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General => The Common Room => Topic started by: Cazza47 on Thursday 08 November 12 19:57 GMT (UK)
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I have been to the archives today and was looking at a map from 1846. It showed apportionment of the rent charge in lieu of tithes. It listed fields in the area and under the title 'quantities in statute measure' there was 3 columns of numbers -- A -- R -- P, could anyone tell me what these letters represent please? I presume it shows the size of the field but have no idea what these letters are.
Carol
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It's Acres, Roods and Perches, isn't it?
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Added: Er ... there are 40 square perches to a rood, and 160 square perches to an acre.
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Acres, rods and perches or poles
1 acre = 4840 sq yards
1 rod or perch/pole = 5 1/2 yards or 30 1/4 sq yards
Nell
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I have heard of acres but rods, perches and poles sound like they belong on a fishing site!!!
Thank you both very much.
Carol
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These measures were printed on the back cover of our exercise books in primary school in the 1950s......
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These measures were printed on the back cover of our exercise books in primary school in the 1950s......
Along with other stuff such as stones, lbs and oz, (weight) £ s d (money) and furlongs and chains, (distance) A chain was I recall 22yds long or 66feet. Something still used today as that is the length of a cricket pitch.
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There is a category for Weights & Measures in the
RootsChat Reference (http://www.rootschat.com/forum/Themes/history/images/english/library.gif) (http://surname.rootschat.com/lexicon/index.php) => Lexicon (click here) (http://surname.rootschat.com/lexicon/reflib-lexicon.php?letter=L)
with a couple of topics about land measurements and imperial measurements.
These include discussions and external links.
regards,
Bob
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Note as with many things measurements were not standardised in the past.
An acre for instance was not the same in different parts of the country in medieval times.
Even the time of day varied across the UK prior to the railway era.
Cheers
Guy
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Hi Guy,
while we're on the subject (of standards) .... what about height - Was that a standard measurement in Britain ?
I saw a query on a german forum about this and ended up finding a book where heights at different times in all the different german states were listed :(
They all talked of "Foot" (often in connection with the minimum height for soldiers) but each state had a different measurement for it. So someone could be a soldier in one state but was too small in another state.
regards,
Bob
added: table of 'foot' (Fuß) measurements; 2nd column is length in metres.
Note that the english 'foot' is 0.964 of a viennese 'foot' (Wiener Fuß)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foot_%28unit%29#Pre-1959
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Coming back to land measurements (i.e rods and roods) ....
On the Wiki page I quoted, if you stroll scroll down a bit you can find this:
The verification of the foot as described in the 16th century by Jacob Koebel in his book Geometrei. Von künstlichem Feldmessen und absehen is:[38]
Stand at the door of a church on a Sunday and bid 16 men to stop, tall ones and small ones, as they happen to pass out when the service is finished; then make them put their left feet one behind the other, and the length thus obtained shall be a right and lawful rood to measure and survey the land with, and the 16th part of it shall be the right and lawful foot.
and you can see the woodcut too:
Determination of the rod, using the length of the left foot of 16 randomly chosen people coming from church service. Woodcut published in the book Geometrei by Jakob Köbel (Frankfurt, c. 1536).
All in all, a very interesting article.
Bob
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Interestingly, my OH has an allotment today which is measured in rods for the calculation of rental.
We used to chant this at school for distances
12 inches = one foot
3 feet = one yard
22 yards = one chain
10 chains = one furlong
8 furlongs = one mile
4 rods, poles or perchs = 1 chain
10 chains = one furlong
8 furlongs = one mile
12 inches = one foot
3 feet = one yard
1760 yards = one mile
Weights were
16 ounces = 1lb (pound)
14 pounds = one stone
2 stone = one quarter
4 quarters = one hundredweight
20 hundredweight = one ton
2240 pounds = one ton
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For those who don't know, or may be interested, a "chain" was just that. A surveyor's instrument. Measuring tapes can stretch so surveyors have traditionally used metal chains to measure length. The metric ones have 10 links to the metre and were a bit of a pig to carry round.
A "furlong" is derived from the term a "furrow long"; i.e. the length of a medieval strip field usually ploughed by oxen.
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The original surveying chain - the Gunters chain, was 66ft long had 100 links so each one was equal to 7.92 inches.
Early surveyors used this bit of steel to measure the lenght and breadth of the UK, and produced maps so accurate even modern laser rangefinding and satellite mapping has alterered them only slightly.
Phil