For the use of Vara as a town name, see Vara, Sweden or Vara, Estonia .
VARA is also the of a public broadcasting organization in the Netherlands: see VARA (radio and TV).

Vara is an old Spanish and Portuguese unit of length. Varas are a surveying unit that appears in many deeds in the southern United States, and varas were also used in many parts of Latin America. It varied in size at various times and places; the Spanish unit was set at about 835.9 mm in 1801. At some time value of 33 in (838 mm) was adopted in California, and 33 1/3 inches (847 mm) in Texas. In the latter definition, one acre equals 5,645.4 square varas, and a square vara equals 0.717 m². The vara was introduced in the 19th century to measure Spanish land grants.

Standardization came with the introduction of varas, cordels, and leagues of 5000 varas. In Texas, Austin's early surveying contracts required that they use the vara as a standard unit.

A common Texas land grant size, discussed in James Michener's Texas , was a "labor and a league": one labor (1000² square varas) of good riparian land, and a square league (5000² square varas) of land away from the river.

References

• The Handbook of Texas Online