# Ideas on distance/length?



## SeverinR (Nov 23, 2011)

I try to stay away from meters/yards in my fantasy.

I do use league(the distance a man or horse could walk in an hour.)
I will probably use dragon's league for the distance a dragon can fly in an hour.

side question: how is league in water travel? How far a person can row in an hour? (I assume its not estimated walking on water)

I have used stones throw, spear throw, arrow shot.
For shorter distance spear length(approx.36-40inches), hand(horse measure type, approx 4 inches) or foot.(estimate of a person's not the traditional 12inch foot)

Considered using furlong/furlang-approx 200meters or 1/8 mile.

I am not overly concerned about exact measurements of distance, as time was less important so travel was more approx.

Anyone have any suggestions?
When buying rope or cloth it might be more important, but I believe haggling included size, maybe even to the point of using the table as a unit.  I will sell you 3 table lengths of this rope for __ silver coins.


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## Sheilawisz (Nov 23, 2011)

Leagues are just fine for Fantasy stories, and that Dragon's league of yours sounds like a great idea to me =) How far can a person row in one hour would depend on the boat: if it's a traditional wooden boat to carry four people, I would say that one hour rowing would cover a distance of about five miles in a lake (it would be different in a river or the sea) if the person is a good rower...

In my own stories I use a mile that is exactly 1760m long, and it's great fun to create your own version of miles for your stories!! I think that Tolkien used Numenorean miles or something for his maps, and after all miles are very old and traditional units of measurement that come from Roman times and fit well a Fantasy setting.

Furlongs would be great as well, and for shorter units "hands" or a different version of foot would be fine... in my stories my characters use meters and centimeters, I just give them different and funny names to the same units =)


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## Benjamin Clayborne (Nov 23, 2011)

I use feet, yards, miles, leagues. I don't think I've used "inch" as a measure although I've used it as a verb ("He inched closer"). I think in a certain kind of fantasy story, coming up with new wacky measurement systems can fit in just fine, but in my WIP it would sound awkward. The civilization depicted is not radically different from many common Earth civilizations, so the units of measurement fit in just as well there as they do in (say) Westeros, where characters use feet, yards, and leagues.


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## SeverinR (Nov 25, 2011)

Sheilawisz said:


> Leagues are just fine for Fantasy stories, and that Dragon's league of yours sounds like a great idea to me =) How far can a person row in one hour would depend on the boat: if it's a traditional wooden boat to carry four people, I would say that one hour rowing would cover a distance of about five miles in a lake (it would be different in a river or the sea) if the person is a good rower...
> 
> In my own stories I use a mile that is exactly 1760m long, and it's great fun to create your own version of miles for your stories!! I think that Tolkien used Numenorean miles or something for his maps, and after all miles are very old and traditional units of measurement that come from Roman times and fit well a Fantasy setting.
> 
> Furlongs would be great as well, and for shorter units "hands" or a different version of foot would be fine... in my stories my characters use meters and centimeters, I just give them different and funny names to the same units =)



Would that be the Roman mile? 

I like using other measurements to make it unique, more of a fantasy feel, of course to Americans, metric would mostly be exotic or at least uncommon.
The boat league I was actually asking, what is a nautical league?


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## Sheilawisz (Nov 25, 2011)

The leagues were used to measure distances at sea, but now we use nautical miles (1852m) like 6076 feet and today that is used internationally =) one league at sea was like three nautical miles, and the Roman mile (1479m) was a little shorter than today's standard miles that are around 1609m... I was thinking that for shorter units you could use the Cubit, which is approximately the length of a forearm and can be divided into units like palms or hands


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## SeverinR (Nov 25, 2011)

I forgot about the cubit. I think the only time I remember the cubit was in Bill Cosby's skit about Noah building the ark.

"Lord,What's a cubit"


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## lawrence (Nov 25, 2011)

I think a cubit is related to the rabbit. A cute rabbit? 



A cubit was the distance from the elbow to the end of the little finger, I think. About 18 inches. Though later there were variations and stuff like the royal cubit. The Ark was around 450 feet long, 50 ft wide and 40 ft high ! Thats alot of wood.

I like to see leagues used, or phrases like 'half a day's march'


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## Codey Amprim (Nov 27, 2011)

severinr said:


> i do use league(the distance a man or horse could walk in an hour.)



thank you! :d


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## SeverinR (Nov 28, 2011)

What I meant was, what is the rationale for nautical league?
league is the distance a man or horse could walk in an hour, but is a nautical league the distance a certain boat could go in an hour? If so which boator ship?
19000 feet in an hour?(1 league=3 nautical miles)


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## Shadoe (Nov 28, 2011)

I use the standard inches, feet, miles, and so on. Mainly because I've got so many world-specific words in use already, I didn't feel like coming up with a new measuring system.


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## Erica (Dec 5, 2011)

I vaguely remember a book where someone bought x number 'ells' of rope. No idea what an ell is.

This site lists some of the archaic and customary English measures and their origins.

Units: Customary Units


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## Ravana (Dec 5, 2011)

That's okay: nobody seems to know what an ell is. 

For English measurement, it was 45 inches–which is probably the context in which most people are likely to run across it. But there are at least a half dozen versions, some only half that length.


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## SeverinR (Dec 6, 2011)

Erica said:


> I vaguely remember a book where someone bought x number 'ells' of rope. No idea what an ell is.
> 
> This site lists some of the archaic and customary English measures and their origins.
> 
> Units: Customary Units


Thanks for the link, great information on non-traditional or out of date units.



Ravana said:


> That's okay: nobody seems to know what an ell is.
> 
> For English measurement, it was 45 inches—which is probably the context in which most people are likely to run across it. But there are at least a half dozen versions, some only half that length.


isn't fabric 45inches wide? Is this based on an ell?
Ell? I just thought the person was cussing but did enunciate well.


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