Thirty days hath September,
April, June and November;
All the rest have thirty-one,
Excepting February alone
Which hath but twenty-eight, in fine,
Till leap year gives it twenty-nine.
It's that time again. This February 29, is a leap day, the calendar oddity that occurs (almost) every four years.
A leap year is a year with 366 days, instead of the usual 365. Leap years are necessary because the actual length of a year is 365.242 days, not 365 days, as commonly stated. Leap years occur every 4 years, and years that are evenly divisible by 4 (2004, for example) have 366 days. This extra day is added to the calendar on February 29th.
Julius Caesar was behind the origin of leap year in 45 BC. The early Romans had a 355-day
Caesar
calendar and to keep festivals occurring around the same season each year a 22 or 23 day month was created every second year. Julius Caesar decided to simplify things and added days to different months of the year to create the 365-day calendar. The actual calculations were made by Caesar's astronomer, Sosigenes. Every fourth year following the 28th day of Februarius (February 29th) one day was to be added, making every fourth year a leap year.
Something that visits us only once every four years—even if it's a day—is bound to be surrounded by mystery.
Now you know why!
And maybe Caesar should have been paying more attention to the Ides of March.
