Equivalence To Other Units of Length
For purposes of measuring cloth, the early yard was divided by the binary method into two, four, eight and sixteen parts. The two most common divisions were the fourth and sixteenth parts. The quarter of a yard was known as the "quarter" without further qualification, while the sixteenth of a yard was called a nail. The eighth of a yard was sometimes called a finger, but was more commonly referred to simply as an eighth of a yard, while the half-yard was called "half a yard".
Other units related to the yard, but not specific to cloth measurement: two yards are a fathom, a quarter of a yard (when not referring to cloth) is a span.
Read more about this topic: Yard
Famous quotes containing the words units and/or length:
“Even in harmonious families there is this double life: the group life, which is the one we can observe in our neighbour’s household, and, underneath, another—secret and passionate and intense—which is the real life that stamps the faces and gives character to the voices of our friends. Always in his mind each member of these social units is escaping, running away, trying to break the net which circumstances and his own affections have woven about him.”
—Willa Cather (1873–1947)
“At length upon the lone Chorasmian shore
He paused, a wide and melancholy waste
Of putrid marshes.”
—Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822)