2. The Latin Countries
Italy
Here every state, almost every city, had a different standard of length. The foot was generally of Roman type = 11·67 inches, or of a very short type, = about 10·3 inches, referable possibly to half an Egyptian royal cubit, = 20·64 inches, a measure still extant in Egypt. There was usually also a braccio or cloth-ell of 23 to 26 inches, probably of Eastern origin.
In Lombardy the standard was the Luitprandi foot (pié Aliprandi) = 20·28 inches, with a corresponding pertica or rod of 12 piedi, usually = 20·23 feet. Legend refers this measure to the foot-length of a giant Lombard king; but it is evidently a cubit, probably a variant of the Egyptian royal cubit, for 2/3 of it gave the Lombard foot, = 13·52 inches; and this, as also the Venetian foot, = 13·69 inches, seems referable to the Egyptian royal foot, = 13·76 inches.
But everywhere and always the people object to a long foot-standard. Whether in ancient Egypt or in modern Italy, they will take a more convenient length; they will halve the cubit so as to get a short foot, or take some span, or some ell divisible into spans. So in Italy there was generally a local foot and also a span. Sometimes the span was 3/4 of the foot, at other times it was a fraction of a braccio or ell; and both foot and span might be called a palmo. This term was equivalent to the L. palmus major as distinguished from the ordinary palmus of 4 digits. In Rome there is, or was till recently, a series the same as that of ancient Rome, on the basis of a foot = 11·72 inches, slightly longer than the ancient foot = 11·67 inches; 5 feet made a passo, and 1000 passi a mile.
The foot was of 16 digits, usually called oncie, inches, and 12 of these digits were taken for a palmo = 8·79 inches. Three of these palmi made the braccio, the cloth-ell, = 26·38 inches.
The Roman field-measures were a mixture of decimal chain-units and of lengths derived from seed-measures of land.
In Tuscany the standard was the braccio, = 22·98 inches, half of which was the palmo, = 11·49 inches. The braccio was divided, as if it were a money-pound, into 20 soldi, of 12 denari.
In the kingdom of Naples, with its population of Greek origin, the standard of length was the meridian mile, divided into 1000 Olympic fathoms or passi. But the passo was divided, not into six long feet, but, like the Egyptian royal cubit, into 7 palmi, = 10·4 inches. The usual standard was the Canna of 8 palmi, a reversion to the common Mediterranean measure of the reed of 8 spans.
In Genoa there was, and perhaps is still, a palmo = 9·764 inches, a length exactly that of the pán in several cities of Provence. It has changed but little since the time of Recorde’s ‘Pawn of Geans’ (1543) or since John Greaves (1647) gave it as = 9·78 inches.[[45]]
Genoa, the language of which district is a dialect of Provençal, has measures of the Provençal type. The measures of Provence will be described at length in [Chap. XXI].
Spain
The standard is the Burgos foot = 11·127 inches, 3 feet making a Vara. This foot was originally = 10·944 inches,[[46]] i.e. half the Beládi cubit, brought by the Moors. This original standard has been preserved very nearly in the two-foot Covado di ribera, the shore-cubit, = 21·9157 inches, its half = 10·9578 inches.
That the Burgos foot has deviated, like most Spanish weights and measures, from the accurate standards of the Moors, is shown by the length of the Spanish Legua maritima, the league of 3 meridian miles, or 6653·36 varas. At the modern standard of the Burgos foot this is
6653·36 × 3 × 11·127 inches = 220,958 inches, while 3 meridian miles are
2026·66 yards × 3 × 12 inches = 218,880 inches, showing an error of 2078 inches = 57·7 yards.
Taking the original standard of the Burgos foot at 10·944 inches,
6653 varas × 3 × 10,944 = 218,880 inches,
exactly corresponding to the Parasang, = 10,000 Beládi cubits of 21·888 inches, or to 20,000 Burgos feet as instituted by the Moors.
The erroneous standard of the Burgos foot appears to have been corrected. The tables of A. de Malarce, approved by the French government in 1879, give the Burgos foot as = O·27833 metre = 10·938 inches.
That Spain also once had the Roman foot is shown by the survival in Tunis of the Drá Andalussi, the Spanish Ell, of 3 Roman spans of 8·753 inches = 26·25 inches.
Portugal
Here the Roman standard is seen in the Palmo or span = 8·749 inches, 3/4 of a foot = 11·665 inches. The palmo is divided into 8 polegadas, inches, of 12 lines, or into 12 dedo, digits, of 8 lines.
The Vara, = 43·7 inches, is of 5 spans; the Braça, or fathom, is 2 varas or 10 spans; 3000 fathoms make a league, = 3·89 miles, divided into 3 milhas of 8 estados, stadia or furlongs. In land-measure 4840 square varas make a geira (= 1·47 acre) exactly, as 4840 square yards make our acre. One may infer that the form and division of the geira was similar to that of our acre; that it is, or was, 220 × 22 varas, a 1/10 strip of some ‘acreme’ measure. This view is supported by the use in Brazil of a land-unit, the quadro, officially 150 × 1 metres; a strip of an original square quadro corresponding to the 10-geira field. In Argentina the cuadra is 150 varas, and the cuadra cuadrada, 4·17 acres, is that measure squared.
Portugal has another span, the palmo avantejado = 9·0256 inches, of which 3 make a covado or cubit = 27·078 inches, virtually the Flemish ell of English standard.