Also 7 taile, tayel, tayl, 7–9 tale, 8 tahel; 7 tay, taye, pl. 6 taes. [a. Pg. tael (pl. taeis), ad. Malay tahil, taïl weight. The early tay, taes, etc. represent the Pg. plural.]
1. The trade name for the Chinese liang or ‘ounce,’ a weight used in China and the East.
In Chinese use the liang varies according to local custom, and to the commodity weighed; but the weight of 11/2 oz. avoirdupois is fixed by treaty for commercial purposes.
1598. W. Phillip, trans. Linschoten, 44. A Tael is a full ounce and a halfe Portingale weight.
1613. J. Saris, Voy. to Japan (1900), 222. Bezar stones are there bought by the Taile … which is one Ounce, and the third part English.
1699. Dampier, Voy., II. I. 132. 5 Tale make a Bancal, a weight so called.
1854. in R. Tomes, Amer. in Japan (1857), 410. The Japanese have a decimal system of weight, like the Chinese, of catty, tael, mace, candareen, and cash, by which articles in general are weighed; but gold and silver are not reckoned above taels.
1908. Morse, Trade Chinese Emp., 149. It is necessary always to bear in mind the distinction between the tael of value and the tael of weight.
2. Hence, A money of account, originally a tael (in weight) of standard silver, the value of which fluctuates with the price of the metal.
The Haikwan tael, i.e., the tael accepted by the Chinese Foreign Custom-house in payment of duties, is the equivalent of 584.85 grains of pure silver (Morse 152). From 1745 to 1860 its value was between 6s. and 7s., in 1864 6s. 8d., in 1900 about 3s., in 1904 2s. 10d.
1588. Parke, trans. Mendoza’s Hist. China, III. iv. 61. They giue him foure million … Taes.
1598. J. Davis, Voy. (Hakl. Soc.), 152. Foure Masses makes a Perdaw, Foure Perdawes makes a Tayel.
1613. J. Saris, Voy. to Japan (1900), 97. Bantam Pepper … was worth here [Japan] at our comming tenne Tayes the Peecull…. A Taye is five shillings sterling with them.
1726. Shelvocke, Voy. round World, 457. They demanded 6000 Tahel.
1745. P. Thomas, Jrnl. Anson’s Voy., 215. Taëls, each of which in our Money comes to about six Shillings and Threepence.
1800. Chron., in Asiat. Ann. Reg., 62/2. His wealth, which … is said to have amounted at the lowest computation, to eighty millions of tales, near twenty-seven millions of pounds sterling.
1901. Empire Rev., I. 394. The land tax is levied upon the cultivable land, and may be put at half a tael or 1s. 6d. per acre.
1908. Morse, Trade Chinese Emp., 151. The Haikwan tael … is a purely fictitious and nonexistent currency…. At no Custom House does any merchant tender Haikwan taels in payment of duties.
