<P> The Classical Mesopotamian system formed the basis for Elamite, Hebrew, Urartian, Hurrian, Hittite, Ugaritic, Phoenician, Babylonian, Assyrian, Persian, Arabic, and Islamic metrologies . The Classical Mesopotamian System also has a proportional relationship, by virtue of standardized commerce, to Bronze Age Harappan and Egyptian metrologies . </P> <P> In 1916, during the last years of the Ottoman Empire and in the middle of World War I, the German assyriologist Eckhard Unger found a copper - alloy bar while excavating at Nippur . The bar dates from c. 2650 BC and Unger claimed it was used as a measurement standard . This irregularly formed and irregularly marked graduated rule supposedly defined the Sumerian cubit as about 518.6 mm (20.42 in). </P> <P> The Near Eastern or Biblical cubit is usually estimated as approximately 457 mm (18 in). Epiphanius of Salamis, in his treatise On Weights and Measures, describes how it was customary, in his day, to take the measurement of the biblical cubit: "The cubit is a measure, but it is taken from the measure of the forearm . For the part from the elbow to the wrist and the palm of the hand is called the cubit, the middle finger of the cubit measure being also extended at the same time and there being added below (it) the span, that is, of the hand, taken all together ." </P> <P> In ancient Greek units of measurement, the standard forearm cubit (Greek: πῆχυς pēkhys) measured approximately 0.46 m (18 in). The short forearm cubit (πυγμή pygmē, lit . "fist"), from the wrist to the elbow, measured approximately 0.34 m (13 in). </P>

What is the measurement of a cubit in the bible