Talk:Talent (measurement)

Deleted because unsourced
The word comes from the Ancient Greek for carrying, since it was roughly the amount of weight that a soldier could march with on his back. (Cf. Roman weights.)

American Heritage Dictionary gives the talentum < τάλαντον etymology, and LSJ defines τάλαντον as "scale, balance." I don't know where this carrying business came from; obviously the ideas are related, but it seems to have meant simply "a thing that is weighted," and then "a weight" used by a merchant or banker, and then transitively an amount of money equivalent to that weight in gold or whatever. LSJ says:  in post-Hom[eric] writers, the τάλαντον was both a commercial weight (differing in different systems), and also the sum of money represented by the corresponding weight of gold or silver. -leigh (&#966;&#952;&#8057;&#947;&#947;&#959;&#962;) 23:58, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Renamed
I've renamed this article talent (measurement) instead of talent (weight), because it's both a weight and monetary measurement, and to call it talent (weight) almost implies that the article should be split so that there's a second article called talent (monetary), and this would unecessarily create two stubs instead of a single decent sized article. Ultratone85 15:08, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

Referencing
It's because of unreferenced, unsourced and speculative articles like this that Wikipedia will never be academically respected. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 139.184.30.135 (talk) 09:04, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


 * So instead of being an asshole about it why don't you help out? ~MDD4696 04:09, 20 March 2008 (UTC)


 * the history of scholarship is the hilarious story of "respected academics" going off on unreferenced, unsourced and speculative flights of fancy and passing off the results as "knowledge". The great gift of wikipedia to the world is its fostering a critical sense among millions of readers. We need bad articles. Jagdfeld (talk) 11:55, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

That's pretty funny, Mdd4696. I suppose if you respond to my need for immediate transportation by giving me a free car that doesn't work I should be grateful you gave me the car and teach myself mechanics. Even if the reason you gave it to me was because I was quadriplegic. Wikipedia is a fun place, but it's the gift of no gift. You can't rely on anything you learn from it. When you hear someone quoting Wikipedia, you don't know if you're hearing nonsense. The fact it might be cited nonsense is meaningless.

The big delusion of the free software and free knowledge communities is that the aggregate work of completely ignorant people somehow acquires inherent value. Necessary skills like the understanding of syllogisms and reading comprehension are generally available to the public but rarely present even in the top graduates of the top institutions. And of course Wikipedia is not the first corrupt reference, but incorporates (potentially) all others by citation.

This article has some fine examples. No doubt someone worked hard on the "How much trireme rowers got paid section", but it is completely ignorant and silly on its face. The value of 33 Kg of silver 2008/12/14 is about $10,800 USD, so they were paid $54 per month. The value of 6,000 (33kg) talents of gold is about $5.2B USD. Is this so hard? But if you want to factor in historical variation in value (pseudo-inflation) then equating values during the Peloponnesian war with the later Byzantine empire makes no sense. Either the hard specie hold their value and we can use today's (or pre Nixon Shock's) or they don't. This article blindly asserts that an American E-2 is the equivalent of a trireme rower, holds the two constant and makes statements about the perceived value of specie. Eh? An inference drawn from false premises is always true, but useful?

Your response "Call the guy a name, demand free labor" is pure defensiveness. You're publishing made up shit, why not call it a blog and at least have truth in advertising?

Reference 7, the Cecil Torr article is not actually in the Classical Review (presumably the Cambridge Journals one) at the specified issue/page number —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.132.120.71 (talk) 00:05, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

di.e.
What is that short for? Jagdfeld (talk) 11:55, 4 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Typo of i.e. —Centrx→talk &bull; 01:27, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Conflict between wikipedia articles
This page, in the very last sentence, states that Basil II accumulated 200,000 lbs. and not 200,000 talents of gold. Just in case someone finds out what is correct they can fix the other article as well. ChiefoftheChiss —Preceding comment was added at 05:31, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Amarna Letters
In the Amarna Letters we hear of the king of Alashiya (Cyprus) sending 500 talents of copper to Egypt and apologising about the small amount saying that his cities were ravaged with plague. Are there any figures and comparisons and so on and so forth for the Bronze Age period? (Or is my translation of the Amarna Correspondence just lazy, sticking in talents as a translation for an unspecified amount?) I can't remember exactly which letter it was. The translation was by William L Moran if anyone has it. Just a thought. Rigourous (talk) 18:15, 16 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Talent of copper worth less than talent of silver, which in turn, would be less than talent of gold? I was reading this and figured I should chip in. If the required amount was 500 talents of gold perhaps 500 talents of copper was worth a lot less than anticipated? Just a thought. Thanks for the work you all are doing on this.

repeated deletion of modern meaning of word
Wikipedia is a comprehensive encyclopedia. Having one sentence in an article on the measure talent which reflects its modern meaning (This parable is the origin of the sense of the word "talent" meaning "gift or skill" as used in English and other languages. ) is not only unproblematic - it is a requirement of a comprehensive encyclopedia. Repeated deletions of this essential, notable, and verifiable fact amount to edit warring. Please read COMPREHENSIVE.μηδείς (talk) 20:52, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Modern Definition would be better suited for actual "Talent" page
I don't know how to move the line. Sorry for any aggravation. I couldn't even find how to move the sentence. I'm new to wiki. If you could help me to move it, I'm fine with you getting credit for it Medeis. Can you help? I'm willing to compromise. T Cone3 —Preceding unsigned comment added by T Cone3 (talk • contribs) 00:24, 10 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Okay, I think I see what you are at. I have typed a response on your talk page.  Let me know there if I understand you correctly.μηδείς (talk) 01:08, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

As I have explained repeatedly, this is a comprehensive encyclopedia article, not a narrow definition of the term without reflection to the wider and contemporary context. There is no need to remove the reference to the modern meaning if there is any desire to explain the modern meaning further in some other article. It is not either/or. Further, the statement has never been contested as untrue or unsupported - to hear that as a reason now smacks of rationalization. Further attempts to simply delete the reference without a well explained rationale will be viewed as vandalism.μηδείς (talk) 03:52, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Money
This article should probably describe talents as a unit of measurement of money. As I understand it, a talent as a measure of currency is the price of a talent (in weight) of some precious metal. 57 pounds of silver is worth about $23,883. Seventy-one pounds of silver are worth about $29,749. Eighty pounds of silver are worth about $33,520. But if the talents were gold, then the value could be between $496,000 and $1,900,000 – a not insubstantial amount of money! Bwrs (talk) 02:13, 17 March 2013 (UTC)

Roman Talent and Amphora
The article claims that a talent is roughly the weight of water which fits on an amphora quadrantal (one cubic pes), and also that it corresponds to 100 Roman librae. However, considering the "accepted values" of 0.296 kg and 0.3289 kg for the pes and libra, respectively, in Ancient Roman units of measurement and the conventional 1000 kg/m3 density of water, one cubic pes comes up to only 79.1 librae, quite a bit short of the 100 librae claimed in the article. Can the source for the assertion back up its claim, or at least give us the values of the libra and pes which it uses? --Wtrmute (talk) 01:56, 4 September 2014 (UTC)

Other Talents
According to De Melo (Loeb Plautus vol 1, p. lxxxi/ii) there was also a Southern Italian talent which was lighter than the Attic talent, hence Talentum Magnum is used to specify an Attic talent. Vince Calegon 12:49, 23 August 2017 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vince Calegon (talk • contribs)

unitconversion.org
I've removed the reference to unitconversion.org, since it's apparently a copy (without attribution) of an older version of this very article. Compare its 2007 edition,, with the 2006 edition of this article,. FNAS (talk) 08:36, 16 August 2018 (UTC)

Talent, mina, shekel relative values
The wp mina article says around 2100 bce, Ur III time, a mina is the weight of 60 shekels and also 1/60 a talent. A talent is then 60 mina and 3600 shekels, not 360. I will correct that in this article. Partridgefoot (talk) 03:11, 4 April 2022 (UTC)