LEAGUE

A measure of length, used in reckoning distances by sea. The sea league is three nautical or geographical miles, or the l-20th of a degree, and consequently about 3-45 English miles. The common land league is a well-known itinerary me as ure on the continent of Europe, chiefly in France. The French, however, have two distinct leagues: the legal post ing league (lieue deposte), containing 2000 toises, and equal to 2-42 English miles; and a league of 25 to the degree (anciently the lieue moyenne), or equal to about 276 English miles. This last, however, can scarcely be regarded as a definite measure; and previous to the Revolution the league was different in the different provinces. The word is said to be derived from the Celtic leach, stone; the distances having been marked by stones in the Roman provinces. In Gaul alone of those provinces, they were marked in some instances by leagues as well as miles. The Gaulish league of was their considered own measure,by the Romans or as containing as equal to1500a mile Roman and apaces.hall" It is supposed that the league, or leuca, was introduced into England by the Normans, where, at an early period, it came to be reckoned as an equivalent to two miles of the lime; this being the sense in which the term leuca is used by the oldest law writers, and in most of the old English charters. See Milk. League, in Politics, appears to be, In strictne , an alliance between two or more powers, in order to execute some com mon enterprise. It is therefore more active, and le dura ble, than an alliance or a confederacy; both of which have some permanent object, while neither nece arily require* active co-operation. In the middle ages, the word league was used nearly in the sense now attached to these lattet terms: hence we read of the llanseatic league, and of the three leagues still subsisting in the canton of the Grisons in Switzerland; both of which were more properly confederacies. The word is of Spanish origin; and it has been said that the period of its commonest use in political language was commensurate with that during which the Spanish government exercised the greatest influence among ihose of Europe — the 16th and 17th centuries. LEAGUE, [s. 666]