Also 6–8 pound Tower. [So called from the standard pound which was kept in the Tower of London.] A pound weight of 5400 grains (= 111/4 Troy ounces), which was the legal mint pound of England prior to the adoption of the Troy pound of 5760 grains in 1526. So Tower weight, weight expressed in terms of the Tower pound.
[1343. Close Roll, 17 Edw. III. m. 4 d (P.R.O.). Vne liure de pois de la Tour de Loundres.]
1469. in Archæologia, XV. 166. For coynage of every lb. of Tour weght of sylver … iiii s. vi d.
1526. Proclam., 5 Nov. (Pat. Roll 18 Hen. VIII. II. m. 2 d. P.R.O.). It is … determyned … that the said pounde Towre shalbe no more vsed nor occupied.
1545. Rates of Customs, d v b. A pounde of Tower wayght wayeth of the Troy .xi. ounces .i. quarter.
1622. Malynes, Anc. Law-Merch., 292. There hath been vsed from the beginning (in the Mint) both Troy and Tower weight, each of them containing twelue ounces in the pound weight, sauing that the Troy weight is heauier by sixteen penie weight vpon the pound weight: by which Troy weight the merchants bought their gold and siluer abroad, and by the same did deliuer it to the Kings mint, receiving in counterpeaze but tower weight for Troy, which was the Princes Prerogatiue.
1789. Walter Merrey, Remarks Coinage, 8. The silver penny was about twenty-two grains and a half of Troy-weight, but called a pennyweight Tower. The shilling was twelve of these pennies, and the pound Tower was twenty of these shillings.
1821. J. Q. Adams, in C. Davies, Metr. Syst. (1871), 94. This [silver] penny was the two hundred and fortieth part of the tower pound.
1844. Lingard, Anglo-Sax. Ch. (1858), II. App. O. 388. The Anglo-Saxon pound is believed to have been that known by the name of the Tower pound; the Norman was the Troy pound, heavier by three-quarters of an ounce than the former.
