An ancient unit of length, roughly the distance from a person's elbow to the tip of their middle finger, used in building and measurement across many ancient civilizations.
From Latin cubitus meaning 'elbow,' from Proto-Indo-European *keub- meaning 'to bend.' The word literally describes the body part used to measure, and it evolved to mean the measurement itself.
The cubit was humanity's first personal measuring tape—your own body was the standard tool, which means a cubit varied from person to person, making ancient construction a game of proportional trial-and-error!
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