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The meanings of mile that are commonly used today are:
Throughout history many units of length named mile have been used, with widely differing definitions, originating with the Roman mile of approximately 1479 metres. A Roman mile consisted of 1000 "double steps", or two strides by a Roman soldier, each such double stride being called a passus having a length of approximately 2.4 feet. The word mile itself has been derived from the words mille passus (plural milia passuum), a thousand paces. Along the roads built by the Romans throughout EuropeFor the band of the same name, see Europe (band . Europe is a continent forming the westermost part of the Eurasian supercontinent. Europe is bounded to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the west by the Atlantic Ocean, to the south by the Mediterranean Se, it was common to erect a stone every mile to announce the distance to Rome, the so-called milestones. The noun milliarium (plural milliaria), designating a milestone, was also used as a figurative alternative for mile.
In navigation, the geographical mileThe geographical mile is a unit of length determined by 1 minute of arc along the Earth's equator, approximately equal to 1855 metres (6087. 15 international feet). The unit is not used much; it is closely related to the nautical mile, which was originall was commonly used, defined as 1 minute of arcA minute is: a unit of time equal to 1/60th of an hour and to 60 seconds. Some rare minutes have 59 or 61 seconds; see leap second. a unit of angle, 1/60th of a degree. It is then also known as a minute of angle or minute of arc and can further be divided along the Earth's equator, approximately equal to 1855 metres.
The name statute mile goes back to Queen Elizabeth I of England who redefined the mile from 5000 feet to 8 furlongs (5280 feet) by statute in 1593.
When the international mile became legal in mid- 1959, the survey mile was retained for measurements derived from U.S. cadastral surveys.
In Denmark and most of Germany the mile in the 19th century was an approximately 7.5 km geographical mile (determined by 4 minutes of arc) specified by Ole Rømer. In parts of Germany there also existed an exact 7.5 km metric mile variant, but it mostly went out of use at the beginning of the 20th century. The Ole Rømer mile was for a long time used as a sea mile in Scandinavia, but was in the middle of the 20th century replaced by the international nautical mile. The international nautical mile is still often referred to by traditionalist Scandinavians as a quarter mile.