2010.

External links