Ancient dimensioning systems combined human and geodetic measure, so that a building embodied, quite literally, characteristics of it’s occupants and the world. We have inherited an ancient international system of measure whose numbers had geodetic, human, and spiritual meaning. The dimensions and ratios are found in the architecture of dynastic Egypt, classical Greece and Rome, medieval Europe and preindustrial Japan.

Fingerbanger 1: Miles Davis – Rated X (Doc Scott Remix) (don lowed)

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Our twelve-inch foot is such a dimension; it is 1/360,000 of 1/360 (one degree) of the circumference of the earth, accurate to 99 percent. Did these cultures really know so precisely the size of the earth? They may well have known it even more accurately, for 360 was probably a convention for the length of a year.

Fingerbanger 2: Hibahihi + Silent Poets – Nine 9 (K.U.D.O. Remix) (don lowed)

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The real circumference of the Earth 364.6 x 360,000 feet, a figure so close to the real number of days in a year that one suspects the ancients had a reason to use the discrepancy deliberately; a multiplier of 365 makes the foot accurate to 99.9 percent.They would have reveled in that 5 day gap: 5 x 6 x 12 = 360, each number endowed with the sacred meaning and closely tied to human scale, the size of the earth, and the annual cycle.

Fingerbanger 3: Pangaea – Bear Witness (don lowed)

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The Egyptian version of the foot was 12.25 inches, and the Japanese shaku is 11.93 inches. The geodetic numbers were conventionalized to represent human dimensions, all of which fit into the duodecimal system, the 12 inch foot; the eighteen inch cubit (length from the elbow to tip of the middle finger); and the six foot man, whose midpoint is 3 feet, the English yard. The tatami, the Japanese measure of area, is three feet by six feet. Our square yard is 3 feet by three feet.

Fingerbanger 4: Rhythm & Sound – Dem Never Know (feat. Jah Cotton) (don lowed)

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Unlike the ancients, we tend not to believe we can tap into the power of the gods simply by making something three feet wide or six feet high, or by using a special ratio such as the Golden Section. We have no such innocence, and yet, when we use their geodetic-human measures and ratios, our designs do link our bodies to the earth and to time. – The Old Way of Seeing, Jonathan Hale

Fingerbanger 5: Bugge Wesseltoft – Existence (don lowed)

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