Kevin's Watch

Isn't it the distance one can walk in an hour?

There is an actual distance that is called a league
and if I remember right, it is roughly 6 miles.

A league is a unit of length or area long common in Europe and Latin America, although no longer an official unit in any nation. The league most frequently expresses the distance a person, or a horse, can walk in 1 hour of time (usually about 3.5 miles or 5.5 kilometres)

The English-Speaking World
In English units over the past couple of centuries or so, the league was most often considered to be 3 miles, or about 4.8 to 5.6 km, depending on the mile being used (most commonly either statute miles or nautical miles).

The league was used in Ancient Rome, where it was defined as being 1.5 Roman miles (i.e., 7500 Roman feet). The origin is the "leuga gallica"

In Argentina, a league is a distance of 5 km

In Brazil, the league is still used occasionally in the country, where it has been described as equivalent to 6 km.

The French lieue – at different times – existed in several variants: 10,000, 12,000, 13,200 and 14,400 French feet, about 3.25 km to about 4.68 km. Its use overlapped the metric system for a while but is now long discontinued.

In Yucatan and other parts of rural Mexico, the league is still commonly used in the original sense of the distance that can be covered on foot in an hour, so that a league along a good road on level ground is a greater distance than a league on a difficult path over rough terrain.

The Spanish League or legua was originally set as a fixed unit of distance of 5,000 varas, about 2.6 miles or 4.2 km. Officially the league was abolished by Philip II of Spain in 1568, but it is still in use unofficially in parts of Latin America, with exact meaning varying in different countries.

Wikipedia is your friend.

Only SRD knows for sure. But I guess he used the English version.

Wow, great essay by Ur-dead!

My understanding is 1 league equals 3 miles.

As Ur-Dead said, it is actually a range.

League - Approximately 2.4 to 4.6 statute miles

We discussed this a bit here:
ahirashangar.ihugny.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1677

but do not click on that link unless you are willing to see a bunch of FR spoilers.

SRD explains Linden believes it to be approximately three miles (give or take a few feet) in RTE.

I think that is a fair distance for an army of twenty-thousand to be walking at twenty leagues a day to end Lord Foul's war. I guess Hile Troy really did expect a large feat from his soldiers. At least he redeemed them.

Only SRD knows for sure. But I guess he used the English version.

Workshop Creation wrote:SRD explains Linden believes it to be approximately three miles (give or take a few feet) in RTE.

I think that is a fair distance for an army of twenty-thousand to be walking at twenty leagues a day to end Lord Foul's war. I guess Hile Troy really did expect a large feat from his soldiers. At least he redeemed them.

Only SRD knows for sure. But I guess he used the English version.

Pssh. Caesar expected about the same of his troops.

And his troops ate Grass.

Emotional Leper wrote:

Workshop Creation wrote:SRD explains Linden believes it to be approximately three miles (give or take a few feet) in RTE.

I think that is a fair distance for an army of twenty-thousand to be walking at twenty leagues a day to end Lord Foul's war. I guess Hile Troy really did expect a large feat from his soldiers. At least he redeemed them.

Only SRD knows for sure. But I guess he used the English version.

Pssh. Caesar expected about the same of his troops.

And his troops ate Grass.

True, but Caesar had the advantage of not being a total moron.

I was curious about this, too. I looked it up and it is generally considered to mean an onland distance of about three miles or on sea, about three nautical miles. I personally can walk about three miles an hour without pushing really really hard, so to do 60 miles, or 20 leagues, in a day would be pretty hard, since you'd have to walk 20 hours without stopping at a pretty brisk pace. Wow, interesing question.

Rocksister wrote:I was curious about this, too. I looked it up and it is generally considered to mean an onland distance of about three miles or on sea, about three nautical miles. I personally can walk about three miles an hour without pushing really really hard, so to do 60 miles, or 20 leagues, in a day would be pretty hard, since you'd have to walk 20 hours without stopping at a pretty brisk pace. Wow, interesing question.

And it would be even harder if you had to carry weapons, armor, and supplies like Hile Troy's poor soldiers did...

duchess of malfi wrote:

Rocksister wrote:I was curious about this, too. I looked it up and it is generally considered to mean an onland distance of about three miles or on sea, about three nautical miles. I personally can walk about three miles an hour without pushing really really hard, so to do 60 miles, or 20 leagues, in a day would be pretty hard, since you'd have to walk 20 hours without stopping at a pretty brisk pace. Wow, interesing question.

And it would be even harder if you had to carry weapons, armor, and supplies like Hile Troy's poor soldiers did...

It entirely depends on how much they were carrying, though. Weren't their weapons made of wood?

Well-trained troops with light gear can, in an emergency, march 100 miles in a day. This is not something they can keep up for many days at a time. Daily rates of travel over long distance (for instance, Marlborough's march from the Netherlands to the Danube valley in 1704 before the battle of Blenheim) tends to be closer to about 2.5 miles/hour, perhaps 20-30 miles/day. Smaller bodies of troops can march faster than larger ones as a certain amount of time gets spent in coordination, etc.

Troy does have the advantage of pre-positioned stores (he's not entirely stupid), but he almost wrecks the Warward with that march -- recall that Mhoram later confessed to Troy that he thought it was impossible when first proposed.

I re-read all the books this year in anticipation of FR, but I honestly don't remember what the soldiers themselves were carrying. I do seem to remember wagons and horses being mentioned for the bulk of the supplies and such. My guess is they were carrying any weapons they might need for a surprise battle, and maybe a water canteen. No matter how light the load, if you aren't accustomed to marching distances that long, in all kinds of terrain and weather, it's going to slow you down a lot. And what if you have diarrhea or a migraine or the flu or a host of other crappy ailments? Try to march THEN. My guess is they didn't have Pepto Bismol or Excedrin migraine in the Land.