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The yard (symbol: yd) is an English unit of length in both the British imperial units and US customary systems of measurement equalling 3 feet or 36 . Since 1959 it has been by international agreement standardized as exactly 0.9144 Metre. A distance of 1,760 yards is equal to 1 mile.
The theoretical survey foot is very slightly longer.
A unit of three English feet is attested in a statute of (see below), but there it is called an ell (ulna, "arm"), a separate and usually longer unit of around . The use of the word ‘yard’ ( or ȝerde) to describe this length is first attested in William Langland's poem on Piers Plowman. The usage seems to derive from the prototype standard rods held by the king and his magistrates (see below).
The word 'yard' is a homonym of 'yard' in the sense of an enclosed area of land. This second meaning of 'yard' has an etymology related to the word ‘garden’ and is not related to the unit of measurement.
In India the yard is colloquially known as a guz, which equals 3 feet.
William of Malmesbury's Deeds of the Kings of England records that during the reign of Henry I (1100–1135), "the measure of his arm was applied to correct the false ell of the traders and enjoined on all throughout England." The folk etymology that the length was bounded by the king's nose was added some centuries later. Charles Moore Watson dismisses William's account as "childish", but William was among the most conscientious and trustworthy medieval historians. The French "king's foot" was supposed to have derived from Charlemagne, and the English kings subsequently repeatedly intervened to impose shorter units with the aim of increasing tax revenue.
The earliest surviving definition of this shorter unit appears in the Act on the Composition of Yards and Perches, one of the statutes of uncertain date tentatively dated to the reign of Edward I or II . Its wording varies in surviving accounts. One reads:
It is ordained that 3 grains of barley dry and round do make an inch, 12 inches make 1 foot, 3 feet make 1 yard, 5 yards and a half make a perch, and 40 perches in length and 4 in breadth make an acre.
The Liber Horn compilation (1311) includes that statute with slightly different wording and adds:
And be it remembered that the iron yard of our Lord the King containeth 3 feet and no more, and a foot ought to contain 12 by the right measure of this yard measured, to wit, the 36th part of this yard rightly measured maketh 1 inch neither more nor less and 5 yards and a half make a perch that is 16 feet and a half measured by the aforesaid yard of our Lord the King.
In some early books, this act was appended to another statute of uncertain date titled the Statute for the Measuring of Land. The act was not repealed until the Weights and Measures Act 1824.
There shall be but one Measure of Cloth through the Realm by the Yard and the Inch, and not by the Yard and Handful, according to the London Measure.
According to Connor, cloth merchants had previously sold cloth by the yard and handful to evade high taxes on cloth (the extra handful being essentially a black-market transaction). Enforcement efforts resulted in cloth merchants switching over to the yard and inch, at which point the government gave up and made the yard and inch official. In 1552, the yard and inch for cloth measurement was again sanctioned in law (5 & 6 Edw. 6. c. 6. An Act for the true making of Woolen Cloth.)
The yard and inch for cloth measurement was also sanctioned again in legislation of 1557–1558 (4 & 5 Ph. & M. c. 5. An act touching the making of woolen clothes. par. IX.)
IX. Item, That every ordinary kersie mentioned in the said act shall contain in length in the water betwixt xvi. and xvii. yards, yard and inch; and being well scoured thicked, milled, dressed and fully dried, shall weigh nineteen pounds the piece at the least:...
As recently as 1593, the same principle is found mentioned once again (35 Eliz. 1. c. 10 An act for the reformation of sundry abuses in clothes, called Devonshire kerjies or dozens, according to a proclamation of the thirty-fourth year of the reign of our sovereign lady the Queen that now is. par. III.)
(2) and each and every of the same Devonshire kersies or dozens, so being raw, and as it cometh forth off the weaver's loom (without racking, stretching, straining or other device to encrease the length thereof) shall contain in length between fifteen and sixteen yards by the measure of yard and inch by the rule,...
In 1834, the primary Imperial yard standard was partially destroyed in a fire known as the Burning of Parliament.. In 1838, a commission was formed to reconstruct the lost standards, including the troy pound, which had also been destroyed. In 1845, a new yard standard was constructed based on two previously existing standards known as A1 and A2, both of which had been made for the Ordnance Survey, and R.S. 46, the yard of the Royal Astronomical Society. All three had been compared to the Imperial standard before the fire.
The new standard was made of Baily's metal No. 4 consisting of 16 parts copper, parts tin, and 1 part zinc. It was 38 inches long and 1 inch square. The Weights and Measures Act 1855 granted official recognition to the new standards. Between 1845 and 1855 forty yard standards were constructed, one of which was selected as the new Imperial standard. Four others, known as 'parliamentary copies', were distributed to the Royal Mint, the Royal Society of London, the Royal Observatory at Greenwich, and the New Palace at Westminster, commonly called the Houses of Parliament. The other 35 yard standards were distributed to the cities of London, Edinburgh, and Dublin, as well as the United States and other countries (although only the first five had official status). The imperial standard received by the United States is known as "Bronze Yard No. 11"
The Weights and Measures Act 1878 (41 & 42 Vict. c. 49) confirmed the status of the existing yard standard, mandated regular intercomparisons between the several yard standards, and authorized the construction of one additional Parliamentary Copy (made in 1879 and known as Parliamentary Copy VI).
The yard (known as the "international yard" in the United States) was legally defined to be exactly 0.9144 meter in 1959 under an agreement in 1959 between Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa, the United Kingdom and the United States.A. V. Astin & H. Arnold Karo, (1959), Refinement of values for the yard and the pound, Washington DC: National Bureau of Standards, republished on National Geodetic Survey web site and the Federal Register (Doc. 59-5442, Filed, June 30, 1959, 8:45 a.m.) In the UK, the provisions of the treaty were ratified by the Weights and Measures Act 1963. The Imperial Standard Yard of 1855 was renamed the United Kingdom Primary Standard Yard and retained its official status as the national prototype yard. Weights and Measures Act 1985 Baily's Metal. Parliamentary Copy (VI) of the Imperial Standard Yard. 41 & 42 Victoria, Chapter 49. Standard Yard at 62° Faht. Cast in 1878
There are corresponding units of area and volume, the square yard and cubic yard respectively. These are sometimes referred to simply as "yards" when no ambiguity is possible, for example an American or Canadian concrete mixer may be marked with a capacity of "9 yards" or "1.5 yards", where cubic yards are obviously referred to.
Yards are also used and are the legal requirement on for shorter distances in the United Kingdom, and are also frequently found in conversation between Britons much like in the United States for distance.Driving Standards Agency (1999), The Highway Code, London: The Stationery Office, , pp. 74–75
Other units related to the yard, but not specific to cloth measurement: two yards are a fathom and a quarter of a yard (when not referring to cloth) is a span.
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