troy1
/trɔɪ
/(in full troy weight)
noun
A system of weights used mainly for precious metals and gems, with a pound of 12 ounces or 5,760 grains: [as modifier]: gold closed at $332.5 a troy ounce [postpositive]: pounds troy...Compare with avoirdupois.
- One troy pound weighs 373.25 g and is subdivided into troy ounces, pennyweight and grains (gr, 24 in a pennyweight).
- My personal estimate is that this might price monetary-reserve gold at somewhere between US $800 and US $1,000 a troy ounce; I may be underestimating the price, but the estimate illustrates the point.
- Gold had a glittering year, up nearly 6% to $452.85 a troy ounce at the end of November, as investors frightened by the dollar's slide scrambled to secure this so-called safe haven.
Origin
Late Middle English: from a weight used at the fair of Troyes (see Troyes).
Rhymes
Troy2
/trɔɪ/(In Homeric legend) the city of King Priam, besieged for ten years by the Greeks during the Trojan War. It was regarded as having been a purely legendary city until Heinrich Schliemann identified the mound of Hissarlik on the NE Aegean coast of Turkey as the site of Troy. The city was apparently sacked and destroyed by fire in the mid 13th century bc, a period coinciding with the Mycenaean civilization of Greece. Also called Ilium.