Yojana

A yojana (Devanagari: योजन; Khmer language: យោជន៍; ; ) is a measure of distance that was used in ancient India, Cambodia, Thailand and Myanmar. Some sources define the unit as the distance an army can march in a day. Various textual sources from ancient India define Yojana as ranging from 3.5 to 15 km.

Edicts of Ashoka (3rd century BCE) Ashoka, in his Major Rock Edict No.13, gives a distance of 600 yojanas between the Maurya empire, and "where the Yona king named Antiyoga (is ruling)", identified as King Antiochus II Theos, whose capital was Babylon. A range of estimates, for the length of a yojana, based on the ~2,000 km from Baghdad to Kandahar, on the eastern border of the empire, to the ~4,000 km to the Capital at Patna, have been offered by historians.Inscriptions of Asoka p.43

The Mahabharata (500 BCE – 300 CE) Offers:

Given the Moon's diameter is now known to be approximately 3,475 km and mean radius of 21,833 km, while the Sun's diameter is approximately 1,391,400 km, the stated values offer conflicting lengths for a yojana, in the verse, between - 0.316 km and 139.14 km.

Yojana in geodesy +Earth's diameter and/or circumference in yojanas as mentioned by classical Hindu astronomersDiameter (12,756 km)Circumference (40,075 km)Aryabhata (476–550 CE)1,050 yojanaSurya Siddhānta (500-800 CE)1,600 yojanaVarahamihira (6th century CE)3,200 yojanaBhāskara I (c. 600 – c. 680 CE)1,050 or 1600 yojanaBrahmagupta (c. 598 – c. 668 CE)1,581 yojana5,000 yojanaBhāskara II (1114–1185 CE)1,581 yojana4,967 yojanaNilakantha Somayaji (1444 – 1545 CE)3,300 yojana

Hindu units of length

Units In Hindu scriptures, Paramāṇu is the fundamental particle and smallest unit of length. Measurement Equivalence (in Hindu measurement) Notes 8 to 30 Paramāṇus 1 trasareṇuAs per Manusmriti, one trasareṇu is the size of the smallest moving speck of dust visible to the naked eye. 8 trasarenu 1 bālāgra (tip of a hair strand) 8 bālāgra 1 likhsha (size of a nit) 8 liksha 1 yūka (size of a louse) 8 yūka 1 yava (width of barley grain of medium size) 8 yava 1 aṅgula (finger-breadth) Estimated between to . 6 angula 1 pada (the breadth of a foot) other sources define this unit differently: see Pada (foot) 2 pada 1 vitasti (span or distance between the tip of the forefinger and wrist) ~ 22.86 cm (9 inches) 2 vitasti 1 hasta (cubit) ~ 45.7 cm (18 inches) 2 hasta 1 náriká~ 91.5 cm (36 inches / 3 feet) 2 náriká 1 dhanu~ 183 cm (72 inches / 6 feet) to 192 cm ( 75.6 inches / 6 feet 3.5 inches) 1 paurusa a man's height with arms and fingers uplifted (standing reach)~ 192 cm (75 inches) 2,000 dhanu 1 gavyuti or gorutam (distance at which a cow's call or lowing can be heard) ~ 3.66 to 3.84 km 4 gavyuti 1 yojana ~ 15 kilometers

Variations in length The length of the yojana varied over time and locale, its length has been estimated as: - 14th-century mathematician Paramesvara. - A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami PrabhupadaSrimad Bhagavatam 10.57.18 (translation) "one yojana measures about eight miles" throughout his translations of the Bhagavata Purana. to - From The Ancient Geography of India, 1871, Alexander Cunningham, estimated by comparison with Chinese units of length.Alexander Cunningham, Measures of Distance. Yojana, Li, Krosa. in The Ancient Geography of India: I. I. The Buddhist Period, Including the Campaigns of Alexander, and the Travels of Hwen-Thsang, Trübner and Company, 1871, pp. 571–574 - 1997, Thompson, from dividing the earths diameter by the yojana circumferences offered In the Surya Siddhanta and Aryabhatiya (late 4th-century to 5th-century CE)

Yojana

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