Arrobas (Spanish) to Grams (@ to g)

1 arroba (Spanish) equals 11,502.325 grams exactly.

1 arroba (Spanish) = 11,502.325 grams

How to convert arrobas (Spanish) to grams

To convert arrobas (Spanish) to grams, multiply the number of arrobas (Spanish) by 11,502.325. This factor is exact. To go the other way, multiply grams by 0.00008693894495 (rounded).

grams = arrobas (Spanish) × 11,502.325

Example: 10 arrobas (Spanish) = 115,023.25 grams.

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

About these units

Arroba (Spanish) (@)

Spanish & PortugueseHistorical unit (no longer in standard use)Approximate value

25 libras, about 11.5 kg. A Castilian weight (and a liquid volume unit); the '@' sign descends from its abbreviation.

Arabic ar-rubʿ, meaning a quarter, is the probable source of arroba, since the unit was the fourth part of a quintal. Moorish rule in Iberia left the word in Spanish and Portuguese, and Wikipedia repeats a tradition, without a source, that it approximated what a donkey could carry. In Castile the quintal was 100 libras, which makes the arroba 25 libras.

With the Castilian libra of 0.460093 kg set in the standard of 1801, the Spanish arroba comes to about 11.5 kg, the figure used here. Similar values were found in Catalonia, Aragon and Andalusia, while the Portuguese arroba was heavier at about 14.7 kg. The same name also applied to a liquid measure for wine and oil, so the word could mean either a weight or a volume depending on the trade.

Colonial administrations took the unit across the Atlantic, where it hardened into different national values: 15 kg in Brazilian cattle and cotton markets, and 12.5 kg in Colombia, Ecuador and Peru. In Spanish and Portuguese the at sign in email addresses is still called arroba, because the symbol was long used as shorthand for the unit.

1 arroba (Spanish) = 11.502325 kilograms (approximately).

Sources: Wikipedia: Arroba; Wikipedia: Spanish customary units

Gram (g)

Metric (SI)Current unit

One thousandth of a kilogram. The standard unit for food quantities and small objects.

A gram was once defined as a small drop of the natural world. The French National Convention of 1795 set it as the absolute weight of a volume of pure water equal to a cube one hundredth of a metre on each side, a cubic centimetre. The reference temperature was first the melting point of ice and was later changed to the temperature of maximum density of water, about 4 degrees Celsius. The word came into French as gramme, from Late Latin gramma, itself from the Greek for a letter or small mark; in Late Antiquity it meant about one twenty-fourth of an ounce.

The gram was the base unit of mass in the centimetre-gram-second system, but in 1960 the SI took the kilogram as its base unit, which made the gram one thousandth of it. That is why it appears in so many everyday places: it is the standard for non-liquid ingredients in cooking and shopping, and nutrition labels commonly list contents per 100 g. For a sense of scale, a small paper clip or a pen cap weighs about a gram, and a Japanese 1-yen coin is close to exactly that, while a US penny is around 2.5 g.

1 gram = 0.001 kilograms (exactly).

Sources: Wikipedia: Gram; Wikipedia: Kilogram

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