Surveying by a Chain or a Perambulator

As stated above, chains varied a fair amount in length from country to country. Unfortunately I have not seen a country by country analysis of the different types of chains used. I suspect putting something like that would be quite a job.

I'm pretty familiar with American and English chains, so that's what I'm going to focus on here.

If you look at old English surveying textbooks you will see that England surveyors used a fair number of different types of chains from about 1600 to 1750, with the 66 ft Gunter chain becoming the most popular chain by far in the 18th century. My good friend Bob Heggan published a very nice and readable article on the history of chains a few years back. That article discusses the major types of early English Chains: Rathborne, Gunter and Wing. Note that all 3 of these chains are mentioned in the Circa 1700 Playing Card at the top of this webpage. I've searched fairly long for a Rathborne chain, but have never seen one. Wing chains are findable on eBay but few sellers know what they are so you need a keen eye to spot the slightly less than 10 inch links. Gunter chains are very findable and affordable.

If you look for old chains on a regular basis every now and then you will come up with an oddball size, which usually triggers some online research to discover where the chain was used. I came across an oddball chain in South Carolina that featured 4 perches with 16 links per perch. I found a single reference to this chain in Wing's 1664 book, where he stated that some surveyors still used a chain like that. What fun!

Many early authors describe how surveyors could survey land using a chain only (see The Atwood book below). I suspect there were a fair number of surveyors who surveyed using only a chain, as it would be the cheapest way to survey given the expensive of more elaborate instruments like Theodolites, Plane Tables and Circumferentors.

I suspect most people who collect chains focus on chains used in their home country. An American collector would likely collect the chains used in America, but may also collect those used early on in England, since many of those chains ended up in America.

Chains are relatively cheap (usually starting at $150 or so), and make for a nice display when added to a surveying instrument like a theodolite, transit or surveyors compass. The key is finding one that is age appropriate to your surveying instrument.

Serious chain collectors typically hunt for different varieties of chains. Half the fun of collecting is trying to figure out where and when the chain would have been used. The oddball 16 links per perch chain I found in South Carolina (see above text) is a perfect example of the fairly cheap entertainment value of looking for and finding different varieties of chains.

As for Perambulators, I've never had one but they are neat looking devices. They seem to run in the $1000 to $1500 range for a nice circa 1800. I suspect the price goes up a fair amount for an older Perambulator, like the late 16th century one shown above. Most of the ones I've seen offered for sale over the years date from 1750 to 1825 or so, however.

Below are some of the important books related to Chains.

The three major early English chains were the Rathborne, Gunter, and Wing chains. Each of these three authors described their chains in the surveying textbooks they authored. Below I posted PDF copies of the Rathborne and Gunter works describing the their chains. Unfortunately the Wing book has not been digitized yet.

I also posted the 1982 Whipple Catalogue "The Compleat Surveyor" write-up on chains and perambulators, as well as Stone's 1723 translation of Bion's book on instruments. That book discusses the French version of the Surveying chain, which has a different length than the chains used in England at the same time.

Finally, I include Atwell's 1665 text that describes how to conduct a survey using only a chain. There were actually a fair number of textbooks that describe how to survey using only a chain, so the Atwell book is simply representative of a good number of there books.