Mu (unit)

The mu () in Mandarin, mau or mou in Cantonese, or bo in Taiwanese Hokkien, also called Chinese acre, is a traditional Chinese unit of measurement for land area. One ''mu'' equals 666.67 square meters in mainland China, 761.4 square meters in Hong Kong and Macau, and 99.17 square meters in Taiwan and Japan. ''Mu'' is the only Chinese area unit legally retained by the People's Republic of China.

Origin

The ''mu'' was defined in terms of the ''bu'', or more precisely the square ''bu''. Deng Zhan of the Three Kingdoms era wrote that "in the old times 100 ''bu'' makes a ''mu'', but now 240 ''bu'' makes a ''mu''. Han dynasty fields use Qin dynasty units." Combined with known values of the Han dynasty ''chi'' and ''bu'', the "new" ''mu'' of the Han Dynasty is therefore 240 ''bu''² = 240 ( × )²
= 461 m².

Mainland

On 7 January 1915, the Beiyang government promulgated a measurement law to use not only the metric system as the standard but also a set of Chinese measurement units based directly on the Qing dynasty definitions ()..

where ''mu'' is the basic unit of area measurement.

On 16 February 1929, the Nationalist government promulgated ''The Weights and Measures Act'' to adopt the metric system as the official standard and to limit the newer Chinese units of measurement to private sales and trade in Article 11, effective on 1 January 1930. These newer "market" units are based on rounded metric numbers.

And ''mu'' remains the base unit.

In mainland China, ''mu'' is the only area unit retained after the traditional Chinese measurement system was discontinued in the "Decree of the State Council Concerning the Use of Uniform Legal Measures in the Country" promulgated in 1959. Now the Chinese measurement system stipulates that 1 ''mu'' is equal to 60 square zhang, which is approximately equal to 666.67 square meters; 15 ''mu'' is equal to 1 hectare; 1 square kilometer is equal to 1500 ''mu''.Decree of the State Council Concerning the Use of Uniform Legal Measures in the Country

Macau

In Macau, ''mu'' is also the basic area unit of Chinese measurement. One ''mu'' is defined as 761.4 square meters.
On 24 August 1992, Macau published ''Law No. 14/92/M'' that Chinese units of measurement similar to those used in Hong Kong, imperial units, and United States customary units would be permissible for five years since the effective date of the law, 1 January 1993, on the condition of indicating the corresponding International System of Units (SI) values, then for three more years thereafter, Chinese, imperial, and US units would be permissible as secondary to the SI.''Law No. 14/92/M'' ( ;
Lei n.^o 14/92/M

Hong Kong

The Chinese units of measurement used in Hong Kong are similar to those used in Macau.
In 1976 the Hong Kong Metrication Ordinance allowed a gradual replacement of the system in favor of the SI metric system. The Weights and Measures Ordinance defines the metric, imperial, and Chinese units.Cap. 68 WEIGHTS AND MEASURES ORDINANCE
/ref> As of 2012, all three systems are legal for trade and are in widespread use.

The standard commercial measure of real estate area is in square feet of the imperial system. Apartment or office size is generally still given in square feet. However, square metres are used for official purposes.

The traditional units of agricultural land area are the ''mau'' or ''mou'' (Cantonese for ''mu'', a unit used throughout China) and the local ''dau chung'' (). Notionally the two units are defined differently, with the ''dau chung'' being the amount of land which could be planted by one ''dau'' () of rice; in practice the area of one ''dau chung'' is roughly equal to one ''mau''.

Taiwan

In Taiwan, the principal unit for measuring the floor space of an office or apartment is (Taiwanese Hokkien: pêⁿ,In Taiwanese Hokkien, is also pronounced pîⁿ, phêⁿ, phîⁿ, phiâⁿ, phêng depends on the accents. Hakka: phiàng, Mandarin: píng). The unit derives from the Japanese '' tsubo'', the base unit of the Japanese area. The principal unit of land measure is (Taiwanese Hokkien: kah, Hakka: kap, Mandarin: jiǎ). The unit is derived from the obsolete Dutch '' morgen'', which was introduced during Taiwan's Dutch era.

Taiwanese ''mu'' is derived from Japanese ''se'', i.e., equals one Japanese ''se'' or 30 ''ping''.

Officially, land area is measured in square metres.

"Mu", "acre" and "are"

There are three area units whose Chinese names include character . Their meanings and conversions are as follows:

* (Chinese ''mu''; character-by-character translation: "market ''mu''"): Or simply called ''mu'', is a traditional Chinese unit of measure, roughly equals 667 square meters in mainland China.
* (acre, "British ''mu''"): A British imperial unit, about 4,047 square meters or 0.405 hectares.
* (are, "common ''mu''"): Part of the metric system, equivalent to 100 square meters.

1 Chinese ''mu'' =6.667 ares = 0.164 acre.

Idioms

* ''One mu and three fen of land,'' or ''1.3 mu of land'' () is a Chinese idiom that figuratively refers to someone's small personal domain or limited territory, often implying a narrow scope of influence or control.
It is also the name of a Chinese website 1Point3Acres.

See also

*Chinese units of measurement
* Taiwanese units of measurement
* Hong Kong units of measurement
* :zh:亩 (the Chinese Wiki article of ''Mu'')

Notes

References

{{reflist

External links

*https://www.britannica.com/science/mou (Mou: Chinese unit of measurement)

Units of area
Customary units of measurement