Note 51 — The Fourteenth New Year’s Feast from the Auspicious Accession

This is an obscure passage, and Jadrūp’s reference to the mention of dāms in the Vedas is curious, for dām is said to be derived from the Greek drachma. However, it appears from the Āyīn (Blochmann, 31), that the dam, though in value only the fortieth part of a rupee, weighed 5 tānks or 1 tolā, 8 mās͟has, 7 surk͟hs. The rupee, we are told there, weighed 11½ mashas—i.e., half a masha less than a tola. Consequently the dam weighed over 20 mashas, and so was not far from being equal in weight to 2 rupees. The weight of a seer varied, and it may be 30 or 36 copper dams were reckoned as equal to a seer. By dam Jahāngīr probably meant paisā, or double paisā. According to Gladwin, 3½ tanks are by jeweller’s weights = one tolā, and a tank is 70·112 grs. Troy. ↑