Megalithic yard

A Megalithic Yard (MY) is a unit of measurement of about 2.72 feet (0.83 m), that some researchers believe was used in the construction of megalithic structures. The proposal was made by Alexander Thom as a result of his surveys of 600 megalithic sites in England, Scotland, Wales and Britanny. Thom also proposed the Megalithic Rod of 2.5 MY. As subunits of these, he further proposed the Megalithic Inch of 2.073 centimetres (0.816 in), one hundred of which are included in a Megalithic Rod, and forty of which composed a Meglithic Yard. Thom applied the statistical lumped variance test of J.R. Broadbent on this quantum and found the results significant, while others have challenged his statistical analysis and suggested that Thom's evidence can be explained in other ways, for instance that the supposed megalithic yard is in fact the average length of a pace.

Thom suggested that "There must have been a headquarters from which standard rods were sent out but whether this was in these islands or on the Continent the present investigation cannot determine."

Margaret Ponting has suggested that artefacts such as a marked bone found during excavations at Dail Mòr near Callanish, the Patrickholme bone bead from Lanarkshire and Dalgety bone bead from Fife in Scotland have shown some evidence of being measuring rods based on the Megalithic Yard in Britain. An oak rod from the Iron Age fortified settlement at Borre Fen mearured 53.15 inches (135.0 cm) with marks dividing it up into eight parts of 6.64 inches (16.9 cm). Euan Mackie referred to five eights of this rod 33.2 inches (84 cm) as "very close to a megalithic yard". A hazel measuring rod recovered from a Bronze Age burial mound in Borum Eshøj, East Jutland by P. V. Glob in 1875 measured 30.9 inches (78 cm). Keith Critchlow suggested this may have shrunk 0.63 inches (1.6 cm) from its original length of one Megalithic Yard over a period of 3000 years.

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