the.com/troy ounce
The ounce gold uses so your jewelry sounds heavier than your groceries.
means A unit of mass equal to about 31.1 grams, used specifically for precious metals like gold, silver, and platinum — slightly heavier than the everyday avoirdupois ounce (28.35g).
from Named for Troyes, a trading city in medieval France famous for its fairs, where this weight standard for precious metals is traditionally said to have been used by merchants. The exact lineage is debated by historians, but the name stuck as the system spread through European and English trade, eventually becoming the standard for weighing gold and silver — a linguistic leftover from an era when a city's market reputation could define a unit of measure for centuries.
- actual weight
- 31.1 grams, not 28.3 like normal ounces
- origin
- named after Troyes, a French medieval trading town
- used for
- gold, silver, and other precious metals only
- sneaky twist
- a troy pound has only 12 troy ounces, not 16