Puerto Rican units of measurement

Several units of measurements are used in Puerto Rico. The units of measure in use in Puerto Rico are based on the United States customary units with two major exceptions: roadway distance signs are measured in kilometers and gasoline is sold by the liter.

System before US customary units

Several units were used before the US takeover in 1898. These units were older Spanish units.

Area

Several units were used to measure area. Among them were the cuerda and the caballería.

Cuerda

In Puerto Rico, a cuerda is a traditional unit of land area nearly equivalent to 3,930 square meters, or 4,700 square yards, 0.971 acre, or 0.393 hectare (ha). The precise conversion is 1 cuerda = 3,930.395625 m2. The term "Spanish acre" instead has been used sometimes by mainlanders. A cuerda and an acre have often been treated as equal because they are nearly the same size. It continues to be an official unit of land measure in Puerto Rico today (2019).[1]

Caballería

Main article: Caballería

This was a unit of land measurement in the Spanish Viceroyalties in the Americas during the times of the Spanish Empire in the 16th through 19th centuries Puerto Rico. Widely used then,[2] it was equivalent to 78.58 hectares (194.2 acres).[3] This unit of measure is now (2019) obsolete.[4]

References

  1. ^ Units - Cuerda. Sizes.com. Puerto Rico Act 135, section 4 (page 100), 1913–14, as amended by Act No. 3, 1913–14: A cuerda, quote: "a unit of land area, approximately 3,930 square meters (approximately 0.971 acres)...In land measurements and records, the measurement by cuerda customarily used in Porto [sic] Rico...equivalent to 3,930.395625 square meters..."
  2. ^ Eli Oquendo Rodriguez. Los Barrios de Ponce: Noticias y Microhistorias de Ocho Comunidades Ponceñas en el Tiempo: Siglos XVI al XIX.. Lajas, Puerto Rico: Editorial Akelarre. 2019. pp. 183-185.
  3. ^ Caballería (Spanish). Sizes.com Accessed 22 October 2019.
  4. ^ Eli Oquendo Rodriguez. Los Barrios de Ponce: Noticias y Microhistorias de Ocho Comunidades Ponceñas en el Tiempo: Siglos XVI al XIX.. Lajas, Puerto Rico: Editorial Akelarre. 2019. pp. 183-184.