A mil (mile in English) is a unit of length, usually used to measure geographic distance, fairly common in Norway and Sweden. Today, it measures by definition 10 kilometres, but earlier in history it had different values.[1][2]
History
In Norway and Sweden, the old "land mile" or "long mile" was 36,000 feet: because of the different definitions of foot then in use, in Norway this was 11,295 m and in Sweden 10,688 m. (Had the imperial foot been used, the distance would have worked out to 10,972.8 m.) The distance was equal to an older unit of measurement, the "rast" ("rest", "pause"), representing a suitable distance between rests when walking. [1]
When the Metric system was introduced in Norway and Sweden in 1889 (the actual law having been passed in 1875), the mil was redefined to be exactly 10 km.
A few years later, the metric system was introduced also in Finland. Even there the traditional measure which is called peninkulma in Finnish and mil in Swedish, was then redefined to be exactly 10 km. In Finland, however, it has been much less in use than in Sweden.
Usage
The mil is currently never used on road signs as kilometre is the standard for all formal written distances, but very common in in colloquial speech involving distances greater than ten kilometres, such as (directly translated) "There are about 52 mil between Trondheim and Oslo".[3] It is also used commonly for measuring vehicle fuel consumption ("litre per mil").[4]
In Finland, peninkulma is not being used anymore.
References
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