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The term, yard derives from the Old English gerd, gyrd etc., which was used for branches, staves and measuring rods. [5] It is first attested in the late 7th century laws of Ine of Wessex, [6] where the "yard of land" mentioned [6] is the yardland, an old English unit of tax assessment equal to 1 ⁄ 4 hide.
The association of the yard with the "gird" or circumference of a person's waist or with the distance from the tip of the nose to the end of the thumb of King Henry I (reigned 1100–1135) are probably standardizing actions, since several yards were in use in Britain. There were also the rod, pole, perch and thumb for measurements of length.
Under the 1300 Composition of Yards and Perches, one of the statutes of uncertain date that was notionally in force until the 1824 Weights and Measures Act, "3 barly cornes dry and rounde" [2] [3] were to serve as the basis for the inch and thence the larger units of feet, yards, perches and thus of the acre, an important unit of area.
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1,760 yards: Over the course of time, the length of a yard changed several times and consequently so did the English, and from 1824, the imperial mile. The statute mile was introduced in 1592 during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I: 1,609.344: mile: some English speaking countries [citation needed] 1959: today: 1,760 yards
Also called a perch or pole: a measure used for surveying land and in architecture. The rod is the same length today as in Anglo-Saxon times, although its composition in terms of feet were changed by the Composition of Yards and Perches from 15 feet to 16 + 1 ⁄ 2 feet or 5 + 1 ⁄ 2 yards.
The megalithic yard is a hypothetical ancient unit of length equal to about 2.72 feet (0.83 m). [ 1 ] [ 2 ] [ 3 ] Some researchers believe it was used in the construction of megalithic structures. The proposal was made by Alexander Thom as a result of his surveys of 600 megalithic sites in England , Scotland , Wales and Brittany . [ 4 ]
The Composition of Yards and Perches (Latin: Compositio Ulnarum et Perticarum) or the Statute of Ells and Perches was a medieval English statute defining the length of the barleycorn, inch, foot, yard, and perch, as well as the area of the acre. Its date has been estimated at 1266–1303. [1]