Norwegian/Swedish mil
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A mil (Norwegian and Swedish for mile) is a unit of length, usually used to measure geographic distance, fairly common in Norway and Sweden. Today, it measures by definition 10 kilometres, but earlier in history it had different values.
In Norway and Sweden, the old "land mile" or "long mile" was 36,000 feet: because of the different definitions of foot then in use, in Norway this was 11.295 km and in Sweden 10.688 km. The distance was equal to an older unit of measurement, the "rast" ("rest, pause"), and represented a suitable distance between rests when walking.[1]
When the Metric system was introduced in Norway and Sweden in 1889 (the actual law was passed in 1875), the mil was redefined to be 10 km.
The mil is currently never used on road signs (kilometre is the standard for all formal written distances), but almost always in informal and imprecise situations involving distances greater than several kilometres, such as "There are about 60 mil between Trondheim and Oslo". It is also used commonly for measuring vehicle fuel consumption ("litre per mil"). [2]
It is sometimes also used in laws, e.g. employers in Sweden are allowed to pay 18 SEK per mil without tax (year 2007) to employees using their own car in work.
