Set of Theresian weights and measures

Along with other reforms in the monarchy, Empress Maria Theresa wanted to get rid of the great confusion in measuring methods. She entrusted this task in 1756 to a distinguished expert, a Vienna University professor of mathematics, astronomy and experimental physics, Father Josef Franz. Based on Franz’s ideas and under his guidance, a set of prototype standardized weights and measures was made the same year, which Maria Theresa then legislated. The prototypes were distributed to all the capitals of the Austrian provinces, which had to have a principal metrological bureau, and to a further eleven branch offices. In 1872 the Ljubljana city administration donated the prototypes to the provincial museum after introduction of the decimal metric system in the monarchy. The National Museum of Slovenia thus today keeps: a prototype for the Viennese Klafter (fathom) (1.89635 m), a prototype of the Viennese Metze (61.49 litres) and the corresponding half and quarter of a Metze, prototype for a half, quarter and eighth of a Mass (1.4 litres), a prototype for a Zentner (56 kg) and a universal prototype, a Quadrantal in the shape of a cube. The edges of the cube are one Viennese foot, and the weight of water contained in the cube is 56 Viennese Pfunds (pounds). The universal prototype could also be used to determine a Viennese Metze, Eimer and Mass. The famous Slovene mathematician and soldier Jurij Vega tried to introduce a decimal system of measurements in 1800, but his efforts bore no fruit in the conservative monarchy. The Theresian measures thus remained in use right up to 1871, when the decimal system was finally legislated.