lexical+scale

=Lexical Scale=

toc Read here about a type of scale. The relevance of this "scale" to the broader concern of "scale" as an "order of magnitude" is discussed.

=Overview= Map scales may be expressed in words (a lexical scale), as a ratio, or as a fraction. Examples are: Old maps may cause difficulties if they possess only a lexical scale in rare, old or even archaic units. For example a scale of one inch to a furlong is not too difficult to interpret in countries where Imperial units are, or were recently, in use. (It is 1/7920). A scale of one pouce to one league may be about 1/144,000 but it depends your choice of the many possible definitions for a league.
 * 'one centimetre to one hundred metres'   or    1:10,000   or    1/10,000
 * 'one inch to one mile'   or    1:63,360    or    1/63,360
 * 'one centimetre to one thousand kilometres'  or   1:100,000,000    or    1/100,000,000.  (The ratio would usually be abbreviated to 1:100M).

Lexical scales are to be deprecated whereas ratios (ratio scale) and fractions (fraction scale) are much more acceptable since they are immediately accessible in any langauge.