2 Kings 6:25 · measurement explained
One quarter kab during Samaria's famine
The siege famine is depicted through shocking market prices, including five pieces of silver for a quarter-kab of an undesirable substance.
Read the verse first
There was a great famine in Samaria. Behold, they besieged it until a donkey’s head was sold for eighty pieces of silver, and the fourth part of a kab of dove’s dung for five pieces of silver.
World English Bible · engwebp-source-2026-09-12
Modern measurement range
One quarter kab
250–300 mL
1.06–1.27 US cups · 8.8–10.6 Imp fl oz
Using the kab estimate. Capacity reconstructions vary; a container volume does not by itself reveal the mass of its contents.
Calculate another amount →The small volume helps readers feel scarcity. The unidentified silver pieces cannot responsibly be converted into a current cash price.
What this conversion does—and does not—show
It gives a defensible modern scale for the amount stated in the verse. Ancient standards varied by time and place, so the endpoints are deliberately approximate. A volume is not a food mass, a metal weight is not a modern cash value, and a conversion does not settle a textual, archaeological, or theological debate.
Conversion references: ESV weights and measures ↗, American Bible Society ↗, and Encyclopedia of the Bible ↗. Reference pages accessed October 10, 2026.