The history of weighing - The Herbert Group
7000BC
Equal armed balance scale used by Sumerians for weighing precious metals and gems.
3000BC
Beam scales used by Egyptians for general trade purposes.
55BC
Steelyard scales introduced to Britain by Romans.
1215
Magna Carta declaration of uniformity of weights.
1352
Act of Parliament forbade the use of Old Bismar Steelyard.
1669
Discovery of parallelogram mechanism by Gilles de Roberval.
1760
John Wood starts trading at the sign of the Angel and Scales in Queen Street, Cheapside, City of London.
1810
French scalemakers use Roberval "Static Enigma".
1840
Pocket sized beam scales for gold sovereigns sold by Herbert for the California goldrush.
1868
Thomas Herbert purchases the scalemaking business from the Wood family.
Acts passed forming basis for today's weights & measures laws.
1906
First indicating fan scales introduced.
1972
First electronic digital scale in UK introduced by Herbert.
1985
First scanner scale developed and sold in the UK by Herbert.
1995
All prepacked products must be sold in metric units.
1999
All loose produce must be sold in metric units.
1999
25,000+ supermarket imperial/metric conversions by Herbert Retail.
2009
Herbert Retail is the first manufaturing company in the world to achieve ISO22000 standard for food safety.