The Roman foot. It appears cited in numerous normative and technical texts from various periods such as the XII Tables (450 BC) (Cornell 1999 , 318 et seq), the urban planning regulations of Augustus and Nero (I d. C.), Trajan (II d . C.), the Constitution of Zenon, the writings of Vitrubio, Pliny the Elder.
The official model or pattern was the pes monetalis that was kept in the Temple of Juno Moneta in Rome ; its measure of 0.296 m can be verified in the bronze and bone rules found in Herculaneum ( Vázquez Queipo 1859, 33), in the funeral stele of a naval carpenter found in the port of Ostia (Adam 1999 (1989), 43), and in an official table of length measurements in force in the 1st century AD found on the market in the Libyan city of Lepcis Magna .
Summary
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- 1 multiples
- 2 The exact measurement of the Roman foot
- 3 Length of the specimens-pattern of the Roman foot
- 1 Capitoline
- 2 Museum of Naples
- 3 Louvre Museum
- 4 Vatican
- 5 place
- 6 Olympic
- 7 Updated measures
- 4 Other values of the Roman foot
- 5 Greek equivalent
- 6 Anglo-Saxon system
- 1 Equivalences
- 7 Sources
Multiples
- palmipes (1¼ feet)
- cubitus (1½ feet)
- gradus (2½ feet)
- passus (5 feet)
- actus (120 feet)
- stadium (625 feet)
- milliarium (5,000 ft)
- leuga (7,500 ft)
The exact measurement of the Roman foot
The measurement of the Roman foot has been investigated since the Renaissance, although it is since the establishment of the decimal metric system in the 19th century that the greatest efforts have been made. In Spain, the grammarian Elio Antonio de Lebrija (1444-1532) had a Roman foot obtained from the measurements he carried out at the Mérida stadium and at the Merida University Library library, to serve as a pattern. Vía de la Plata between two milestones (Enrique Granados; López Rodríguez 1998 , ix-x). It was the German Hultsch , among others, who established in 1882 the average value of 0.2957 cm. Updated measurements.
Another definition of the Roman foot measurement is the 16/28 equivalent of the Nippur cubit. The International Bureau for Hexadecimal Metrology (BI-SMH) defines the Nippur elbow exactly at 518,616 mm, 2 so a Roman foot would equal 296,352 mm. This value coincides with that of the historical Roman foot obtained through modern statistical methods, established at 296.2 mm ± 0.5 mm, or also 296.2 ± 0.17% mm (see Rottländer, Tübingen, Germany).
Length of the specimen-pattern of the Roman foot
References taken from the measures published in Gabriel Puig and Larraz:
Capitoline
- Old measure: 0.293280 m.
- Cassini measurement: 0.294408 m.
- Bïanchini measurement: 0.294859 m.
Naples museum
- 1st ex. Cagnazi measure: 0.294350 m.
- 2nd ex. id. id .: 0.295000 m.
- 3rd ex. id. id .: 0.296200 m.
- 4th ex. id. id .: 0.296350 m.
Louvre Museum
- N ° 3016 de Jomard measurement: 0.295900 m.
- 3014 id. id .: 0.296300 m.
Vatican
- Approximate measure: 0.297410 m.
- Exact measurement (D’Anville): 0.297810 m.
They placed
- Mariana. De pond. et mens., p. 34: 0.300000 m.
Olympic
- Curtius measurement: 0.307632 m.
- Measure deduced from the Partenon by Foucherot: 0.308597 m.
Updated measurements
- Another definition of the Roman foot measurement is the 16/28 equivalent of the Nippur cubit. The International Bureau for Hexadecimal Metrology (BI-SMH) defines the Nippur elbow exactly at 518,616 mm, so a Roman foot would equal 296,352 mm.
- This value coincides with that of the historical Roman foot obtained through modern statistical methods, established at 296.2 mm ± 0.5 mm, or also 296.2 ± 0.17% mm (see Rottländer, Tübingen, Germany ).
Other values of the Roman foot
Other values of the foot used in Roman works were the gallic foot measuring 0.324 m, the Ptolemaic of the province of Cyrenaica 0.309 m and the Druze foot, used by Druso in Germania, which had a length of 13½ inches instead of 12, which gives it a metric value of 0.332 m (Puig and Larraz, 1898).
Greek equivalent
In Classical Greece there were also several foot units, at least the three recognized from the work of W. Dörpfeld (Hellmann 2002, 45): the Doric foot with an approximate value of 32.6 cm, the Attic foot of 29.4 cm and the 34.8 cm Ionic foot
Anglo-Saxon system
In English, the measure “foot” is written foot and plural feet. Abbreviation: ft (foot) or ‘(single quote).
Equivalences
- 1 foot = 12 inches.
- 2 1 foot = 30.48 centimeters.
- 3 1 inch = 2.54 centimeters.
Currently the ‘foot’ is used only as a popular unit of measurement in Anglo-Saxon countries of the United States and United Kingdom , and is still used in aeronautics, even outside Anglo-Saxon countries, to express the altitude of aircraft and other air vehicles. The adoption by these countries of the International System (IS) a few years ago will make this unit fall into disuse, also in these countries. It was usual to use it for lengths of up to about three meters. For longer lengths the yard or mile is usually used.
