How many scruples are in one stone?

One stone contains approximately 4,898 scruples. This is 6,350 grams divided by 1.296 grams per scruple.

How do I convert stones to scruples?

Multiply stones by 4,898. For example, 10 stones equals about 48,980 scruples.

When was this conversion historically relevant?

In 19th-century British medicine, when physicians weighed patients in stones and prescribed drugs in scruples, making implicit conversion between these units a clinical skill.

Stones to Scruples (st to s ap) Converter

1 st = 4,900 s ap

1 Stone equals 4,900 Scruples (1 st = 4,900 s ap). Convert Stones to Scruples with formula, table, and examples.

One stone equals approximately 4,898 scruples. The scruple, an obsolete apothecary unit of about 1.296 grams, divides the stone's 14 pounds into nearly 5,000 pharmaceutical doses. This conversion connects British body weight with historical pharmacy, relevant when dose calculations reference both patient weight in stones and drug doses in scruples.

How to Convert Stones to Scruples

s ap = st × 4,900

Multiply the value in Stones by 4,900

Take your value in Stones
Multiply by 4,900
Read the result in Scruples

Common Stones to Scruples Conversions

Stones (st)	Scruples (s ap)	Status
0.01 st	49 s ap
0.05 st	245 s ap
0.1 st	490 s ap
0.5 st	2,450 s ap
1 st	4,900 s ap
2 st	9,800 s ap
5 st	24,500 s ap
8 st	39,200 s ap
10 st	49,000 s ap
14 st	68,600 s ap
20 st	98,000 s ap
50 st	245,000 s ap
100 st	490,000 s ap

Good to Know About Stones to Scruples Conversion

The stone-scruple conversion captures the daily clinical reality of pre-metric British medicine. The doctor weighed the patient in stones; the pharmacist dispensed medicine in scruples. Between them, an implicit conversion translated body size into drug dose, a calculation that is now formalized as 'milligrams per kilogram' but was once an art of medical judgment linking stones to scruples.

Stones to Scruples: What You Need to Know

19th-century British physicians prescribed medications in scruples to patients whose weight was known in stones. Weight-adjusted dosing required the physician to mentally estimate how many scruples of drug were appropriate for a patient of a given stone weight.

What is a Stone? st

A British unit of mass equal to 14 pounds or approximately 6.35 kilograms. Commonly used in the UK and Ireland for body weight.

Imperial body weight (UK/Ireland) horse racing

Learn more about Stone →

What is a Scruple? s ap

An apothecary scruple equals 20 grains or 1/3 of a dram apothecary (1.2959782 grams). A historical pharmaceutical unit largely replaced by metric measurements.

Apothecaries historical pharmacy historical medicine

Learn more about Scruple →

Going the other way? Use our Scruples to Stones converter.

Stones to Scruples FAQ

One stone contains approximately 4,898 scruples. This is 6,350 grams divided by 1.296 grams per scruple.
Multiply stones by 4,898. For example, 10 stones equals about 48,980 scruples.
In 19th-century British medicine, when physicians weighed patients in stones and prescribed drugs in scruples, making implicit conversion between these units a clinical skill.

Non-Frequently Asked Questions About Stones to Scruples

Questions nobody should ask - but someone did.

A 12-stone patient at one scruple per stone would receive 12 scruples (about 15.6 grams) of medication. Whether this was safe depended entirely on the drug. Twelve scruples of aspirin would be a high but survivable dose; twelve scruples of arsenic would be immediately lethal. Victorian dosing precision left much to be desired.
If scruples scaled linearly with body mass, a 10-stone person should have 48,980 moral scruples, which would make them essentially immobile with ethical hesitation. In practice, moral scruples are distributed without regard to body mass, which is probably for the best.
It is certainly one of the most historically British. Both units were actively used in British medical practice during the 18th and 19th centuries: stones on the doctor's scale, scruples on the pharmacist's balance. Their simultaneous use in a single patient encounter was the daily reality of pre-metric British healthcare.