# Units of measurement in times of yore



## Dave Watson (Sep 3, 2012)

So, half of my WIP is based on a Scottish island in the tenth century. Anyone know how they measured time and distances in that time period? At the moment, I've got them referring to miles and hours, but I've a feeling that's historically inaccurate!


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## Olly Buckle (Sep 3, 2012)

Not sure how it would have worked in Scotland, but in England they would have been using 'sun' hours. Before time was measured by the clock (o'clock) the day was split into twelve hours of darkness, twelve of light so winter hours were shorter than summer hours during the day. Six am was the dawn, twelve was noon, six pm sunset, the height above the horizon gave you the hour. It worked well in an English agricultural economy where most work had to be done in summer, but the difference must have been almost unmanageable when you got well north. o'sun got dropped for o'clock in England about the end of the fourteenth century when clocks became widespread and reasonably accurate. The terms 'o'clock' and 'o'sun' were only adopted when the two were running in parallel of course.

Sorry, missed the spatial measures, I don't know, but miles seems reasonable to me, it is an old measure, a Roman mile was a thousand legion paces. Of course that gives the lie to it, that would have to be less than 1760 yards, the truth is they probably used the name, but there was no standard measure


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## Bloggsworth (Sep 3, 2012)

In an isolated community, time in the 10thC would have been measured in terms of daylight; up with the sun, bed with the sun with innacurate sub-divisions, that was all that was neccessary; the week was of course 7 suns; and in an agrarian society there would have been 13 months (moons) in a year - the Julian calendar may have been ignored for practical purposes. As far as distance goes, it would to a great degree depend on the size of the island. If a large island, long distances may have been measured in walking time, half a day to here, quarter day to there, that sort of thing. For smaller measurements the cubit was pretty universal (Tip of the fingers to the elbow), as was tip of the thumb to the first knuckle or 3 barleycorns for one inch; "A hand" was approximately 4" and there were 3 hands to the foot (Try it, measure across the knuckles at the base of the fingers and check if it is 1/3 of the length of your foot!), in England the "Yardstick", the distance from the nose to the tip of the fingers on one arm, became official some 200 years later, it is unclear when it was first defined as a standard and whether it included Scotland as it was an independent kingdom at the time.


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## Cran (Sep 4, 2012)

*Olly* - the _pace_, or _passus_ (from _mille passuum_) was a double stride - left foot to left foot - a _passus_ was roughly five feet (either the Romans had shorter legs, or they didn't want to kick their skirts too high when marching). 

Before King Henry did his nose-to-thumb thing, a _yard_ was a single stride - the old _mile_, which varied a lot all around England and surrounds, was therefore 2000 _old_ _yards_, or 1000 _old paces_. 



Dave Watson said:


> So, half of my WIP is based on a Scottish island in the tenth century. Anyone know how they measured time and distances in that time period? At the moment, I've got them referring to miles and hours, but I've a feeling that's historically inaccurate!


 In the tenth century, most of the islands, and a decent chunk of the Scots mainland, were under Scandinavian influence or control. The rest were Pictish or Gaelic (Alba and/or Scotia) in the north, and Brythonic (old Brits) or Northumbrian in the south. I'd begin with a brief study of Scotland in the High Middle Ages. So, the terms used for measurement would depend firstly on which island. 

For all sorts of old Imperial measurements, see Imperial Measures of Length

What makes the Scandinavian influence interesting is that the old Norse _mil_ was a _"long mile" _which was 36000 feet, but (it gets better!) depending upon whether your Scots Islander had Norwegian or Swedish tribal heritage, the length of the foot varied; an old Norsk mil was about 1000 modern feet longer than the old Svensk mil. A similar measure was the _rast_ (rest or pause), considered a fair walking distance before taking a break. 

Fun and games also happen if you want to use the _league_, because some old cultures defined the league by distance (anywhere from 1.5 to 3 _miles_), others by time (the walked distance covered in one _hour_ - and of course, you know about the _hour_, don't you?).


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## Dave Watson (Sep 4, 2012)

Cran said:


> In the tenth century, most of the islands, and a decent chunk of the Scots mainland, were under Scandinavian influence or control. The rest were Pictish or Gaelic (Alba and/or Scotia) in the north, and Brythonic (old Brits) or Northumbrian in the south. I'd begin with a brief study of Scotland in the High Middle Ages. So, the terms used for measurement would depend firstly on which island.
> 
> For all sorts of old Imperial measurements, see Imperial Measures of Length
> 
> ...



Cheers Cran. The story's based on the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides, which in the tenth century was still mainly under Norse control, though there was a lot of power shifting back and forth between the Vikings and Scots rulers around that time as far as I've been able to discover. 

What I know about the _hour _is that it consists of sixty minutes, and that there are 24 of them in a day. If you know something I don't, please expand!


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## Cran (Sep 4, 2012)

As already noted by *Olly* and *Bloggs*, hours were originally flexible and/or locally arbitrary. The ancient Egyptians and contemporaries divided things into ten hours of daylight, two hours of twilight, and twelve hours of darkness (or night); this meant that some hours were longer or shorter than others, depending upon the time of day, and the time of year. 

At some point, the Greeks introduced the concept of equinoctal hours - the twenty four equal divisions we still use today - but in isolated agrarian communities, the earlier system prevailed even after mechanical clocks became popular wedding gifts. For farmers, the sun ruled the day; the time allotted to outside tasks. Regardless of the time of year, it was always six hours to noon, and another six to night.


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## Olly Buckle (Sep 4, 2012)

> What I know about the hour is that it consists of sixty minutes, and that there are 24 of them in a day. If you know something I don't, please expand!


I think Cran might be referring to my post, before clocks hours varied in length according to the time of year so they accommodated twelve hours light, twelve hours dark.


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## dolphinlee (Sep 29, 2012)

I think you can forget about measuring time accurately.  The people of the island would be crofters fishermen and shepherds. 
They would get up at first light and go to bed at sundown.  They would know by the position of the sun how far along the day was. However, on Lewis the days are often cloudy and the sun is not visible. Before the advent of time pieces people were more tuned to the 'time' of the day. People didn't have lunch at 12.38. They had lunch somewhere around the 'time' when the sun was at its highest position. 

Only important people need to tell time.  Alfred the Great invented the candle clock.  At the time there were sundials but these were outside and not much use in rainy weather.  If you are scheduling many meetings in a day you need an accurate way to measure time.  If you are spending all day weaving tweed then you do not.

measurements - Lewis was under Norwegian influence Norwegian units of measurement - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Two facts you might use.  Peat was and is still used for heating in Lewis. (And a damned poor fuel it is!)

If you have people weaving tweed don't forget to say it was put outside in a stone cattle trough and the men urinated on it when they walked past.  Urine was also collected in every home.  This sortens the cloth and makes it less scratchy.


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