_Einz qu ’hum alast un sul arpent de camp_ (Before one (he) went a single acre of ground)
evidently means about a furlong, just as in Iliad x., ‘when he was as far off as the length of the furrow made by mules’ has the same meaning.
Similarly the _sesteirado_ of Provence was used as an itinerary measure, probably of 100 cano = about 220 yards, the same as the centenié.
The _sesteirado_, the rood of Southern France, corresponding to the _boisselée_, the bushel-land of Mid-France, was, like the latter, originally a seed-unit, the extent sown with a _sestié_ of seed-corn. Its extent is 0·4 acre, = our rood. Now if this were square, each side would measure 40 yards, a length too small for itinerary measure. Neither Northern nor Southern France had any official itinerary measure under the league, so field-units were necessarily used; in the north the arpent-length, in the south the sesteirado-length; both corresponding to our rood-length, furrow-length or furlong. There seems little doubt that the _centenié_, the popular itinerary measure of the south, 100 cano or fathoms, was the same as the sesteirado-length. And the sesteirado being 400 square cano, it seems that its dimensions were 100 × 4 cano. It was moreover the rood, or quarter of the greater land-unit, the _saumado_, the ‘seam’ of land, which would thus be 100 × 16 cano just as our rood was 40 × 1 rods, and our acre 40 × 4 rods. Ten sesteirado-lengths, 10 centenié, made the _milo_, a mile of 1000 local fathoms, one-third of the league of Southern France.
YARDLAND.—L. _quatrona terræ_, _virgata_. Fr. _bouvée_. Bovate, Oxgang. About 30 acres more or less, including pasture and perhaps some woodland. Before the Norman conquest the gebur-geriht (boor’s right) was 6 sheep and 7 acres arable on his yard-land. This corresponds roughly to the German _hufe_ = about 20 acres, and to the Netherlands _hoeve_, the unit of small holding. Almost everywhere and always, 6 or 7 acres of arable have been all that the boor’s yoke of oxen can till. There was other work for the oxen besides ploughing, and at least five ploughings were usually necessary for proper tillage; then there was cartage and feudal duties in consideration of the small rent.