Vedro

Russian (Imperial)Historical unit (no longer in standard use)Approximate value

The Russian 'bucket', about 12.3 L (ten shtofs). The standard Russian liquid measure until metrication.

1 vedro = 12.29941 liters (approximately).

Approximate value. Standards for the vedro varied by place and period, so this converter uses the most commonly cited value. Treat results as estimates, not exact figures.

About the vedro

Vedro means bucket in Russian, and the unit was the main liquid measure of the Russian Empire, used for wine, vodka and other drinks. Wholesale spirits were counted in vedros and in the bochka, a barrel of 40 vedros holding about 492 L.

Peter the Great did not scrap the old Russian units but redefined them against English ones. The liquid vedro was fixed at exactly 750 cubic inches, which gives 12.29941 L, or about 2.7 imperial gallons. A separate dry vedro of 800 cubic inches, about 13.12 L, was used for grain, so the word has two values depending on the goods.

Smaller liquid units were fractions of it: a bottle of vodka was one twentieth, a kruzhka one tenth, a charka one hundredth, and the standard shtof one tenth in the 19th century. Metric units became optional in Russia in 1900, compulsory in the Russian SFSR in 1918, and the Soviet Union dropped the old measures officially in 1925.

Sources: Wikipedia: Vedro; Wikipedia: Obsolete Russian units of measurement

Vedro conversion chart

1 vedro expressed in every other volume unit:

More Russian (Imperial) units

• charka (volume)
• shtof (volume)
• vershok (length)
• arshin (length)
• sazhen (length)
• verst (length)
• zolotnik (weight & mass)
• funt (Russian pound) (weight & mass)
• pood (weight & mass)

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