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Theunits of measurement in use inDenmark are currently part of themetric system. A variety of otherhistorical weights and measures have been employed throughout the nation's history.

TheDanes started with a system of units based on a Greekpous ("foot") of 308.4 millimetres (1.012 ft) which they picked up through trade in the lateBronze Age/earlyIron Age. Some early standards of measure can be recovered from measured drawings made of the 52.5-foot-long (16.0 m)Hjortspring boat, which though dating to the early Iron Age exemplifies plank-built vessels of the late Bronze Age and the 82-foot-long (25 m)Nydam ship. Thwarts are typically spaced about 3fod apart.

KingChristian V of Denmark introduced an office to oversee weights and measures, ajustervæsen. This was first led by the royal mathematicianOle Rømer, who established a national system of weights and measures on May 1, 1683.^[1][2] Rømer's system, which he updated in 1698, was based on the Rhine foot. Its definitions included the following:^[3]

• the Danish mile as 24,000 Rhineland feet (i.e. 4 minutes of arc latitude)
• the Danish pound (pund) as1⁄62 of the weight of a cubic Rhineland foot of water (499.7 g)
• the Danish ell (alen) as 2 Rhineland feet (630 mm)

Rømer also suggested a pendulum definition for the foot (although this would not be implemented until after his death), and invented an early temperature scale.^[4][5]

The metric system was introduced in 1907.

See alsoDanish rute (rod)

• mil – Danishmile. Towards the end of the 17th century,Ole Rømer,Gerardus Mercator and other contemporaries of the great Dutch cartographerThisus began followingClaudius Ptolemy in connecting the mile to the great circle of the earth, and Roemer defined it as 12,000alen. This definition was adopted in 1816 as the PrussianMeile. The coordinated definition from 1835 was 7.532 km. Earlier, there were many variants, the most commonplace theSjællandsk miil of 17,600alen or 11.13 km (6.92 mi).
• palme –palm, for circumference, 8.86 cm (3.49 in)
• alen –ell, 2fod
• fod –foot, about 313.85 mm (12.356 inches) in most recent usage. Defined as aRheinfuss 314.07 mm (12.365 inches) from 1683, before that 314.1 mm (12.366 in) with variations.
• rut – 5026 mm, 16 fod.
• kvarter – quarter,1⁄4alen
• tomme – thumb (inch),1⁄12fod
• linie –line,1⁄12tomme
• skrupel –scruple,1⁄12linie

• tønde land –Barrel of land, 8skæpper land

• pægl (da) –peg a quarter pot, 242 mL
• potte – pot, from 16831⁄32 cubicfod, about in 19th and 20th centuries
• smørtønde – barrel of butter, from 1683, 136potter
• korntønde – barrel of corn (grain), from 1683 144potter

• pund – pound, from 1683 the weight of1⁄62 cubicfod of water, 499.75 g (1.1 lb)

• dusin – dozen, 12
• snes – score, 20
• skok – 60
• ol – 4 snese, 80
• gros – gross, 144

• Weights and measures
• Historical weights and measures
• SI

• Customary units of measurement
• Units of measurement by country

• CS1 Danish-language sources (da)
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