{{Short description|Greek unit of land area}} The '''stremma''' ({{abbr|pl.|plural}} stremmata; {{langx|el|στρέμμα}}, ''strémma'') is unit of land area used mainly in Greece and Cyprus, equal to 1,000 square metres or approximately {{frac||1|4}} acre.

==History== The ancient Greek equivalent was the square plethron, which served as the Greeks' form of the acre. It was originally defined as the area plowed by a team of oxen in a day<ref>{{Citation |last=Pryce |first=Frederick Norman |author2-last=Lang |author2-first=Mabel L. |author3-last=Vickers |author3-first=Michael |display-authors=1 |editor-last=Spawforth |editor-first=Antony |editor2-last=Hornblower |editor2-first=Simon |editor3-last=Eidinow |editor3-first=Esther |display-editors=0 |contribution=measures |contribution-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bVWcAQAAQBAJ&pg=PA917 |title=The Oxford Classical Dictionary, ''4th&nbsp;ed.'' |page=917 |location=Oxford |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=2012 |isbn=978-0-19-954556-8 |ref={{harvid|Pryce|2012}} }}.</ref> but was nominally standardised as the area enclosed by a square 100 Greek feet (''pous'') to a side. It was the size of a Greek wrestling square.

The Byzantine or Morean stremma continued to vary depending on the period and the quality of the land, but usually enclosed an area between 900 and 1 900 m<sup>2</sup>.<ref>Siriol Davis, "Pylos Regional Archaeological Project, Part VI: administration and settlement in Venetian Navarino", ''Hesperia'', Winter, 2004 [http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0SDG/is_1_73/ai_n13493303/pg_17]</ref> It was also originally known as a "plethron" but this was replaced during Byzantine times by the word "stremma", derived from the verb for "turning" the ground with a plough.<ref>Λεξικό της κοινής Νεοελληνικής (Dictionary of Modern Greek), Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών, Θεσσαλονίκη, 1998. {{ISBN|960-231-085-5}}</ref>

The Ottoman stremma or Turkish stremma, is the Greek (and occasionally English) name for the dunam, which is probably derived from the Byzantine unit.<ref>V.L. Ménage, Review of Speros Vryonis, Jr. ''The decline of medieval Hellenism in Asia Minor and the process of islamization from the eleventh through the fifteenth century'', Berkeley, 1971; in ''Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies'' (University of London) '''36''':3 (1973), pp. 659-661. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/613605 at JSTOR (subscription required)]; see also Erich Schilbach, ''Byzantinische Metrologie''.</ref> Again, this varied by region: some values include 1 270 m<sup>2</sup>,<ref>''The Dictionary of Modern Greek'' <!-- which one? --> Λεξικό, 1998</ref> and 1 600 m<sup>2</sup>.<ref>Costas Lapavitsas, {{cite journal|url=http://eprints.soas.ac.uk/8828/1/Lapavitsas4112005.pdf |journal=Ηλεκτρονικό Δελτίο Οικονομικής Ιστορίας |title=Social and Economic Underpinning of Industrial Development: Evidence from Ottoman Macedonia |access-date=2012-08-29}}</ref>

==See also== *1 E3 m² for further comparisons * Byzantine units *Conversion of units * Greek units * Metric units

==Bibliography== {{reflist}}

Category:Units of area Category:Human-based units of measurement Category:Metricated units