How much is a "round" of butter? This is in an old pound cake recipe

Looks like a misprint for Pound. The point of Pound Cake is that you use the same amount of each ingredient - for example, a pound.

A round of bread or butter seems to be a term that is used by some English speakers, but I'm not sure where from. I'm not sure what equivalent measurement it has, if it even has an exact measurement, but I think it has the idea of an entire piece of butter.

Survey of English Dialects:

Slices of bread alongside a round of butter and a hillock of sea or river salt was neatly presented on a plate deliberately pottered with bits missing.

from a restaurant review

 

The butter is weighed into balls either the size of those sweet tiny pats (used in restaurants and on airplanes), the most popular round 220 g block (not sure if it is called a block if it is round…) or the sleek rectangular blocks (very sexy in their shiny silver wrapping, with the label stamp-pressed on) for restaurant use.

Pepe is making a special round of butter for our breakfast

from http://mondaymorningcookingclub.com.au

I'm guessing you are young. It weren't long ago we kept butter on the table in a covered round dish and the butter inside the dish sat on ice chips to stay cool (I can't add any extra pics because Pussykins is lying on my other arm).

The butter molds were round and the ones for home use were generally 1/2 pound, 1 pound up to 2 pound. Some housewives made their own butter, some ordered butter, some ordered butter then re-molded into fancy shapes to impress company. [Butter Molds] (http://dairyantiques.com/Butter_Molds.html)

The very definition of a pound cake is a cake that is made of a pound each of butter, sugar, flour, and eggs -- that is why is was called a pound cake. It's a simple misprint.

Fyi, a pound of flour may be given in the recipe as about 4 1/4 cups. A pound of sugar measures out at about 2 1/4 cups. For a pound of eggs, use 9 medium, 8 large, or 7 extra large. (Eggs sizes aren't 100% reliable and sizing is done by total container weight, not individual eggs, but these numbers should get you close, if you don't have a scale.) Oh, and by the way, a pound of butter displaces 2 cups.

Pound cake recipes can be found with infinite variations, but the one-pound weight of each of the above ingredients is the reason it was named pound cake hundreds of years ago.

I believe the word "round" is a misprint and that it should read "pound". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pound_cake - you'll find this link from Wikipedia useful. "Pound cake refers to a type of cake traditionally made with a pound of each of four ingredients: flour, butter, eggs, and sugar. However, any cake made with a 1:1:1:1 ratio, by weight, of flour, butter, eggs, and sugar may also be called a pound cake, as it yields the same results."