Talk:League (unit)

message: I posted this question also in Talk:Ancient_Roman_units_of_measurement, but it may also be good to ask the same question on this side. It is just a question out of curiosity. The article Ancient Roman units of measurement states that 1 mile is equivalent in Ancient Rome to 5000 ft, while 1 league is 7500 ft. Hence: 1 league is 1.5 mile. However this article states that 1 league is 3 miles in Ancient Rome (quote: "The league was used by Ancient Rome, which defined it as being 3 miles."). Which is true? Brynnar 18:26, 15 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This sounds like folk etymology to me. The Roman legions are known to have made 30 miles a day when travelling (including camp pitching, cooking etc), much much farther than one league. Rhialto 09:02, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  League = 1.5 miles or 3 miles? 

message: Perhaps have it, instead of listing several books where it's used, how about having it just say that it is commonly used in fictional literature, and give 1 or 2 examples? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 144.118.197.217 (talk) 01:37, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I changed it. 62.20.156.137 22:23, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Was it you that added "We don't need to list every fantasy novel, one is enough!"? Well, now the impression is that David Eddings is the only one using it (except Jules Verne). Let me see if I can't clarify this further. CapnZapp (talk) 16:10, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Leagues in fiction 

message: I reverted the latest change in conversions using templates, with undue precision, and with the original measurements no longer listed first.  I'll do it again if it is done on this massive basis without discussion.  Gene Nygaard (talk) 15:33, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Improper change in conversions

message: The wording of the Hay-Herbert Treaty (Alaska boundary treaty, 1903) uses the phrase "ten marine leagues from the sea".  Was a marine league the same as a terrestrial league?Skookum1 (talk) 05:36, 10 January 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: "Marine league"?

message: It'd be nice to have a little more information about the timeline of the unit's popularity; i.e., when it began to decline in popularity, why, and what replaced it (and did it survive/perish in some applications longer/faster than others?) OhNoitsJamie Talk 13:37, 1 May 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Usage...when did it become obsolete?

message: This information is listed under Brazil however during the mid 1800s French scientists such as Fizeau did occasionally use them as well. For example Fizeau gives his velocity of light as "70,948 leagues [per second] of 25 to the degree"
Thepossumdance  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.61.15.63 (talk) 17:03, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  League of X degrees 

message: I removed the link from here to Anthropic units due to doubts over the notability or even existence of that concept in the context of measurements; there's some discussion at Talk:Anthropic units#Article title. Joe Kress has restored it, with this edit summary: "rv - see lede - league is the distance a person can walk in one hour, and indeed walking speed is typically 3 mph - it's anthropic, not anthropomorphic". In view of my personal doubts about the use of the word "anthropic" in this context, I'd be pleased and interested to see some reference for that statement. "Anthropic" does not have that meaning in any dictionary I own. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 12:49, 28 September 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: You are missing the point.   You want to delete the anthropic units article, or at least, you blanked 90% of it and then started removing links from several other articles.  This will create a navigation problem.  You fix the underlying problem, THEN figure out if links need to be added, edited, or removed.  Otherwise, when the issue is settled, you then make a bunch of people have to go back and do manual searches to find which articles had links removed instead of the far more efficient use of the "What links here" link that allows a person to quickly spot related articles.  Montanabw(talk) 17:10, 28 September 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Anthropic? 

message: I'm curious, was the hour over which a league was mentioned a temporal hour? That is, at one point, hours were defined to be 1/12 of the the light portion of a day, and consequently varied in length from winter to summer. Was the league measurement being used in conjunction with this definition of hour, so that leagues varied both by terrain and time of year?Plantdrew (talk) 21:53, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Temporal Hour? 

message: I propose to eliminate the section on Use in fiction from this article, per WP:TRIVIA. It adds nothing to the understanding of what a league is. I note that we do not have similar trivia lists in articles on other units of measurement such as Foot (unit) and Pint. Does anyone disagree? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 13:16, 8 February 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Use in fiction 

message: The article has an unsubstantiated claim that the term league is used in Australia, particularly western NSW, to refer to the distance travelled by car in an hour. I have lived and travelled for years in western NSW, and have never heard of this application of the word - or of anyone who has ever heard of it in this sense. It is interesting that a google search of this claim brings up several dozen sites, using word for word the statement in this article. Without any citation, they are all copying each other. I believe this section is a fiction inserted by someone as a joke, and recommend it be deleted. Ptilinopus (talk) 06:00, 29 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  League in Australia? 

message: The following information about leagues was copied from the Mile article. I have placed it here so that if someone finds any of it of use for this article in can be merged in.
Length (m)	Name                                            	Country used             	From	To	Definition                                     	Remarks
2,220     	Gallo-Roman league                              	Gallo-Roman culture      	    	  	1.5 miles                                      	Under the reign of Emperor Septimius Severus’, this replaced the Roman mile as the official unit of distance in the Gallic and Germanic provinces, although there were regional and temporal variations.Pre-metric units of length
2,470     	                                                	Sardinia, Piemont        	    	  	                                               	
2,622     	                                                	Scotland                 	    	  	                                               	
2,880     	                                                	Ireland                  	    	  	                                               	
3,780     	                                                	Flanders                 	    	  	                                               	
3,898     	French lieue (post league)                      	France                   	    	  	2000 "body lengths"                            	
4,000     	general or metric league                        	                         	    	  	                                               	
4,000     	legue                                           	Guatemala                	    	  	                                               	
4,190     	legue                                           	Mexico                   	    	  	= 2500 tresas = 5000 varas                     	
4,444.8   	landleuge                                       	                         	    	  	1/25° of a circle of longitude                 	
4,452.2   	lieue commune                                   	France                   	    	  	                                               	Units of measurement in France before the French Revolution
4,513     	legue                                           	Paraguay                 	    	  	                                               	
4,513     	legua                                           	Chile, (Guatemala, Haiti)	    	  	= 36 cuadros = 5400 varas                      	
4,808     	                                                	Switzerland              	    	  	                                               	
4,828     	English land league                             	England                  	    	  	3 miles                                        	
4,8004,900	Germanic rasta, also doppelleuge (double league)	                         	    	  	                                               	
5,000     	légua nova                                      	Portugal                 	    	  	                                               	
5,196     	legua                                           	Bolivia                  	    	  	= 40 ladres                                    	
5,152     	legua argentina                                 	Argentina, Buenos Aires  	    	  	= 6000 varas                                   	
5,154     	legue                                           	Uruguay                  	    	  	                                               	
5,200     	Bolivian legua                                  	Bolivia                  	    	  	                                               	
5,370     	legue                                           	Venezuela                	    	  	                                               	
5,500     	Portuguese legua                                	Portugal                 	    	  	                                               	
5,510     	legue                                           	Ecuador                  	    	  	                                               	
5,510     	Ecuadorian legua                                	Ecuador                  	    	  	                                               	
5,532.5   	Landleuge(state league)                         	Prussia                  	    	  	                                               	
5,540     	legue                                           	Honduras                 	    	  	                                               	
5,556     	Seeleuge (nautical league)                      	                         	    	  	1/20° of a circle of longitude 3 nautical miles	
5,570     	legua                                           	Spain and Chile          	    	  	                                               	Spanish customary units
5,572     	legua                                           	Kolumbien                	    	  	= 3 Millas                                     	
5,572.7   	legue                                           	Peru                     	    	  	= 20,000 feet                                  	
5,572.7   	legua antiguaold league                         	Spain                    	    	  	= 3 millas = 15,000 feet                       	
5,590     	légua                                           	Brazil                   	    	  	= 5,000 varas = 2,500 bracas                   	
5,600     	Brazilian legua                                 	Brazil                   	    	  	                                               	
6,197     	légua antiga                                    	Portugal                 	    	  	= 3 milhas = 24 estadios                       	
6,687.24  	legua nuevanew league, since 1766               	Spain                    	    	  	= 8000 Varas                                   	
;Notes
|}</div>
-- PBS (talk) 16:47, 7 August 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Information move from the [[Mile]] article 

message: Given that the original definition of the metre is  = 90 degress of latitude (through the Paris meridian), the leagues of 20 and 25 to a degree are exactly 107/(20×90) = 5555. m and 07/(25×90) = 4444. m, as expected.  But the Légua of 18 by degree = 6,172.4 metres doesn't fit the pattern, being 0.43950617 m short.
Any sources that can back up this apparent contradiction?  Perhaps it's supposed to be 6172.84, and the 8 was lost in a typo?  71.41.210.146 (talk) 04:26, 12 January 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: It's almost certainly a typo, yes, considering that the league of 18 to the degree has one less significant figure than the other two, but regardless, a 0.44 m difference over 6,172 m is a difference of about 71 parts per million, which I think is well over the measurement uncertainties of 16th–18th Century instruments.  At any rate, be bold! --Wtrmute (talk) 10:59, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Shouldn't the Légua of 18 by degree be 10<sup>7</sup>/(18&times;90) = 6172.83950617284... m? 

message: In the table this is stated: Though the NM was defined on the basis of the minute, it varies from the equatorial minute, because at that time people could only estimate the circumference of the equator to be 40,000 km.  However, as the NM was defined from the minute of latitude, not the minute of "equatorial longitude" (if such an expression exists in English), the statement that the difference is due to bad knowledge at the time, is not true but built on a misunderstanding.  Thus I suggest that the cited comment is removed from the article.  Fomalhaut76 (talk) 11:26, 11 October 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Nautical mile and the circumference of the Equator 

message: This sentence is not supported by the reference given (which is a glossary entry on the word "league" in a book covering events between 1897 and 1901), and furthermore, what is supported is already covered by the section on the definition of the league in Spain. Can anyone find a better source for this? Or should it just be removed? (Not to mention the elephant in the room, being the use of "Perhaps") Tkanus dialogue 15:21, 27 September 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Perhaps in some rural parts of Mexico, the [Spanish league] is still used..." 

message: There's much much more in the Chardon article already cited, some of which corrects the page's current errors, for anyone who has access to JSTOR papers. — LlywelynII 04:49, 5 February 2023 (UTC)
thread_title: Sources for future article expansion/correction

message: I would like to remove the claim that a league "may have" originally been the distance a person could walk in an hour.  Citation or not, it is patently ridiculous. Back in the time of ancient Celts nobody had wrist watches. An hour was meaningless to people walking around and would not have been used to define distance. FatBear1 (talk) 04:29, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Origin of the term  

message: The table needs an additional column for Miles.  In the United States we don't use meters or kilometers very much.  Although we can convert a single distance fairly easily (I have 1609.344 permanently memorized), doing a zillion for comparison purposes is a pain, especially when we are trying to see if any might make some sense when reading books written hundreds of years ago.  agb 143.43.152.60 (talk) 20:34, 29 March 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Table "Miles" column needed