Year
Encyclopedia
A year is the orbital period
of the Earth
moving around the Sun
. For an observer on Earth, this corresponds to the period it takes the Sun to complete one course throughout the zodiac
along the ecliptic
.
In astronomy, the Julian year
is a unit of time
, defined as 365.25 day
s of SI second
s each.
There is no universally accepted symbol for the year as a unit of time. The International System of Units
does not propose one. A common abbreviation in international use is a (for Latin annus), in English also y or yr.
Due to the Earth's axial tilt
, the course of a year sees the passing of the season
s, marked by changes in weather
, hours of daylight
, and consequently vegetation
and fertility.
In temperate
and subpolar regions, generally four seasons are recognized: spring
, summer
, autumn
and winter
, astronomically marked by the Sun reaching the points of equinox
and solstice
, although the climatic seasons lag behind
their astronomical markers.
In some tropical
and subtropical regions it is more common to speak of the rainy
(or wet, or monsoon
) season versus the dry season
.
A calendar year
is an approximation of the Earth's orbital period in a given calendar
.
A calendar year in the Gregorian calendar
(as well as in the Julian calendar
) has either 365 (common year
s) or 366 (leap year
s) days.
The word "year" is also used of periods loosely associated but not strictly identical with either the astronomical or the calendar year, such as the seasonal year
, the fiscal year or the academic year, etc.
By extension, the term year can mean the orbital period of any planet
: for example, a "Martian year" is the time in which Mars completes its own orbit. The term is also applied more broadly to any long period or cycle, such as the "Great Year
".
Jahr, Old High German
jar, Old Norse
ár and Gothic
jer, all from a PIE
*yērom "year, season".
Cognates outside of Germanic are Avestan yare "year", Greek
"year, season, period of time" (whence "hour
"), Old Church Slavonic
jaru and Latin
hornus "of this year".
Latin Annus (a 2nd declension masculine noun; annum is the accusative singular
; anni is genitive singular and nominative plural; anno the dative and ablative singular) is from a PIE
noun , which also yielded Gothic
aþnam "year".
Both *yē-ro- and *at-no- are based on verbal roots expressing movement, *at- and *ey- respectively, both meaning "to go" generally.
The Greek word for "year", , is cognate with Latin vetus "old", from PIE *wetus- "year", also preserved in this meaning in Sanskrit
"yearling (calf)" and "year".
Derived from Latin annus are a number of English words, such as annual, annuity, anniversary, etc.; per annum means "each year".
is the time between successive recurrences of a season
al event such as the flooding of a river, the migration of a species of bird, the flowering of a species of plant, the first frost, or the first scheduled game of a certain sport. All of these events can have wide variations of more than a month
from year to year.
is the time between two dates with the same name in a calendar
.
A half year (one half of a year) may run from January to June, or July to December.
No astronomical year has an integer number of days or lunar months, so any calendar that follows an astronomical year must have a system of intercalation
such as leap year
s. Financial and scientific calculations often use a 365-day calendar
to simplify daily rates.
In the Julian calendar
, the average length of a year is 365.25 days. In a non-leap year, there are 365 days, in a leap year there are 366 days. A leap year occurs every 4 years.
The Gregorian calendar
attempts to keep the vernal equinox on or soon before March 21, hence it follows the vernal equinox year
. The average length of this calendar's year is mean solar days (as 97 out of 400 years are leap years); this is within one ppm
of the current length of the mean tropical year
( days). It is estimated that, by the year 4000, the vernal equinox will fall back by one day in the Gregorian calendar, not because of this difference, but because of the slowing down of the Earth's rotation and the associated lengthening of the sidereal day.
The Persian calendar
, in use in Afghanistan
and Iran
, has its year begin on the day of the vernal equinox as determined by astronomical computation (for the time zone of Tehran
), as opposed to using an algorithmic system of leap years.
is used to assign a number to individual years, using a reference point in the past as the beginning of the era. In many countries, the most common era is from the estimated date of the birth of Jesus
; dates in this era are designated Anno Domini
("in the year of the Lord", abbreviated A.D.) or C.E. (common era
). Other eras are also used to enumerate the years in different cultural, religious or scientific contexts.
For example, the federal government of the U.S. has a fiscal year that starts on October 1 instead of January 1. In India
the fiscal year is between April 1 and March 31. In the United Kingdom
and Canada
, the financial year runs from April 6 and April 1 respectively, and in Australia
it runs from July 1.
s, such as semesters or quarters.
Some schools in the UK and USA divide the academic year into three roughly equal-length terms (called "trimesters" or "quarters" in the USA), roughly coinciding with autumn, winter, and spring. At some, a shortened summer session, sometimes considered part of the regular academic year, is attended by students on a voluntary or elective basis.
Other schools break the year into two main semesters, a first (typically August through December) and a second semester (January through May). Each of these main semesters may be split in half by mid-term exams, and each of the halves is referred to as a "quarter" (or "term" in some countries). There may also be an elective summer session and/or a short January session.
Some other schools, including some in the United States, have four marking periods. The school year in many countries starts in August or September and ends in May, June or July.
Some schools in the United States, notably Boston Latin School
, may divide the year into five or more marking periods. Some state in defense of this that there is perhaps a positive correlation between report frequency and academic achievement.
There are typically 180 days of teaching each year in schools in the USA, excluding weekends and breaks, while 190 days for pupils in state schools in the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Canada.
In India the academic year normally starts from June 1 and ends on May 31. Though schools start closing from mid-March, the actual academic closure is on May 31 and in Nepal it starts from July 15.
Schools and universities in Australia typically have academic years that roughly align with the calendar year (i.e. starting in February or March and ending in October to December), as the southern hemisphere experiences summer from December to February.
, as used in astronomy and other sciences, is a time unit defined as exactly 365.25 days. This is the normal meaning of the unit "year" (symbol "a" from the Latin
annus) used in various scientific contexts. The Julian century of days and the Julian millennium of days are used in astronomical calculations. Fundamentally, expressing a time interval in Julian years is a way to precisely specify how many days (not how many "real" years), for long time intervals where stating the number of days would be unwieldy and unintuitive. By convention, the Julian year is used in the computation of the distance covered by a light-year
.
In the Unified Code for Units of Measure
, the symbol a (without subscript) always refers to the Julian year aj of exactly second
s.
365.25 days of seconds = 1 a = 1 aj = Ms
The SI multiplier prefixes may be applied to it to form ka (kiloannum), Ma (megaannum) etc.
Each of these three years can be loosely called an 'astronomical year'.
The sidereal year
is the time taken for the Earth to complete one revolution of its orbit, as measured against a fixed frame of reference (such as the fixed stars, Latin sidera, singular sidus). Its average duration is mean solar days (365 d 6 h 9 min 9.76 s) (at the epoch J2000.0 =January 1, 2000, 12:00:00 TT
).
The tropical year
is the period of time for the ecliptic longitude of the Sun to increase by 360 degrees. Since the Sun's ecliptic longitude is measured with respect to the equinox, the tropical year comprises a complete cycle of the seasons; because of the economic importance of the seasons, the tropical year is the basis of most calendar
s. The tropical year is often defined as the time between southern solstices, or between northward equinoxes. Because of the Earth's axial precession, this year is about 20 minutes shorter than the sidereal year. The mean tropical year is approximately 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, 45 seconds (= days).
The anomalistic year is the time taken for the Earth to complete one revolution with respect to its apsides
. The orbit of the Earth is elliptical; the extreme points, called apsides, are the perihelion, where the Earth is closest to the Sun (January 3 in 2011), and the aphelion, where the Earth is farthest from the Sun (July 4 in 2011). The anomalistic year is usually defined as the time between perihelion passages. Its average duration is days (365 d 6 h 13 min 52.6 s) (at the epoch J2011.0).
If Earth moved in an ideal Kepler orbit
, i.e. a perfect ellipse with the Sun fixed at one focus, each kind of year would always have the same duration, and the sidereal and anomalistic years would be equal. Because of perturbation
s by the gravity of other planets, Earth's motion varies slightly, causing the sidereal and tropical years to vary in length by about 25 minutes (see table below). Both are affected in the same way, so that the sidereal year is consistently 20 minutes longer than the tropical year, provided that they are measured in the same way.
An example of a year that will have a duration exceeding the average value of SI days with as much as 24.23 minutes is the one that will begin at winter solstice December 21, 2042 17:47:45.5 (Atomic time).
(a point where the Moon's orbit intersects the ecliptic). This period is associated with eclipse
s: these occur only when both the Sun and the Moon are near these nodes; so eclipses occur within about a month of every half eclipse year. Hence there are two eclipse season
s every eclipse year. The average duration of the eclipse year is
This term is sometimes erroneously used for the draconic or nodal period of lunar precession
, that is the period of a complete revolution of the Moon's ascending node around the ecliptic: Julian years ( days; at the epoch J2000.0).
is the time for the Sun (as seen from the Earth) to complete one revolution with respect to the perigee
of the Moon's orbit. This period is associated with the apparent size of the full moon
, and also with the varying duration of the synodic month
. The duration of one full moon cycle is:
days. The vague year was used in the calendars of Ancient Egypt
, Iran
, Armenia
and in Mesoamerica
among the Aztecs
and Maya
.
s of a star. It differs from the sidereal year
for stars away from the ecliptic
due mainly to the precession of the equinoxes
.
is the interval between heliacal risings of the star Sirius
. It is equal to the sidereal year and its duration is very close to the mean Julian year of 365.25 days.
is the sidereal year for a planet of negligible mass (relative to the Sun) and unperturbed by other planets that is governed by the Gaussian gravitational constant
. Such a planet would be slightly closer to the Sun than Earth's mean distance. Its length is:
. The following equation can be used to compute the current Besselian epoch (in years):
The TT subscript indicates that for this formula, the Julian date should use the Terrestrial Time
scale, or its predecessor, ephemeris time
.
An average Gregorian year is day
s = week
s = hour
s = minute
s = second
s (mean solar, not SI).
A common year is 365 days = hours = minutes = seconds.
A leap year is 366 days = hours = minutes = seconds.
The 400-year cycle of the Gregorian calendar has days and hence exactly weeks.
See also Leap seconds and other aspects of the Gregorian calendar.
. The International System of Units
does not propose one. NIST SP811 and ISO 80000-3:2006
suggest the symbol a is taken from the Latin word annus.
In English, the abbreviations y or yr are sometimes used,
specifically in geology
and paleontology
, where kyr, myr, byr (thousands, millions, and billions of years, respectively) and similar abbreviations are used to denote intervals of time remote from the present.
, although a is also the symbol for the are, the unit of area used to measure land area, but context is usually enough to disambiguate).
In English, the abbreviations y and yr are also used.
The Unified Code for Units of Measure
disambiguates the varying symbologies of ISO 1000, ISO 2955 and ANSI X3.50 http://aurora.regenstrief.org/~ucum/ucum.html#para-31 by using
A definition jointly adopted by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry
and the International Union of Geological Sciences
is to use annus, with symbol a, for year, defined as the length of the tropical year in the year 2000:
The notation has proved controversial; it conflicts with an earlier convention among geoscientists to use a specifically for "years ago", and y or yr for a one-year time period.
, geology
, and paleontology
, the abbreviation yr for "years" and ya for "years ago" are sometimes used, combined with prefixes for "thousand", "million", or "billion".
They are not SI units, using y to abbreviate English year, but following ambiguous international recommendations, use either the standard English first letters as prefixes (t,m,and b) and/or the familiar metric multiplier prefixes (k, m, and g). These abbreviations include:
Use of "mya" and "bya" is deprecated in modern geophysics, the recommended usage being "Ma" and "Ga" for dates Before Present
, but "m.y." for the duration of epochs.
This ad hoc distinction between "absolute" time and time intervals is somewhat controversial amongst members of the Geological Society of America.
Note that on graphs using "ya" units on the horizontal axis time flows from right to left, which may seem counter-intuitive. If the "ya" units are on the vertical axis, time flows from top to bottom which is probably easier to understand than conventional notation.
, or Equinoctial cycle corresponds to a complete revolution of the equinoxes around the ecliptic. Its length is about 25,700 years, and cannot be determined precisely as the precession speed is variable.
is the time it takes Earth's solar system
to revolve once around the galactic center
. It comprises roughly 230 million Earth years.
Orbital period
The orbital period is the time taken for a given object to make one complete orbit about another object.When mentioned without further qualification in astronomy this refers to the sidereal period of an astronomical object, which is calculated with respect to the stars.There are several kinds of...
of the Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
moving around the Sun
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields...
. For an observer on Earth, this corresponds to the period it takes the Sun to complete one course throughout the zodiac
Zodiac
In astronomy, the zodiac is a circle of twelve 30° divisions of celestial longitude which are centred upon the ecliptic: the apparent path of the Sun across the celestial sphere over the course of the year...
along the ecliptic
Ecliptic
The ecliptic is the plane of the earth's orbit around the sun. In more accurate terms, it is the intersection of the celestial sphere with the ecliptic plane, which is the geometric plane containing the mean orbit of the Earth around the Sun...
.
In astronomy, the Julian year
Julian year (astronomy)
In astronomy, a Julian year is a unit of measurement of time defined as exactly 365.25 days of 86 400 SI seconds each, totaling 31 557 600 seconds. The Julian year is the average length of the year in the Julian calendar used in Western societies in previous centuries, and for which the unit is...
is a unit of time
Unit of time
Units of measurement for time have historically been based on the movement of the Sun and the Moon . Shorter intervals were measured by physiological periods such as drawing breath, winking or the heartbeat.Units of time consisting of a number of years include the lustrum and the olympiad...
, defined as 365.25 day
Day
A day is a unit of time, commonly defined as an interval equal to 24 hours. It also can mean that portion of the full day during which a location is illuminated by the light of the sun...
s of SI second
Second
The second is a unit of measurement of time, and is the International System of Units base unit of time. It may be measured using a clock....
s each.
There is no universally accepted symbol for the year as a unit of time. The International System of Units
International System of Units
The International System of Units is the modern form of the metric system and is generally a system of units of measurement devised around seven base units and the convenience of the number ten. The older metric system included several groups of units...
does not propose one. A common abbreviation in international use is a (for Latin annus), in English also y or yr.
Due to the Earth's axial tilt
Axial tilt
In astronomy, axial tilt is the angle between an object's rotational axis, and a line perpendicular to its orbital plane...
, the course of a year sees the passing of the season
Season
A season is a division of the year, marked by changes in weather, ecology, and hours of daylight.Seasons result from the yearly revolution of the Earth around the Sun and the tilt of the Earth's axis relative to the plane of revolution...
s, marked by changes in weather
Weather
Weather is the state of the atmosphere, to the degree that it is hot or cold, wet or dry, calm or stormy, clear or cloudy. Most weather phenomena occur in the troposphere, just below the stratosphere. Weather refers, generally, to day-to-day temperature and precipitation activity, whereas climate...
, hours of daylight
Daylight
Daylight or the light of day is the combination of all direct and indirect sunlight outdoors during the daytime. This includes direct sunlight, diffuse sky radiation, and both of these reflected from the Earth and terrestrial objects. Sunlight scattered or reflected from objects in outer space is...
, and consequently vegetation
Vegetation
Vegetation is a general term for the plant life of a region; it refers to the ground cover provided by plants. It is a general term, without specific reference to particular taxa, life forms, structure, spatial extent, or any other specific botanical or geographic characteristics. It is broader...
and fertility.
In temperate
Temperate
In geography, temperate or tepid latitudes of the globe lie between the tropics and the polar circles. The changes in these regions between summer and winter are generally relatively moderate, rather than extreme hot or cold...
and subpolar regions, generally four seasons are recognized: spring
Spring (season)
Spring is one of the four temperate seasons, the transition period between winter and summer. Spring and "springtime" refer to the season, and broadly to ideas of rebirth, renewal and regrowth. The specific definition of the exact timing of "spring" varies according to local climate, cultures and...
, summer
Summer
Summer is the warmest of the four temperate seasons, between spring and autumn. At the summer solstice, the days are longest and the nights are shortest, with day-length decreasing as the season progresses after the solstice...
, autumn
Autumn
Autumn is one of the four temperate seasons. Autumn marks the transition from summer into winter usually in September or March when the arrival of night becomes noticeably earlier....
and winter
Winter
Winter is the coldest season of the year in temperate climates, between autumn and spring. At the winter solstice, the days are shortest and the nights are longest, with days lengthening as the season progresses after the solstice.-Meteorology:...
, astronomically marked by the Sun reaching the points of equinox
Equinox
An equinox occurs twice a year, when the tilt of the Earth's axis is inclined neither away from nor towards the Sun, the center of the Sun being in the same plane as the Earth's equator...
and solstice
Solstice
A solstice is an astronomical event that happens twice each year when the Sun's apparent position in the sky, as viewed from Earth, reaches its northernmost or southernmost extremes...
, although the climatic seasons lag behind
Seasonal lag
Seasonal lag is the phenomenon whereby the date of maximum average air temperature at a geographical location on a planet is delayed until some time after the date of maximum insolation...
their astronomical markers.
In some tropical
Tropics
The tropics is a region of the Earth surrounding the Equator. It is limited in latitude by the Tropic of Cancer in the northern hemisphere at approximately N and the Tropic of Capricorn in the southern hemisphere at S; these latitudes correspond to the axial tilt of the Earth...
and subtropical regions it is more common to speak of the rainy
Wet season
The the wet season, or rainy season, is the time of year, covering one or more months, when most of the average annual rainfall in a region occurs. The term green season is also sometimes used as a euphemism by tourist authorities. Areas with wet seasons are dispersed across portions of the...
(or wet, or monsoon
Monsoon
Monsoon is traditionally defined as a seasonal reversing wind accompanied by corresponding changes in precipitation, but is now used to describe seasonal changes in atmospheric circulation and precipitation associated with the asymmetric heating of land and sea...
) season versus the dry season
Dry season
The dry season is a term commonly used when describing the weather in the tropics. The weather in the tropics is dominated by the tropical rain belt, which oscillates from the northern to the southern tropics over the course of the year...
.
A calendar year
Calendar year
Generally speaking, a calendar year begins on the New Year's Day of the given calendar system and ends on the day before the following New Year's Day. By convention, a calendar year consists of a natural number of days. To reconcile the calendar year with an astronomical cycle , certain years...
is an approximation of the Earth's orbital period in a given calendar
Calendar
A calendar is a system of organizing days for social, religious, commercial, or administrative purposes. This is done by giving names to periods of time, typically days, weeks, months, and years. The name given to each day is known as a date. Periods in a calendar are usually, though not...
.
A calendar year in the Gregorian calendar
Gregorian calendar
The Gregorian calendar, also known as the Western calendar, or Christian calendar, is the internationally accepted civil calendar. It was introduced by Pope Gregory XIII, after whom the calendar was named, by a decree signed on 24 February 1582, a papal bull known by its opening words Inter...
(as well as in the Julian calendar
Julian calendar
The Julian calendar began in 45 BC as a reform of the Roman calendar by Julius Caesar. It was chosen after consultation with the astronomer Sosigenes of Alexandria and was probably designed to approximate the tropical year .The Julian calendar has a regular year of 365 days divided into 12 months...
) has either 365 (common year
Common year
A common year is a common type of calendar year. It has exactly 365 days and so is not a leap year. More generally, it is a calendar year without intercalation....
s) or 366 (leap year
Leap year
A leap year is a year containing one extra day in order to keep the calendar year synchronized with the astronomical or seasonal year...
s) days.
The word "year" is also used of periods loosely associated but not strictly identical with either the astronomical or the calendar year, such as the seasonal year
Seasonal year
The seasonal year is the time between successive recurrences of a seasonal event such as the flooding of a river, the migration of a species of bird, or the flowering of a species of plant....
, the fiscal year or the academic year, etc.
By extension, the term year can mean the orbital period of any planet
Planet
A planet is a celestial body orbiting a star or stellar remnant that is massive enough to be rounded by its own gravity, is not massive enough to cause thermonuclear fusion, and has cleared its neighbouring region of planetesimals.The term planet is ancient, with ties to history, science,...
: for example, a "Martian year" is the time in which Mars completes its own orbit. The term is also applied more broadly to any long period or cycle, such as the "Great Year
Great year
The Great Year is an archaic cosmological conception, found in different cultures, which acquired new interpretations with the development of astronomical knowledge In the Western tradition Plato has been the main source for the idea, so it was also frequently called 'Platonic year'...
".
Etymology
West Saxon gear (jɛar), Anglian gēr continues Proto-Germanic *jǣram (*jē2Eihwaz
Eiwaz or Eihaz was a Proto-Germanic word for "yew", and the reconstructed name of the rune ....
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
Jahr, Old High German
Old High German
The term Old High German refers to the earliest stage of the German language and it conventionally covers the period from around 500 to 1050. Coherent written texts do not appear until the second half of the 8th century, and some treat the period before 750 as 'prehistoric' and date the start of...
jar, Old Norse
Old Norse
Old Norse is a North Germanic language that was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and inhabitants of their overseas settlements during the Viking Age, until about 1300....
ár and Gothic
Gothic language
Gothic is an extinct Germanic language that was spoken by the Goths. It is known primarily from the Codex Argenteus, a 6th-century copy of a 4th-century Bible translation, and is the only East Germanic language with a sizable Text corpus...
jer, all from a PIE
Pie
A pie is a baked dish which is usually made of a pastry dough casing that covers or completely contains a filling of various sweet or savoury ingredients....
*yērom "year, season".
Cognates outside of Germanic are Avestan yare "year", Greek
Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek is the stage of the Greek language in the periods spanning the times c. 9th–6th centuries BC, , c. 5th–4th centuries BC , and the c. 3rd century BC – 6th century AD of ancient Greece and the ancient world; being predated in the 2nd millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek...
"year, season, period of time" (whence "hour
Hour
The hour is a unit of measurement of time. In modern usage, an hour comprises 60 minutes, or 3,600 seconds...
"), Old Church Slavonic
Old Church Slavonic
Old Church Slavonic or Old Church Slavic was the first literary Slavic language, first developed by the 9th century Byzantine Greek missionaries Saints Cyril and Methodius who were credited with standardizing the language and using it for translating the Bible and other Ancient Greek...
jaru and Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
hornus "of this year".
Latin Annus (a 2nd declension masculine noun; annum is the accusative singular
Accusative case
The accusative case of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb. The same case is used in many languages for the objects of prepositions...
; anni is genitive singular and nominative plural; anno the dative and ablative singular) is from a PIE
Pie
A pie is a baked dish which is usually made of a pastry dough casing that covers or completely contains a filling of various sweet or savoury ingredients....
noun , which also yielded Gothic
Gothic language
Gothic is an extinct Germanic language that was spoken by the Goths. It is known primarily from the Codex Argenteus, a 6th-century copy of a 4th-century Bible translation, and is the only East Germanic language with a sizable Text corpus...
aþnam "year".
Both *yē-ro- and *at-no- are based on verbal roots expressing movement, *at- and *ey- respectively, both meaning "to go" generally.
The Greek word for "year", , is cognate with Latin vetus "old", from PIE *wetus- "year", also preserved in this meaning in Sanskrit
Sanskrit
Sanskrit , is a historical Indo-Aryan language and the primary liturgical language of Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism.Buddhism: besides Pali, see Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Today, it is listed as one of the 22 scheduled languages of India and is an official language of the state of Uttarakhand...
"yearling (calf)" and "year".
Derived from Latin annus are a number of English words, such as annual, annuity, anniversary, etc.; per annum means "each year".
Seasonal year
A seasonal yearSeasonal year
The seasonal year is the time between successive recurrences of a seasonal event such as the flooding of a river, the migration of a species of bird, or the flowering of a species of plant....
is the time between successive recurrences of a season
Season
A season is a division of the year, marked by changes in weather, ecology, and hours of daylight.Seasons result from the yearly revolution of the Earth around the Sun and the tilt of the Earth's axis relative to the plane of revolution...
al event such as the flooding of a river, the migration of a species of bird, the flowering of a species of plant, the first frost, or the first scheduled game of a certain sport. All of these events can have wide variations of more than a month
Month
A month is a unit of time, used with calendars, which was first used and invented in Mesopotamia, as a natural period related to the motion of the Moon; month and Moon are cognates. The traditional concept arose with the cycle of moon phases; such months are synodic months and last approximately...
from year to year.
Calendar year
A calendar yearCalendar year
Generally speaking, a calendar year begins on the New Year's Day of the given calendar system and ends on the day before the following New Year's Day. By convention, a calendar year consists of a natural number of days. To reconcile the calendar year with an astronomical cycle , certain years...
is the time between two dates with the same name in a calendar
Calendar
A calendar is a system of organizing days for social, religious, commercial, or administrative purposes. This is done by giving names to periods of time, typically days, weeks, months, and years. The name given to each day is known as a date. Periods in a calendar are usually, though not...
.
A half year (one half of a year) may run from January to June, or July to December.
No astronomical year has an integer number of days or lunar months, so any calendar that follows an astronomical year must have a system of intercalation
Intercalation
Intercalation is the insertion of a leap day, week or month into some calendar years to make the calendar follow the seasons or moon phases. Lunisolar calendars may require intercalations of both days and months.- Solar calendars :...
such as leap year
Leap year
A leap year is a year containing one extra day in order to keep the calendar year synchronized with the astronomical or seasonal year...
s. Financial and scientific calculations often use a 365-day calendar
365-day calendar
A 365-day calendar consists of exactly 365 days per year , and is primarily used in computer models and as an assumption in every-day calculations...
to simplify daily rates.
In the Julian calendar
Julian calendar
The Julian calendar began in 45 BC as a reform of the Roman calendar by Julius Caesar. It was chosen after consultation with the astronomer Sosigenes of Alexandria and was probably designed to approximate the tropical year .The Julian calendar has a regular year of 365 days divided into 12 months...
, the average length of a year is 365.25 days. In a non-leap year, there are 365 days, in a leap year there are 366 days. A leap year occurs every 4 years.
The Gregorian calendar
Gregorian calendar
The Gregorian calendar, also known as the Western calendar, or Christian calendar, is the internationally accepted civil calendar. It was introduced by Pope Gregory XIII, after whom the calendar was named, by a decree signed on 24 February 1582, a papal bull known by its opening words Inter...
attempts to keep the vernal equinox on or soon before March 21, hence it follows the vernal equinox year
Tropical year
A tropical year , for general purposes, is the length of time that the Sun takes to return to the same position in the cycle of seasons, as seen from Earth; for example, the time from vernal equinox to vernal equinox, or from summer solstice to summer solstice...
. The average length of this calendar's year is mean solar days (as 97 out of 400 years are leap years); this is within one ppm
Parts-per notation
In science and engineering, the parts-per notation is a set of pseudo units to describe small values of miscellaneous dimensionless quantities, e.g. mole fraction or mass fraction. Since these fractions are quantity-per-quantity measures, they are pure numbers with no associated units of measurement...
of the current length of the mean tropical year
Tropical year
A tropical year , for general purposes, is the length of time that the Sun takes to return to the same position in the cycle of seasons, as seen from Earth; for example, the time from vernal equinox to vernal equinox, or from summer solstice to summer solstice...
( days). It is estimated that, by the year 4000, the vernal equinox will fall back by one day in the Gregorian calendar, not because of this difference, but because of the slowing down of the Earth's rotation and the associated lengthening of the sidereal day.
The Persian calendar
Iranian calendar
The Iranian calendars or sometimes called Persian calendars are a succession of calendars invented or used for over two millennia in Greater Iran...
, in use in Afghanistan
Afghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...
and Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
, has its year begin on the day of the vernal equinox as determined by astronomical computation (for the time zone of Tehran
Tehran
Tehran , sometimes spelled Teheran, is the capital of Iran and Tehran Province. With an estimated population of 8,429,807; it is also Iran's largest urban area and city, one of the largest cities in Western Asia, and is the world's 19th largest city.In the 20th century, Tehran was subject to...
), as opposed to using an algorithmic system of leap years.
Numbering calendar years
A calendar eraCalendar era
A calendar era is the year numbering system used by a calendar. For example, the Gregorian calendar numbers its years in the Western Christian era . The instant, date, or year from which time is marked is called the epoch of the era...
is used to assign a number to individual years, using a reference point in the past as the beginning of the era. In many countries, the most common era is from the estimated date of the birth of Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
; dates in this era are designated Anno Domini
Anno Domini
and Before Christ are designations used to label or number years used with the Julian and Gregorian calendars....
("in the year of the Lord", abbreviated A.D.) or C.E. (common era
Common Era
Common Era ,abbreviated as CE, is an alternative designation for the calendar era originally introduced by Dionysius Exiguus in the 6th century, traditionally identified with Anno Domini .Dates before the year 1 CE are indicated by the usage of BCE, short for Before the Common Era Common Era...
). Other eras are also used to enumerate the years in different cultural, religious or scientific contexts.
Fiscal year
A fiscal year or financial year is a 12-month period used for calculating annual financial statements in businesses and other organizations. In many jurisdictions, regulations regarding accounting require such reports once per twelve months, but do not require that the twelve months constitute a calendar year.For example, the federal government of the U.S. has a fiscal year that starts on October 1 instead of January 1. In India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
the fiscal year is between April 1 and March 31. In the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
and Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
, the financial year runs from April 6 and April 1 respectively, and in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
it runs from July 1.
Academic year
An academic year is the annual period during which a student attends an educational institution. The academic year may be divided into academic termAcademic term
An academic term is a division of an academic year, the time during which a school, college or university holds classes. These divisions may be called terms...
s, such as semesters or quarters.
Some schools in the UK and USA divide the academic year into three roughly equal-length terms (called "trimesters" or "quarters" in the USA), roughly coinciding with autumn, winter, and spring. At some, a shortened summer session, sometimes considered part of the regular academic year, is attended by students on a voluntary or elective basis.
Other schools break the year into two main semesters, a first (typically August through December) and a second semester (January through May). Each of these main semesters may be split in half by mid-term exams, and each of the halves is referred to as a "quarter" (or "term" in some countries). There may also be an elective summer session and/or a short January session.
Some other schools, including some in the United States, have four marking periods. The school year in many countries starts in August or September and ends in May, June or July.
Some schools in the United States, notably Boston Latin School
Boston Latin School
The Boston Latin School is a public exam school founded on April 23, 1635, in Boston, Massachusetts. It is both the first public school and oldest existing school in the United States....
, may divide the year into five or more marking periods. Some state in defense of this that there is perhaps a positive correlation between report frequency and academic achievement.
There are typically 180 days of teaching each year in schools in the USA, excluding weekends and breaks, while 190 days for pupils in state schools in the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Canada.
In India the academic year normally starts from June 1 and ends on May 31. Though schools start closing from mid-March, the actual academic closure is on May 31 and in Nepal it starts from July 15.
Schools and universities in Australia typically have academic years that roughly align with the calendar year (i.e. starting in February or March and ending in October to December), as the southern hemisphere experiences summer from December to February.
Julian year
The Julian yearJulian year (astronomy)
In astronomy, a Julian year is a unit of measurement of time defined as exactly 365.25 days of 86 400 SI seconds each, totaling 31 557 600 seconds. The Julian year is the average length of the year in the Julian calendar used in Western societies in previous centuries, and for which the unit is...
, as used in astronomy and other sciences, is a time unit defined as exactly 365.25 days. This is the normal meaning of the unit "year" (symbol "a" from the Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
annus) used in various scientific contexts. The Julian century of days and the Julian millennium of days are used in astronomical calculations. Fundamentally, expressing a time interval in Julian years is a way to precisely specify how many days (not how many "real" years), for long time intervals where stating the number of days would be unwieldy and unintuitive. By convention, the Julian year is used in the computation of the distance covered by a light-year
Light-year
A light-year, also light year or lightyear is a unit of length, equal to just under 10 trillion kilometres...
.
In the Unified Code for Units of Measure
Unified Code for Units of Measure
The Unified Code for Units of Measure is a system of codes for unambiguously representing measurement units to both humans and machines....
, the symbol a (without subscript) always refers to the Julian year aj of exactly second
Second
The second is a unit of measurement of time, and is the International System of Units base unit of time. It may be measured using a clock....
s.
365.25 days of seconds = 1 a = 1 aj = Ms
The SI multiplier prefixes may be applied to it to form ka (kiloannum), Ma (megaannum) etc.
Sidereal, tropical, and anomalistic years
- The relations among these are considered more fully in Axial precession (astronomy).
Each of these three years can be loosely called an 'astronomical year'.
The sidereal year
Sidereal year
A sidereal year is the time taken by the Earth to orbit the Sun once with respect to the fixed stars. Hence it is also the time taken for the Sun to return to the same position with respect to the fixed stars after apparently travelling once around the ecliptic. It was equal to at noon 1 January...
is the time taken for the Earth to complete one revolution of its orbit, as measured against a fixed frame of reference (such as the fixed stars, Latin sidera, singular sidus). Its average duration is mean solar days (365 d 6 h 9 min 9.76 s) (at the epoch J2000.0 =
Terrestrial Time
Terrestrial Time is a modern astronomical time standard defined by the International Astronomical Union, primarily for time-measurements of astronomical observations made from the surface of the Earth....
).
The tropical year
Tropical year
A tropical year , for general purposes, is the length of time that the Sun takes to return to the same position in the cycle of seasons, as seen from Earth; for example, the time from vernal equinox to vernal equinox, or from summer solstice to summer solstice...
is the period of time for the ecliptic longitude of the Sun to increase by 360 degrees. Since the Sun's ecliptic longitude is measured with respect to the equinox, the tropical year comprises a complete cycle of the seasons; because of the economic importance of the seasons, the tropical year is the basis of most calendar
Calendar
A calendar is a system of organizing days for social, religious, commercial, or administrative purposes. This is done by giving names to periods of time, typically days, weeks, months, and years. The name given to each day is known as a date. Periods in a calendar are usually, though not...
s. The tropical year is often defined as the time between southern solstices, or between northward equinoxes. Because of the Earth's axial precession, this year is about 20 minutes shorter than the sidereal year. The mean tropical year is approximately 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, 45 seconds (= days).
The anomalistic year is the time taken for the Earth to complete one revolution with respect to its apsides
Apsis
An apsis , plural apsides , is the point of greatest or least distance of a body from one of the foci of its elliptical orbit. In modern celestial mechanics this focus is also the center of attraction, which is usually the center of mass of the system...
. The orbit of the Earth is elliptical; the extreme points, called apsides, are the perihelion, where the Earth is closest to the Sun (January 3 in 2011), and the aphelion, where the Earth is farthest from the Sun (July 4 in 2011). The anomalistic year is usually defined as the time between perihelion passages. Its average duration is days (365 d 6 h 13 min 52.6 s) (at the epoch J2011.0).
If Earth moved in an ideal Kepler orbit
Kepler orbit
In celestial mechanics, a Kepler orbit describes the motion of an orbiting body as an ellipse, parabola, or hyperbola, which forms a two-dimensional orbital plane in three-dimensional space...
, i.e. a perfect ellipse with the Sun fixed at one focus, each kind of year would always have the same duration, and the sidereal and anomalistic years would be equal. Because of perturbation
Perturbation (astronomy)
Perturbation is a term used in astronomy in connection with descriptions of the complex motion of a massive body which is subject to appreciable gravitational effects from more than one other massive body....
s by the gravity of other planets, Earth's motion varies slightly, causing the sidereal and tropical years to vary in length by about 25 minutes (see table below). Both are affected in the same way, so that the sidereal year is consistently 20 minutes longer than the tropical year, provided that they are measured in the same way.
| Winter solstice (Atomic time) | |
|---|---|
| 2007-12-22 06:04:04.2 | +10.51 minutes |
| 2008-12-21 12:03:19.7 | -11.86 minutes |
| 2009-12-21 17:40:13.2 | +15.91 minutes |
| 2010-12-21 23:44:53.2 | -11.94 minutes |
| 2011-12-22 05:21:41.8 | +3.58 minutes |
| 2012-12-21 11:14:01.9 | +2.85 minutes |
| 2013-12-21 17:05:38.3 | +0.86 minutes |
| 2014-12-21 22:55:15.2 | +0.48 minutes |
An example of a year that will have a duration exceeding the average value of SI days with as much as 24.23 minutes is the one that will begin at winter solstice December 21, 2042 17:47:45.5 (Atomic time).
Draconic year
The draconic year, draconitic year, eclipse year, or ecliptic year is the time taken for the Sun (as seen from the Earth) to complete one revolution with respect to the same lunar nodeLunar node
The lunar nodes are the orbital nodes of the Moon, that is, the points where the orbit of the Moon crosses the ecliptic . The ascending node is where the moon crosses to the north of the ecliptic...
(a point where the Moon's orbit intersects the ecliptic). This period is associated with eclipse
Eclipse
An eclipse is an astronomical event that occurs when an astronomical object is temporarily obscured, either by passing into the shadow of another body or by having another body pass between it and the viewer...
s: these occur only when both the Sun and the Moon are near these nodes; so eclipses occur within about a month of every half eclipse year. Hence there are two eclipse season
Eclipse season
Eclipse seasons are the only times during a year eclipses can occur, due to the 5° inclination of the moon's orbit. Each season lasts for approximately 33 days and repeats just short of six months, thus there are always two full eclipse seasons each year. 2 to 3 eclipses always occur each eclipse...
s every eclipse year. The average duration of the eclipse year is
- days (346 d 14 h 52 min 54 s) (at the epoch J2000.0).
This term is sometimes erroneously used for the draconic or nodal period of lunar precession
Lunar precession
Precession is the rotation of a plane with respect to a reference plane. The orbit of the Moon has two important such precessional motions....
, that is the period of a complete revolution of the Moon's ascending node around the ecliptic: Julian years ( days; at the epoch J2000.0).
Full moon cycle
The full moon cycleFull moon cycle
The full moon cycle is a cycle of about 14 lunations over which full moons vary in apparent size and age . The sequence is*Full moon big - *Full moon young -...
is the time for the Sun (as seen from the Earth) to complete one revolution with respect to the perigee
Perigee
Perigee is the point at which an object makes its closest approach to the Earth.. Often the term is used in a broader sense to define the point in an orbit where the orbiting body is closest to the body it orbits. The opposite is the apogee, the farthest or highest point.The Greek prefix "peri"...
of the Moon's orbit. This period is associated with the apparent size of the full moon
Full moon
Full moon lunar phase that occurs when the Moon is on the opposite side of the Earth from the Sun. More precisely, a full moon occurs when the geocentric apparent longitudes of the Sun and Moon differ by 180 degrees; the Moon is then in opposition with the Sun.Lunar eclipses can only occur at...
, and also with the varying duration of the synodic month
Month
A month is a unit of time, used with calendars, which was first used and invented in Mesopotamia, as a natural period related to the motion of the Moon; month and Moon are cognates. The traditional concept arose with the cycle of moon phases; such months are synodic months and last approximately...
. The duration of one full moon cycle is:
- days (411 d 18 h 49 min 34 s) (at the epoch J2000.0).
Lunar year
The lunar year comprises twelve full cycles of the phases of the Moon, as seen from Earth. It has a duration of approximately 354.37 days.Vague year
The vague year, from annus vagus or wandering year, is an integral approximation to the year equaling 365 days, which wanders in relation to more exact years. Typically the vague year is divided into 12 schematic months of 30 days each plus 5 epagomenalIntercalation
Intercalation is the insertion of a leap day, week or month into some calendar years to make the calendar follow the seasons or moon phases. Lunisolar calendars may require intercalations of both days and months.- Solar calendars :...
days. The vague year was used in the calendars of Ancient Egypt
Egyptian calendar
The ancient civil Egyptian calendar had a year that was 360 days long and was divided into 12 months of 30 days each, plus five extra days at the end of the year. The months were divided into three weeks of ten days each...
, Iran
Iranian calendar
The Iranian calendars or sometimes called Persian calendars are a succession of calendars invented or used for over two millennia in Greater Iran...
, Armenia
Armenian calendar
The Armenian calendar is the traditional calendar of Armenia. It is a solar calendar based on the same system as the ancient Egyptian model, having an invariant 365-day year with no leap year rule...
and in Mesoamerica
Mesoamerican calendars
Mesoamerican calendars are the calendrical systems devised and used by the pre-Columbian cultures of Mesoamerica. In addition to the basic function of a calendar—defining and organizing periods of time in a way that allows events to be fixed, ordered and noted relative to each other and some...
among the Aztecs
Aztec calendar
The Aztec calendar is the calendar system that was used by the Aztecs as well as other Pre-Columbian peoples of central Mexico. It is one of the Mesoamerican calendars, sharing the basic structure of calendars from throughout ancient Mesoamerica....
and Maya
Haab'
The Haab is part of the Maya calendric system. It was the Maya version of the 365-day calendar known to many of the pre-Columbian cultures of Mesoamerica...
.
Heliacal year
A heliacal year is the interval between the heliacal risingHeliacal rising
The heliacal rising of a star occurs when it first becomes visible above the eastern horizon for a brief moment just before sunrise, after a period of time when it had not been visible....
s of a star. It differs from the sidereal year
Sidereal year
A sidereal year is the time taken by the Earth to orbit the Sun once with respect to the fixed stars. Hence it is also the time taken for the Sun to return to the same position with respect to the fixed stars after apparently travelling once around the ecliptic. It was equal to at noon 1 January...
for stars away from the ecliptic
Ecliptic
The ecliptic is the plane of the earth's orbit around the sun. In more accurate terms, it is the intersection of the celestial sphere with the ecliptic plane, which is the geometric plane containing the mean orbit of the Earth around the Sun...
due mainly to the precession of the equinoxes
Precession of the equinoxes
In astronomy, axial precession is a gravity-induced, slow and continuous change in the orientation of an astronomical body's rotational axis. In particular, it refers to the gradual shift in the orientation of Earth's axis of rotation, which, like a wobbling top, traces out a pair of cones joined...
.
Sothic year
The Sothic yearSothic cycle
The Sothic cycle or Canicular period is a period of 1,461 ancient Egyptian years or 1,460 Julian years...
is the interval between heliacal risings of the star Sirius
Sirius
Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky. With a visual apparent magnitude of −1.46, it is almost twice as bright as Canopus, the next brightest star. The name "Sirius" is derived from the Ancient Greek: Seirios . The star has the Bayer designation Alpha Canis Majoris...
. It is equal to the sidereal year and its duration is very close to the mean Julian year of 365.25 days.
Gaussian year
The Gaussian yearGaussian year
A Gaussian year is defined as 365.2568983 days. It was adopted by Carl Friedrich Gauss as the length of the sidereal year in his studies of the dynamics of the solar system.A slightly different value is now accepted as the length of the sidereal year,...
is the sidereal year for a planet of negligible mass (relative to the Sun) and unperturbed by other planets that is governed by the Gaussian gravitational constant
Gaussian gravitational constant
The Gaussian gravitational constant is an astronomical constant first proposed by German polymath Carl Friedrich Gauss in his 1809 work Theoria motus corporum coelestium in sectionibus conicis solem ambientum , although he had already used the concept to great success in predicting the...
. Such a planet would be slightly closer to the Sun than Earth's mean distance. Its length is:
- days (365 d 6 h 9 min 56 s).
Besselian year
The Besselian year is a tropical year that starts when the (fictitious) mean Sun reaches an ecliptic longitude of 280°. This is currently on or close to January 1. It is named after the 19th century German astronomer and mathematician Friedrich BesselFriedrich Bessel
-References:* John Frederick William Herschel, A brief notice of the life, researches, and discoveries of Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel, London: Barclay, 1847 -External links:...
. The following equation can be used to compute the current Besselian epoch (in years):
- B = 1900.0 + (Julian dateTT − ) /
The TT subscript indicates that for this formula, the Julian date should use the Terrestrial Time
Terrestrial Time
Terrestrial Time is a modern astronomical time standard defined by the International Astronomical Union, primarily for time-measurements of astronomical observations made from the surface of the Earth....
scale, or its predecessor, ephemeris time
Ephemeris time
The term ephemeris time can in principle refer to time in connection with any astronomical ephemeris. In practice it has been used more specifically to refer to:...
.
Variation in the length of the year and the day
The exact length of an astronomical year changes over time. The main sources of this change are:- The precession of the equinoxes changes the position of astronomical events with respect to the apsides of Earth's orbit. An event moving toward perihelion recurs with a decreasing period from year to year; an event moving toward aphelion recurs with an increasing period from year to year (though this effect does not change the average value of the length of the year).
- Each planet's movement is perturbed by the gravity of every other planet.
- Tidal drag between the Earth and the Moon and Sun increases the length of the day and of the month (by transferring angular momentum from the rotation of the Earth to the revolution of the Moon); since the apparent mean solar day is the unit with which we measure the length of the year in civil life, the length of the year appears to change. Tidal drag in turn depends on factors such as post-glacial reboundPost-glacial reboundPost-glacial rebound is the rise of land masses that were depressed by the huge weight of ice sheets during the last glacial period, through a process known as isostasy...
and sea level rise.
- Changes in the effective mass of the Sun, caused by solar windSolar windThe solar wind is a stream of charged particles ejected from the upper atmosphere of the Sun. It mostly consists of electrons and protons with energies usually between 1.5 and 10 keV. The stream of particles varies in temperature and speed over time...
and radiation of energy generated by nuclear fusion and radiated by its surface, will affect the Earth's orbital period over a long time (approximately an extra 1.25 microsecondMicrosecondA microsecond is an SI unit of time equal to one millionth of a second. Its symbol is µs.A microsecond is equal to 1000 nanoseconds or 1/1000 millisecond...
per year).
- The Poynting–Robertson effect shortens the year by about 30 nanosecondNanosecondA nanosecond is one billionth of a second . One nanosecond is to one second as one second is to 31.7 years.The word nanosecond is formed by the prefix nano and the unit second. Its symbol is ns....
s per year.
- Gravitational radiation shortens the year by about 165 attoseconds per year.
Summary
- 346.62 days: a draconitic year.
- 353, 354 or 355 days: the lengths of common years in some lunisolar calendarLunisolar calendarA lunisolar calendar is a calendar in many cultures whose date indicates both the moon phase and the time of the solar year. If the solar year is defined as a tropical year then a lunisolar calendar will give an indication of the season; if it is taken as a sidereal year then the calendar will...
s. - 354.37 days (12 lunar months): the average length of a year in lunar calendarLunar calendarA lunar calendar is a calendar that is based on cycles of the lunar phase. A common purely lunar calendar is the Islamic calendar or Hijri calendar. A feature of the Islamic calendar is that a year is always 12 months, so the months are not linked with the seasons and drift each solar year by 11 to...
s, notably the Muslim calendar. - 365 days: a vague year and a common yearCommon yearA common year is a common type of calendar year. It has exactly 365 days and so is not a leap year. More generally, it is a calendar year without intercalation....
in many solar calendarSolar calendarA solar calendar is a calendar whose dates indicate the position of the earth on its revolution around the sun .-Tropical solar calendars:...
s. days: a mean tropical year (rounded to five decimal places) for the epoch 2000. days: a vernal equinox year (rounded to four decimal places) for the epoch 2000. days: the average length of a year in the Gregorian calendar. - 365.25 days: the average length of a year in the Julian calendar. days: a sidereal year.
- 366 days: a leap yearLeap yearA leap year is a year containing one extra day in order to keep the calendar year synchronized with the astronomical or seasonal year...
in many solar calendars. - 383, 384 or 385 days: the lengths of leap years in some lunisolar calendars.
- 383.9 days (13 lunar months): a leap year in some lunisolar calendars.
An average Gregorian year is day
Day
A day is a unit of time, commonly defined as an interval equal to 24 hours. It also can mean that portion of the full day during which a location is illuminated by the light of the sun...
s = week
Week
A week is a time unit equal to seven days.The English word week continues an Old English wice, ultimately from a Common Germanic , from a root "turn, move, change"...
s = hour
Hour
The hour is a unit of measurement of time. In modern usage, an hour comprises 60 minutes, or 3,600 seconds...
s = minute
Minute
A minute is a unit of measurement of time or of angle. The minute is a unit of time equal to 1/60th of an hour or 60 seconds. In the UTC time scale, a minute on rare occasions has 59 or 61 seconds; see leap second. The minute is not an SI unit; however, it is accepted for use with SI units...
s = second
Second
The second is a unit of measurement of time, and is the International System of Units base unit of time. It may be measured using a clock....
s (mean solar, not SI).
A common year is 365 days = hours = minutes = seconds.
A leap year is 366 days = hours = minutes = seconds.
The 400-year cycle of the Gregorian calendar has days and hence exactly weeks.
See also Leap seconds and other aspects of the Gregorian calendar.
Symbol
There is no universally accepted symbol for the year as a unit of timeUnit of time
Units of measurement for time have historically been based on the movement of the Sun and the Moon . Shorter intervals were measured by physiological periods such as drawing breath, winking or the heartbeat.Units of time consisting of a number of years include the lustrum and the olympiad...
. The International System of Units
International System of Units
The International System of Units is the modern form of the metric system and is generally a system of units of measurement devised around seven base units and the convenience of the number ten. The older metric system included several groups of units...
does not propose one. NIST SP811 and ISO 80000-3:2006
suggest the symbol a is taken from the Latin word annus.
In English, the abbreviations y or yr are sometimes used,
specifically in geology
Geology
Geology is the science comprising the study of solid Earth, the rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which it evolves. Geology gives insight into the history of the Earth, as it provides the primary evidence for plate tectonics, the evolutionary history of life, and past climates...
and paleontology
Paleontology
Paleontology "old, ancient", ὄν, ὀντ- "being, creature", and λόγος "speech, thought") is the study of prehistoric life. It includes the study of fossils to determine organisms' evolution and interactions with each other and their environments...
, where kyr, myr, byr (thousands, millions, and billions of years, respectively) and similar abbreviations are used to denote intervals of time remote from the present.
Symbol a
NIST SP811 and ISO 80000-3:2006 suggest the symbol a (in the International System of UnitsInternational System of Units
The International System of Units is the modern form of the metric system and is generally a system of units of measurement devised around seven base units and the convenience of the number ten. The older metric system included several groups of units...
, although a is also the symbol for the are, the unit of area used to measure land area, but context is usually enough to disambiguate).
In English, the abbreviations y and yr are also used.
The Unified Code for Units of Measure
Unified Code for Units of Measure
The Unified Code for Units of Measure is a system of codes for unambiguously representing measurement units to both humans and machines....
disambiguates the varying symbologies of ISO 1000, ISO 2955 and ANSI X3.50 http://aurora.regenstrief.org/~ucum/ucum.html#para-31 by using
- ar for are and:
- at = a_t = days for the mean tropical yearTropical yearA tropical year , for general purposes, is the length of time that the Sun takes to return to the same position in the cycle of seasons, as seen from Earth; for example, the time from vernal equinox to vernal equinox, or from summer solstice to summer solstice...
- aj = a_j = 365.25 days for the mean Julian year
- ag = a_g = days for the mean Gregorian year
- a = 1 aj year (without further qualifier)
A definition jointly adopted by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry
International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry
The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry is an international federation of National Adhering Organizations that represents chemists in individual countries. It is a member of the International Council for Science . The international headquarters of IUPAC is located in Zürich,...
and the International Union of Geological Sciences
International Union of Geological Sciences
The International Union of Geological Sciences is an international non-governmental organization devoted to international cooperation in the field of geology.-About:...
is to use annus, with symbol a, for year, defined as the length of the tropical year in the year 2000:
- a = days = seconds
The notation has proved controversial; it conflicts with an earlier convention among geoscientists to use a specifically for "years ago", and y or yr for a one-year time period.
SI prefix multipliers
- ka (for kiloannum), is a unit of time equal toMillenniumA millennium is a period of time equal to one thousand years —from the Latin phrase , thousand, and , year—often but not necessarily related numerically to a particular dating system....
one thousand (103) years. - Ma (for megaannum), is a unit of timeTimeTime is a part of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify rates of change such as the motions of objects....
equal to one millionMillionOne million or one thousand thousand, is the natural number following 999,999 and preceding 1,000,001. The word is derived from the early Italian millione , from mille, "thousand", plus the augmentative suffix -one.In scientific notation, it is written as or just 106...
(106) years. It is commonly used in scientific disciplines such as geologyGeologyGeology is the science comprising the study of solid Earth, the rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which it evolves. Geology gives insight into the history of the Earth, as it provides the primary evidence for plate tectonics, the evolutionary history of life, and past climates...
, paleontologyPaleontologyPaleontology "old, ancient", ὄν, ὀντ- "being, creature", and λόγος "speech, thought") is the study of prehistoric life. It includes the study of fossils to determine organisms' evolution and interactions with each other and their environments...
, and celestial mechanicsCelestial mechanicsCelestial mechanics is the branch of astronomy that deals with the motions of celestial objects. The field applies principles of physics, historically classical mechanics, to astronomical objects such as stars and planets to produce ephemeris data. Orbital mechanics is a subfield which focuses on...
to signify very long time periods into the past or future. For example, the dinosaurDinosaurDinosaurs are a diverse group of animals of the clade and superorder Dinosauria. They were the dominant terrestrial vertebrates for over 160 million years, from the late Triassic period until the end of the Cretaceous , when the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event led to the extinction of...
species Tyrannosaurus rexTyrannosaurusTyrannosaurus meaning "tyrant," and sauros meaning "lizard") is a genus of coelurosaurian theropod dinosaur. The species Tyrannosaurus rex , commonly abbreviated to T. rex, is a fixture in popular culture. It lived throughout what is now western North America, with a much wider range than other...
was abundant approximately 65 Ma (65 million years) ago (ago may not always be mentioned; if the quantity is specified while not explicitly discussing a duration, one can assume that "ago" is implied; the alternative but deprecated "mya" unit includes "ago" explicitly.). In astronomical applications, the year used is the Julian yearJulian year (astronomy)In astronomy, a Julian year is a unit of measurement of time defined as exactly 365.25 days of 86 400 SI seconds each, totaling 31 557 600 seconds. The Julian year is the average length of the year in the Julian calendar used in Western societies in previous centuries, and for which the unit is...
of precisely 365.25 days. In geology and paleontology, the year is not so precise and varies depending on the author. - Ga (for gigaannum), is a unit of time equal to 109 years (one billion1000000000 (number)1,000,000,000 is the natural number following 999,999,999 and preceding 1,000,000,001.In scientific notation, it is written as 109....
on the short scaleLong and short scalesThe long and short scales are two of several different large-number naming systems used throughout the world for integer powers of ten. Many countries, including most in continental Europe, use the long scale whereas most English-speaking countries use the short scale...
, one milliard on the long scaleLong and short scalesThe long and short scales are two of several different large-number naming systems used throughout the world for integer powers of ten. Many countries, including most in continental Europe, use the long scale whereas most English-speaking countries use the short scale...
). It is commonly used in scientific disciplines such as cosmologyPhysical cosmologyPhysical cosmology, as a branch of astronomy, is the study of the largest-scale structures and dynamics of the universe and is concerned with fundamental questions about its formation and evolution. For most of human history, it was a branch of metaphysics and religion...
and geologyGeologyGeology is the science comprising the study of solid Earth, the rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which it evolves. Geology gives insight into the history of the Earth, as it provides the primary evidence for plate tectonics, the evolutionary history of life, and past climates...
to signify extremely long time periods in the past. For example, the formation of the EarthEarthEarth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
occurred approximately 4.57 Ga (4.57 billion years) ago. - Ta (for teraannum), is a unit of time equal to 1012 years (one trillion on the short scale, one billion on the long scale). It is an extremely long unit of time, about 70 times as long as the age of the universeAge of the universeThe age of the universe is the time elapsed since the Big Bang posited by the most widely accepted scientific model of cosmology. The best current estimate of the age of the universe is 13.75 ± 0.13 billion years within the Lambda-CDM concordance model...
. It is the same order of magnitude as the expected life span of a small red dwarf star. - Pa (for petaannum), is a unit of time equal to 1015 years (one quadrillion on the short scale, one billiard on the long scale). The half-life of the nuclide cadmiumCadmiumCadmium is a chemical element with the symbol Cd and atomic number 48. This soft, bluish-white metal is chemically similar to the two other stable metals in group 12, zinc and mercury. Similar to zinc, it prefers oxidation state +2 in most of its compounds and similar to mercury it shows a low...
-113 is about 8 Pa. This symbol coincides with that for the pascalPascal (unit)The pascal is the SI derived unit of pressure, internal pressure, stress, Young's modulus and tensile strength, named after the French mathematician, physicist, inventor, writer, and philosopher Blaise Pascal. It is a measure of force per unit area, defined as one newton per square metre...
without a multiplier prefix, though both are infrequently used and context will normally be sufficient to distinguish time from pressure values. - Ea (for exaannum), is a unit of time equal to 1018 years (one quintillion on the short scale, one trillion on the long scale). The half-life of tungstenTungstenTungsten , also known as wolfram , is a chemical element with the chemical symbol W and atomic number 74.A hard, rare metal under standard conditions when uncombined, tungsten is found naturally on Earth only in chemical compounds. It was identified as a new element in 1781, and first isolated as...
-180 is 1.8 Ea.
Symbols y and yr
In astronomyAstronomy
Astronomy is a natural science that deals with the study of celestial objects and phenomena that originate outside the atmosphere of Earth...
, geology
Geology
Geology is the science comprising the study of solid Earth, the rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which it evolves. Geology gives insight into the history of the Earth, as it provides the primary evidence for plate tectonics, the evolutionary history of life, and past climates...
, and paleontology
Paleontology
Paleontology "old, ancient", ὄν, ὀντ- "being, creature", and λόγος "speech, thought") is the study of prehistoric life. It includes the study of fossils to determine organisms' evolution and interactions with each other and their environments...
, the abbreviation yr for "years" and ya for "years ago" are sometimes used, combined with prefixes for "thousand", "million", or "billion".
They are not SI units, using y to abbreviate English year, but following ambiguous international recommendations, use either the standard English first letters as prefixes (t,m,and b) and/or the familiar metric multiplier prefixes (k, m, and g). These abbreviations include:
| SI-prefixed equivalent | order of magnitude | |
| kyr | "ka" | * Thousands forms |
| myr | "Ma" | * Millions forms |
| byr | "Ga" | * Billions forms |
| tya or kya | "ka ago" |
|
| mya | "Ma ago" |
Pliocene The Pliocene Epoch is the period in the geologic timescale that extends from 5.332 million to 2.588 million years before present. It is the second and youngest epoch of the Neogene Period in the Cenozoic Era. The Pliocene follows the Miocene Epoch and is followed by the Pleistocene Epoch... 5.3 to 2.6 mya
Holocene The Holocene is a geological epoch which began at the end of the Pleistocene and continues to the present. The Holocene is part of the Quaternary period. Its name comes from the Greek words and , meaning "entirely recent"... started 0.01 mya |
| bya or gya | "Ga ago" |
Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets... , 4.5 bya Big Bang The Big Bang theory is the prevailing cosmological model that explains the early development of the Universe. According to the Big Bang theory, the Universe was once in an extremely hot and dense state which expanded rapidly. This rapid expansion caused the young Universe to cool and resulted in... , 13.7 bya |
Use of "mya" and "bya" is deprecated in modern geophysics, the recommended usage being "Ma" and "Ga" for dates Before Present
Before Present
Before Present years is a time scale used in archaeology, geology, and other scientific disciplines to specify when events in the past occurred. Because the "present" time changes, standard practice is to use AD 1950 as the origin of the age scale, reflecting the fact that radiocarbon...
, but "m.y." for the duration of epochs.
This ad hoc distinction between "absolute" time and time intervals is somewhat controversial amongst members of the Geological Society of America.
Note that on graphs using "ya" units on the horizontal axis time flows from right to left, which may seem counter-intuitive. If the "ya" units are on the vertical axis, time flows from top to bottom which is probably easier to understand than conventional notation.
Equinoctial cycle
The Great yearGreat year
The Great Year is an archaic cosmological conception, found in different cultures, which acquired new interpretations with the development of astronomical knowledge In the Western tradition Plato has been the main source for the idea, so it was also frequently called 'Platonic year'...
, or Equinoctial cycle corresponds to a complete revolution of the equinoxes around the ecliptic. Its length is about 25,700 years, and cannot be determined precisely as the precession speed is variable.
Galactic year
The Galactic yearGalactic year
The galactic year, also known as a cosmic year, is the duration of time required for the Solar System to orbit once around the center of the Milky Way Galaxy. Estimates of the length of one orbit range from 225 to 250 million "terrestrial" years....
is the time it takes Earth's solar system
Solar System
The Solar System consists of the Sun and the astronomical objects gravitationally bound in orbit around it, all of which formed from the collapse of a giant molecular cloud approximately 4.6 billion years ago. The vast majority of the system's mass is in the Sun...
to revolve once around the galactic center
Galactic Center
The Galactic Center is the rotational center of the Milky Way galaxy. It is located at a distance of 8.33±0.35 kpc from the Earth in the direction of the constellations Sagittarius, Ophiuchus, and Scorpius where the Milky Way appears brightest...
. It comprises roughly 230 million Earth years.
See also
- Astronomical year numberingAstronomical year numberingAstronomical year numbering is based on AD/CE year numbering, but follows normal decimal integer numbering more strictly. Thus, it has a year 0, the years before that are designated with negative numbers and the years after that are designated with positive numbers...
- ISO 8601ISO 8601ISO 8601 Data elements and interchange formats – Information interchange – Representation of dates and times is an international standard covering the exchange of date and time-related data. It was issued by the International Organization for Standardization and was first published in 1988...
: standard for representation of dates and times - Jēran
- List of calendars
- List of years
- Man-hour
- Orders of magnitude (time)Orders of magnitude (time)-Seconds:- See also :* Heat Death* Second law of thermodynamics* Big Rip* Big Crunch* Big Bounce* Big Bang* Cyclic model* Dyson's eternal intelligence* Final anthropic principle* Ultimate fate of the Universe* Timeline of the Big Bang...
- Unit of timeUnit of timeUnits of measurement for time have historically been based on the movement of the Sun and the Moon . Shorter intervals were measured by physiological periods such as drawing breath, winking or the heartbeat.Units of time consisting of a number of years include the lustrum and the olympiad...