ACRE, the universal measure of land in Britain. The word (formed from the Saxon acher, or the German aker, a field), did not originally signify a determinate quantity of land, but any open ground, especially a wide champaign; and in this antique sense it seems to be preserved in the names of places, as Castle-acre, West-acre, &c. An acre in England contains four square roods, a rood 40 perches or poles of 16½ feet each by statute. Yet this measure does not prevail in all parts of England, as the length of the pole varies in different counties, and is called customary measure, the difference running from the 16½ feet to 28. The acre is also divided into 10 square chains, of 22 yards each, that is, 4840 square yards. An acre in Scotland contains four square roods; one square rood is 40 square falls; one square fall, 36 square ells; one square ell, nine square feet and 73 square inches; one square foot, 144 square inches. The Scots acre is also divided into 10 square chains; the measuring chain should be 24 ells in length, divided into 100 links, each link 8.25 inches; and so one square chain will contain 10,000 square links. The English statute acre is about three roods and six falls standard measure of Scotland.
The French acre, arpent, contains 1¼ English acre, or 54,450 square English feet, whereof the English acre contains only 43,560.—The Strasburg acre is about half an English acre.—The Welsh acre contains commonly two English ones.—The Irish acre is equal to one acre two roods and 19 perches ¼ English.