Ligne

The ligne or line or Paris line, is a historic unit of length used in France and elsewhere prior to the adoption of the metric system in the late 18th century, and used in various sciences after that time. It is vestigially retained today by French and Swiss watchmakers to measure the size of watch movements, in button making, and ribbon manufacture.

Use

Watchmaking

There are 12 lignes to one French inch (pouce). The standardized conversion for a ligne is 2.2558291 mm (1 mm = 0.443296 ligne), and it is abbreviated with the letter L or represented by the triple prime, ‴. One ligne is the equivalent of 0.0888 international inch.

This is comparable in size to the British measurement called "line" (one-twelfth of an English inch), used prior to 1824.

Buttonmaking

In the 9th century German button makers began to use the term ligne to measure the diameter of buttons. The consensus definition was that a ligne was the measurement of a round wick, folded flat. In this sense it measures ¹⁄₄₀ of an inch, but not exactly, for there were several inches in the kingdoms and petty states of Germany at that time.

Sambre

The Sambre is a river in northern France and in Wallonia, Belgium, left tributary of the Meuse River. The ancient Romans called the river Sabis.

Course

The source of the Sambre is near Le Nouvion-en-Thiérache, in the Aisne department. It passes through the Franco-Belgian coal basin, formerly an important industrial district. Its Belgian portion was at the western end of the sillon industriel, which was Wallonia's industrial backbone. It is canalized along much of its length and flows into the Meuse River at Namur, Belgium. The Sambre is connected with the Oise River by the Sambre-Oise Canal.

The Sambre flows through the following departments of France, provinces of Belgium and towns:

The Sambre at Aulne

The Sambre at Aulne

The Sambre at Flawinne (Namur)

The Sambre at Flawinne (Namur)

The Sambre at Ham-sur-Sambre

Ligné

Ligné may refer to the following places in France: