a measure of length, containing more or fewer geometrical paces, according to the different usages and customs of countries. A league at sea contains 3000 geometrical paces, or three English miles. The French league sometimes contains the same measure, and sometimes consists of 3500 paces; the mean or common league consists of 2400 paces, and the little league of 2000. The Spanish leagues are larger than the French; seventeen Spanish leagues making a degree, or twenty French leagues, or sixty-nine and a half English statute miles. The Dutch and German leagues contain each four geographical miles. The Persian leagues are pretty nearly of the same extent with the Spanish; that is, they are equal to four Italian miles, which is pretty near what Herodotus calls the length of the Persian parasang, which contained thirty stadia, eight of which, according to Strabo, were equal to a mile. The word comes from leuca or leuga, an ancient Gaulish word for an itinerary measure, and retained in that sense by the Romans. Some derive the word leuca from λευκός, white, as the Gauls, in imitation of the Romans, marked the spaces and distances of their roads with white stones.