How far is a day's march?
... for, say, 20 people?
... who are trained for it and have high morale?
... and large backbacks?
What if they are making a road as they go?
... out of packed sand?
... out of other material?
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From personal experience - two fit people with decent sized packs in mountainous terrain, 12 miles is a good day. In flatter terrain, we would hit maybe 18.
ReplyDeleteExtrapolate as needed
A league is supposed to be as far as a person can hike in an hour, and is usually defined as three miles.
ReplyDeleteEdit: on level, fairly open terrain.
Seven leagues, as in the seven league boots, is how far an army can advance in a day. An army has a lot of infrastructure to move, and can’t just forage as they go along. 20 people could probably do more than seven leagues a day.
Making a road, I don’t know. But I don’t think it scales — more people might make it faster. Enough people and you basically trample out a trail just by passing through.
Correct: a thousand people marching in rows makes a road simply by passing through. So do elephants.
ReplyDeletePDF of the US Army Manual for foot marches circa 1990
ReplyDeleteglobalsecurity.org - www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/army/fm/21-18/fm21-18.pdf
Roman legions were highly trained and had extremely large backpacks. They marched, on paved road, 25 km per day
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