Spanish League

[Dave Karoly, PLS]

Has anyone encountered this unit of measure. Any information on how long it is would be appreciated. I know Spanish units tend to vary by place and the location is the Northern California coast.

[jbostley]

labor
a traditional unit of area in Latin American countries. The labor is equal to the area of a square 1000 varas on a side, or 0.04 legua. Using the Texas standard for the vara (33 1/3 inches), this is equivalent to 177.136 acres or 71.685 hectares. The word labor means work in Spanish, as it does in English. As a unit it represents the area that could be cultivated by a single farmer, somewhat like the old English hide.

legua [1]
the Spanish league. The traditional legua is equal to 5000 varas, which is close to 2.6 miles or 4.2 kilometers. Using the Texas definition of the vara, the legua is 2.6305 miles, 13889 feet, or 4233.4 meters. Using the traditional Spanish definition, it would be 2.597 miles, 13712 feet, or 4179.4 meters. Technically, this unit was abolished by Philip II in 1568, but it remained in rather wide use, especially in the Americas. During the late 18th and early 19th centuries, a league of 8000 varas (4.15 miles or 6680 meters) was legal in Spain. At sea, Spanish sailors used the usual marine league (3 nautical miles or 5556 meters) or Philip V's "geographical" league of 1/17.5 degree (3.429 nautical miles or 6350.5 meters). At present, the legua is used informally in Argentina and in other Spanish-speaking countries as a metric unit equal to exactly 5 kilometers (3.107 miles).

legua [2]
a traditional Spanish unit of area equal to one square legua [1]. In Spanish-speaking Latin America and the southwestern states of the U.S. land was customarily measured in leguas, with 1 legua equal to 25 labors (see above) or 25 million square varas. Using the Texas definition of the vara as the starting point, the legua is 4428.4 acres, 6.919 square miles, 1792 hectares, or 17.92 square kilometers. A slightly larger figure, 4439 acres (1796 hectares), is used in California. Larger sizes, between 1800 and 1900 hectares, were formerly used in some parts of South America. In Mexico and Texas, this unit is often called a sitio.

sitio
a name used traditionally in Mexico and the southwestern U.S. for the square legua (see legua [2]), a unit of area equal to 25 million square varas or about 1800 hectares. The word means "place."

[jbostley]

http://www.unc.edu/~rowlett/units/dictL.html

this is pretty good web site for a dictionary that specializes in units of measure!

that's where I found the definitions posted prior to this post.

[Peter Ehlert]

excelent reference!
Thanks, Peter

[Bowman]

how about this

[Dave Karoly, PLS]

That's a very helpful reference; I'm printing it out and putting it in my binder of miscellaneous reference stuff. I also found the UNC website.