Aught (/0)
Aught (/0) :
A unit used by jewelers and craftspeople to measure the size of small beads (often called seed beads). The measurement scale is inverted: larger numbers of aughts correspond to smaller beads. Beads of size 11/0, a common size, average a little less than 2 millimeters in diameter, and other sizes are more-or-less inversely proportional. The measure may have originated as the number of beads that could comfortably be strung on one inch of cord; with present sizes a string of n beads of size n/0 occupies about 0.8 inch (20 mm). The word aught, meaning zero, is a fairly recent corruption of the old English word naught, meaning nothing; apparently the phrase a naught, meaning a zero, came to be misspelled as an aught
No records Found