arpent

American  

[ahr-puhnt, ar-pahn] / ˈɑr pənt, arˈpɑ̃ /

noun

plural

arpents

1. an old French unit of area equal to about one acre (0.4 hectare). It is still used in the province of Quebec and in parts of Louisiana.

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arpent British  

/ arpɑ̃, ˈɑːpənt /

noun

1. a former French unit of length equal to 190 feet (approximately 58 metres)

2. an old French unit of land area equal to about one acre: still used in Quebec and Louisiana

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Etymology

Origin of arpent

1570–80; < Middle French < Latin arepennis half-acre < Gaulish; akin to MIr airchenn unit of area

Example Sentences

But I'm not go more mebbe t'ree arpent, w'en      de sky is get black all roun', An' de win' she blow lak I never see, an'      de beeg snowstorm come down.

From The Habitant and Other French-Canadian Poems by Drummond, William Henry

Supposing them three toises apart, there will be one hundred to the arpent, which gives three hundred livres a year, besides the corn growing on the same ground.

From Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson, Volume 2 by Randolph, Thomas Jefferson

It was estimated that an industrious settler, working by himself, could clear not more than one superficial arpent in a whole season.

From Crusaders of New France A Chronicle of the Fleur-de-Lis in the Wilderness Chronicles of America, Volume 4 by Munro, William Bennett

An homme de vignes, which consists of seven hundred plants, three feet apart, yields generally about three quarters of a pi�ce, which is nearly four pi�ces to the arpent.

From Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson, Volume 2 by Randolph, Thomas Jefferson

Each grant varied from sixteen arpents—an arpent being about five-sixths of an English acre—by fifty, to ten leagues by twelve.

From Lord Elgin by Bourinot, John George, Sir