The earlier statutes do not define the itinerary :measures; confining themselves entirely to those by which land and goods were bought and sold. And the itinerary measures seem to have been on the increase, perhaps for the following reason : the jurisdiction of towns, monas teries, &c., was usually defined as extending a leuca or a given number of leuca in every direction from their precincts, so that it became the interest of these powerful bodies to make the leuca as long as possible. The old French term ban-lieue, banni-leuca, or league of the edict or regulation, refers to the space over which jurisdiction was granted. Ingulphus, or his personator (for such a fact the two are almost equally good authorities), perhaps lets us a little into the secret when, speaking of his own monastery, be says, "Prudentissimi meta tores, contra malitiam emulormn nostrorum piissime providentes, potius plus quam minus ponere voluerunt." The same Ingulphus informs us that in his time the usual league was of 2000 paces, or 1-535 modern English miles, if the Roman pace be meant : but be adds that the English, adopting a Norman word to their own measure, frequently spoke of leucm when they meant miles. But it may be questioned whether the mile and the leuca ever became interchangeable words in writings or charters, at least in England : in several Conti nental countries the term mile never became vernacular, and miliare is therefore translated by league.
There is sufficient evidence to show that, whatever the mile of a later date may have been, the leuca was generally two miles, though instances occur in which it is still described as 1500 paces. The fol lowing are extracts with which we have been favoured from manu scripts in the British Museum. In the registers of the monastery of Canterbury (of the 14th century) we have the following :—" Mensura unius pollicis Ineipit ex transverse radicum unguinum pollicis. Tres pollices unam pair:tam faciunt quatuor palmi faciunt unum pedem. l'es et dimidiutu faeiunt eubitum parvum : Sex parvi cubiti faeiunt cubitum magnum. Quinque pedes faciunt possum unum. Ceuturn viginti quinque passus faciunt stadium unum. Octo stadia faciunt unum miliare. Duo miliaria faciunt "maul leueam." This gives a leuca of 10,000 feet. Again, in the same manuscript " Memorandum quod virga commune coutinet xvi. pedes et (fiend. videlicet quinque ulnas et dimid. seeundum standardum Regis. Idem xl. virgat. conti
nent i. quaranteoam. Item vu. quarante,nie et dimid. iii. virgat. et ii. palm. continent unum miliar. Item duo minas. continent i. leucam." This gives a leuca of the same length. In a manuscript supposed to be of the time of Edward IV. we find "v. fote make a pace, and thcr go viii. forelongs to a mile in Ynglaud, and H. ynglysch inylc make a ffrenshe leweke." Bracton (Henry III.) and Fleta (Edward I. ?) both assert (see the citations in Cowell, Comyns's ' Digest,' &e.) 6 leagues and half a league and the third part of a half (or 61 leagues) as being the distance between two markets which do not injure each other ; because 20 miles is a reasonable day's journey : now (both of them say) if the dicta, or day's work, be divided into three parts, the first is for going to the market, the second for business, and the third for returning. This appears to mean that uo market should be established within a third of a day's journey of any one who is already within a third of a day's journey of the established market, so as to give him the option of going to either; that is, the two markets must be at least of 20 miles apart, which being further described as 61 leagues, shows that the leuca is 2 miles. This quotation is important, as establishing the meaning which the old law writers attached to the word.
It may then, we think, be confidently asserted, that the league, which began as a mile and a half (Roman), soon became lengthened, until it remained fixed at two of the miles of the day. It appears, also, that this length of 2 miles was a settled league at so early a period, that it is the measure of our oldest law writers, and of most of the oldest charters. It depends, therefore, upon the mile of the 13th and 14th centuries ; and we must refer to the article MILE for the dis cussion of its absolute length. In order that matters of computation very nearly related may not be separated, we refer to that article some independent evidence on the length of the league, which makes no mention of the mile. We shall finish this article by stating our con viction that the length of the league or leuca was, in the time of the old law writers, very near, one way or the other, to two modern statute miles and nine-tenths of a mile : the old mile being to the modern statute mile in the proportion of 145 to 100.