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Re: Men in Women's Shoes

Posted: Fri Jan 26, 2018 4:17 am
by beachlion
In the Middle Ages in Europe, every market had the local measurements written in stone. A foot was the length of the foot of the local ruler. Also for the ell.
Thanks to Napoleon, the metric system was introduced and everybody was using the same length of the meter and derivations of it.

I found an Italian sign at Sicily where local units were compared to the meter.
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Re: Men in Women's Shoes

Posted: Fri Jan 26, 2018 10:09 am
by crfriend
Kirbstone wrote:The word Mile' is derived from the Latin 'Millia-passum', which is one thousand 'passum's...or Left-right-Left, as soldiers/legionaires marched. The average pace being just over 2 & a half feet, the 'Passum' being just over 5 feet, a thousand of which added up to one 'Mile'.
That would eventually turn into the "Statute Mile", which is OK if a confusing number to work with. Then we have the "Nautical Mile" which makes a lot more sense as at least it's tied to something (the size of the Earth), although its reference datum highly likely makes it universally unique and hence of not much use once one gets off the planet.
Time for my 0.56 liter of Guinness.
More, please!

Re: Men in Women's Shoes

Posted: Fri Jan 26, 2018 4:54 pm
by JohnH
The original definition of the meter was 1 ten-millioth the distance from the north pole to the equator passing through Paris. And the it was defined by two scratch marks on a platinum-iridium rod. Next it was defined by so many wavelengths of light under certain conditions. Now it is the distance of light traveled during a certain time.

Now our "beloved" inch is defined as 0.0254 meter, exactly.

Also the Imperial pound is defined exactly as 453.59237 grams.

So those of us who use the cobbled together Imperial units use something based on metric units.

John

Re: Men in Women's Shoes

Posted: Sat Jan 27, 2018 12:14 am
by beachlion
JohnH wrote:...... So those of us who use the cobbled together Imperial units use something based on metric units.
John
Some Imperial units are based on more unusual things. The inch used to be defined as the length of three barley corns, end to end. The foot came sometimes from real feet but also from 12 inches.
With the acceptance of the SI-units worldwide, the foot and inch were expressed in metric units.

With a Dutch woodworking forum, I'm known as a Metric Ambassador to the United States. I don't see much progress. ;)

Re: Men in Women's Shoes

Posted: Sat Jan 27, 2018 1:00 am
by JohnH
At least there is hope with the Internet. Luthiers who make violin family instruments, classical guitars, and lutes use metric units, even in the United States. I have old guitar and lute building books that still use inches. Fractional inches are a real pain in the hind end after you get used to metric units.