Steelyard - 300lb

These large scales shows that Herberts produced weighing equipment for small dry items such as tea to very large, heavy products such as bags of grain, sugar and his case whole meat carcasses. This steelyard would be used in a butcher's shop. In the days before supermarkets, specialist butchers could be found in every town and village high street. They usually bought their carcass meat from wholesale markets such as Smithfield and hung them on the hooks shown. When the meat is placed on the hooks, the horizontal beam rises. The metal ball is then moved along the beam until it returns to the horizontal. The precise weight of the meat can then be read - the beam has a series of weights marked along its length. 

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