moon information!

matthew.malthouse · 09 Jan 2002, 10:15 · from whorl-v0013.mbox · original

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From: matthew.malthouse at guardian.co.uk
Subject: Re: (whorl) moon information!
Date: Wed, 9 Jan 2002 10:15:50 +0000
Message-ID: <whorl-v0013-whorl.v012.n186.1 at digest.urth.net>
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On 09/01/2002 03:55:52 maa32 wrote:

>All right, guys.  Finally got some real information that is pretty cool.  =
At
>confluence, Green is 30,000 leagues away (every six years).  At one point,
>someone mentions that at the moment of their comment Green is 80,000 leagu=
es
>away.  Ok here is the cool part: 30,000 leagues is 89,996 miles; 80,000
>leagues is 239,988 miles.

By what conversion?

30,000       Geographical Leagues     Marine Leagues
=3D
US Mile            90,000.00            103,569.94
Statute Mile       90,000.18            103,570.15
Nautical Mile      78,208.02             90.000.00 (1' latitude)
BR Nautical Mile   78,158.05             89,942.50 (Obsoltete 1970)
Sea Mile           79,200.16             91,141.73
Roman Mile         97,865.71            112,321.62

The closest to your figure I can make it is marine leagues to the obsolete
British Nautical mile.

So first is there any reference in tBotNS, tBotLS or tBotSS which might giv=
e us
a clue as to the meaning of "league" in those places?  Then what means might
they have to make any more than an estimate of the distance?

Secondly league is a lovely word and we might trust that Wolfe uses is prop=
erly
(in contrast to Jordan who made it 4 miles in the benighted Wheel of Time).=
  But
what is "properly"?  To an American author the choice of British measure se=
ems
less likely than other posibilities.  And what might make the more obscure
nautical measure preferable to geographical measure?

I'm inclined to think that it really is a coincidence.

Matthew

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