Foot (unit) - Obsolete Use in Different Countries - Other Obsolete Feet

Other Obsolete Feet

Prior to the introduction of the metric system, many European cities and countries used the foot, but it varied considerably: the voet in Ieper (Ypres), Belgium was 273.8 millimetres (10.78 in) while the piede in Venice was 347.73 millimetres (13.690 in). A list of conversions between the various units of measure were catalogued in many European reference works including:

• Traite, Paris – 1759
• Palaiseau – Bordeaux: 1816
• de Gelder, Amsterdam and 's-Gravenhage – 1824
• Horace, Brussels – 1840
• Noback & Noback (2 volumes), Leipzig – 1851
• Bruhns, Leipzig – 1881

Many of these standards were peculiar to a particular city, especially in Germany (which, before German Unification in 1871, consisted of many kingdoms, principalities, free cities and so on). In many cases the conversion factors varied, depending on who took them – for example, the English foot was measured as 11 pouces 2.6 lignes (French inches and lines) by Picard, 11 pouces 3.11 lignes by Maskelyne and 11 pouces 3 lignes by D'Alembert.

Most of the various feet in this list ceased to be used as the countries concerned adopted the metric system: the Netherlands and modern Belgium adopted the metric system in 1817 having used the mesures usuelles under Napoleon and newly formed German Empire adopted the metric system in 1871 as its system of measure

The palm (typically 200 mm to 280 mm) was used in many Mediterranean cities instead of the foot. Horace Doursther, whose reference was published in Belgium which had the smallest foot measurements, grouped both units together, while J.F.G. Palaiseau devoted three chapters to units of length – one for linear measures (palms and feet), one for cloth measures (ells) and one for distances traveled (miles and leagues). In the table below, arbitrary cut-off points of 270 mm and 350 mm have been chosen.

Notes