Wa ( , also ''waa'' or ''wah'', abbreviated ) is a unit of

length Length is a measure of distance. In the International System of Quantities, length is a quantity with Dimension (physical quantity), dimension distance. In most systems of measurement a Base unit (measurement), base unit for length is chosen, ...

, equal to two

metre The metre (or meter in US spelling; symbol: m) is the base unit of length in the International System of Units (SI). Since 2019, the metre has been defined as the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of of ...

s (2 m) or four sok (.) ''Wa'' as a

verb A verb is a word that generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual description of English, the basic f ...

means to outstretch (one's) arms to both sides, which relates to the

fathom A fathom is a unit of length in the imperial and the U.S. customary systems equal to , used especially for measuring the depth of water. The fathom is neither an international standard (SI) unit, nor an internationally accepted non-SI unit. H ...

's distance between the fingertips of a

man A man is an adult male human. Before adulthood, a male child or adolescent is referred to as a boy. Like most other male mammals, a man's genome usually inherits an X chromosome from the mother and a Y chromosome from the f ...

's outstretched arms. The 1833 Siamese-American Treaty of Amity and Commerce, reads, " heSiamese fathom...being computed to contain 78 English or American inches, corresponding to 96 Siamese inches." The length then would have been equivalent to a modern 1.981 metres. Since conversion to the metric system in 1923, the length as derived from the

is precisely two metres, but the unit is neither part of nor recognized by the modern International metric system (SI). Wa also occurs as a

colloquialism Colloquialism (also called ''colloquial language'', ''colloquial speech'', ''everyday language'', or ''general parlance'') is the linguistic style used for casual and informal communication. It is the most common form of speech in conversation amo ...

for "square wa" ( tarang wa) a unit of

area Area is the measure of a region's size on a surface. The area of a plane region or ''plane area'' refers to the area of a shape or planar lamina, while '' surface area'' refers to the area of an open surface or the boundary of a three-di ...

abbreviated or .) As with many terms normally written in the

Thai alphabet The Thai script (, , ) is the abugida used to write Thai, Southern Thai and many other languages spoken in Thailand. The Thai script itself (as used to write Thai) has 44 consonant symbols (, ), 16 vowel symbols (, ) that combine into at leas ...

romanization of Thai There are many systems for the romanization of the Thai language, i.e. representing the language in Latin script. These include systems of transliteration, and transcription. The most seen system in public space is Royal Thai General System of Tra ...

causes spelling variants such as ''waa'' and ''wah''.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Wa (Unit) Units of length Human-based units of measurement Thai units of measurement

See also

References

External links