Talent (measurement)

[2] The Akkadian talent was called kakkaru[5][6] in the Akkadian language,[7] corresponding to Biblical Hebrew kikkar כִּכָּר (translated as Greek τάλαντον 'talanton' in the Septuagint,[8] English 'talent'), Ugaritic kkr (𐎋𐎋𐎗),[9] Phoenician kkr (𐤒𐤒𐤓),[10] Syriac kakra (ܟܲܟܪܵܐ),[11] and apparently to gaggaru in the Amarna Tablets.

[12] The name comes from the Semitic root KKR meaning 'to be circular',[13] referring to round masses of gold or silver.

The talent was divided into 60 minas, each of which was subdivided into 60 shekels (following the common Mesopotamian sexagesimal number system).

Thus in the Book of Kings we read that Naaman “bound two talents of silver in two bags, with two changes of garments, and laid them upon two of his servants; and they bare them before him”.

[21] According to Seltman, the original Homeric talent was probably the gold equivalent of the value of an ox or a cow.

[26] An Attic talent of silver was the value of nine man-years of skilled work, according to known wage rates from 377 BC.

The German historian Friedrich Hultsch calculated a range of 36.15 to 37.2 kg based on such estimates as the weight of one full Aeginetan metretes of coins, and concluded that the Aeginetan talent represented the water weight of a Babylonian ephah: 36.29 kg by his reckoning (the metretes and the ephah were units of volume).

[dubious – discuss][citation needed] The talent (Hebrew: ככר, kikkar; Aramaic: קינטרא‎, qintara) in late Hebrew antiquity (c. 500 CE) was the greatest unit of weight in use at the time, and which weight varied depending on the era.

kikkar) would have amounted to 2,343 of these silver coins in specie (27.328 kilograms (60.25 lb)), in addition to the minuscule weight of 12 ma’in (10.08 grammes).

[38] The use of the word "talent" to mean "gift or skill" in English and other languages originated from an interpretation of this parable sometime late in the 13th century.

[41] According to Epiphanius, the talent is called mina (maneh) among the Hebrews, and was the equivalent in weight to one-hundred denarii.