This Sunday is leap day, an event that happens once every four years during a leap year.

According to Eric Weisstein's World of Astronomy at http://scienceworld.wolfram.com, a leap year is
"a year in which an extra day (is) added to the calendar in order to synchronize it with the seasons."

This extra day falls at the end of February, thereby giving the month 29 days instead of the usual 28.

According to http://www.timeanddate.com, there are three rules that determine which years are leap
years in the Gregorian calendar -- used by most countries: Every year divisible by four is a leap year,
but every year divisible by 100 is not a leap year, unless the year is also divisible by 400, then it is
still a leap year.

This means that although the years 1600 and 2000 were leap years, 1700, 1800 and 1900 were not.

According to the National Maritime Museum, a change was made from the Julian calendar to the
Gregorian calendar hundreds of years ago to align the months with the seasons due to a discrepancy
in the Julian calendar. The difference between the real length and the adopted length of the year was
0.00781 days. According to the NMM's Web site, "the discrepancy ... may not seem important but
over hundreds of years the difference becomes obvious."

Therefore the Gregorian calendar was implemented. This change resulted in a more complex leap year
in which "century years should only be leap years if they were divisible by 400." Thus, we have leap
day and leap year.

"In the dictionary, New Year and New Year's Day is capitalized," Raenell Dawn, editor of
http://www.leapzine.com, said on the Web site. "Leap Year and Leap Day are equally deserving. I've
been told that Leap Day is not capitalized because Leap Day is not a holiday. It doesn't have to be a
holiday. It's Leap Day. Simple as that."

-- Reese Lee

© 2005 Oregon Daily Emerald