Arpents to Square Kilometers (arpent to km²)

1 arpent (North American) equals 0.00341889 square kilometers exactly.

1 arpent (North American) = 0.00341889 square kilometers

How to convert arpents to square kilometers

To convert arpents to square kilometers, multiply the number of arpents by 0.00341889. This factor is exact. To go the other way, multiply square kilometers by 292.4925926 (rounded).

square kilometers = arpents × 0.00341889

Example: 10 arpents = 0.0341889 square kilometers.

Approximate value. Standards for the arpent (North American) varied by place and period, so this converter uses the most commonly cited value. Treat results as estimates, not exact figures.

About these units

Arpent (North American) (arpent)

French (Ancien Régime)Historical unit (no longer in standard use)Approximate value

About 3,419 m² (0.845 acre), a square of 180 French feet. Still used in Louisiana and Quebec land records. The older Paris arpent was larger, about 5,107 m².

Arpent probably descends from the Late Latin arepennis, half a jugerum, which may itself trace to a Gaulish word for the end of a field. French surveyors used it for land and forests, and the size changed from province to province. Wikipedia describes the Paris arpent as 220 French feet on a side, about 71.5 m, which gives roughly 5,107 square meters.

The smaller arpent of 180 French feet, about 58.5 m on a side, gives 32,400 square French feet, near 3,419 square meters or 0.845 acre. Wikipedia files this version under North America, where Louisiana grants usually fixed river frontage in arpents with plots 40 or more deep. Some states round it differently, to 0.84628 acre in Louisiana and 0.8507 acre in Arkansas and Missouri.

The figure used here is 3,418.9 square meters. Mauritius and Seychelles use yet another arpent, near 4,221 square meters, and Quebec land records still use the term.

1 arpent (North American) = 3,418.89 square meters (approximately).

Sources: Wikipedia: Arpent

Square Kilometer (km²)

Metric (SI)Current unit

One million square meters (100 hectares). Used for the area of cities, countries and lakes.

Metric land measure took a surprisingly long time to settle on the kilometer. The meter was defined in 1799, yet people initially preferred the myriameter, 10,000 meters, and the French phrase myriamètres par heure was still in print in 1802. The Netherlands adopted the kilometer in 1817 under the name mijl. Once the kilometer was established, the square kilometer followed naturally as the unit for areas too large to count comfortably in hectares or square meters.

One square kilometer is 1,000,000 square meters, or 100 hectares, about 0.3861 square miles or 247.1 acres. A useful picture comes from history: many medieval European cities were enclosed by walls around roughly a square kilometer, with Delft at about 0.9 km² and Lucca at about 1.09 km². A standard 18-hole golf course of 6,000 meters needs about 0.8 km². The symbol km² means the square of a kilometer, not a thousand square meters. The planned Square Kilometre Array radio telescope takes its name from the collecting area it aims for.

1 square kilometer = 1,000,000 square meters (exactly).

Sources: Wikipedia: Square kilometre; Wikipedia: Kilometres per hour

Related conversions

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