Leap year. When is the leap year: we figure it out together

A leap year, or it is also called the word "leap year", causes a lot of rumors and superstitions, which boil down mainly to the fact that this year is unhappy and promises only one negative event. In this article, we will discuss how true these opinions are.

A bit of history

The word "leap" came to us from the Latin language, that is, it is of ancient origin, and its literal translation sounds like "second sixth".

According to the Julian calendar, the Earth goes through its circle in 365.25 days, while every year the day shifted by 6 hours. Such an error could well confuse ancient men, and in order to avoid this, it was decided that after every fourth year another day would be added to the annual circle. Accordingly, this year will include 366 days, and they will be added in the shortest month - February, it will consist of 29 days. For distinction, he was called a leap.

In Ancient Russia, in turn, there were many legends about the emergence of leap years, and each of them was already perceived as necessarily unlucky. The legends about the arrival of the new calendar and the leap year in it in Russia were also reflected in the Saints. So, February 29 is dedicated to the memory of St. Kasyan, and among the people he is called Kasyanov Day. Several legends and apocrypha are dedicated to this day (stories that are not recognized by the church as confirmed and consistent with what we know about God). But it sheds light on the origin of the bad reputation of the leaps.

According to this legend, Kasyan appears to the common people not as a man, but as an angel, moreover, a fallen one, who was once tempted by Satan, as a result of which he fell away from God. However, in the future, he realized how wrong he was, repented and begged the Creator for mercy. Taking pity on the traitor, God, before taking him back, put His angel to him. The celestial shackled Kasyan and, by order from above, beat him on the forehead with a metal hammer for admonition for 3 years, and released him on the fourth.

The second legend about Kasyan

According to the second story Kasyan- this is a person, and Kasyanov's day is the date of his name day. However, according to legend, that man systematically drunk dead for three years in a row, but on the fourth he came to his senses, brought repentance, gave up addiction, turned to repentance and became a saint - he acquired the Holy Spirit. Therefore, the people considered, it is fitting for them to celebrate their day so rarely - only on February 29th.

The third legend about Kasyan

This legend is dedicated to St. Kasyan traveling the earth and Nicholas the Wonderworker, well known to Christians. And then they meet a man along the way. He asked them for help as his wagon became bogged down in the mud. Kasyan replied to this that he was careful not to spoil his clean riza, and Nikolai, not afraid of dirt, immediately helped. The saints returned to the Kingdom of God, and the Creator noticed that Nicholas's robe was dirty and asked him what it was about.

The Saint told him what had happened on the way. Then the Lord noticed that Kasyan's clothes were clean, and asked the question: did they not travel together? Kasyan replied that he was afraid to stain his clothes. God understood that Cosmas was cunning, and arranged in such a way that his name day is celebrated with him once every 4 years. And Nikolai's namesake for his meekness - twice in 365 days.

Anyway , whatever it may be, the leap was recognized as bad. Therefore, the Russian superstitious people tried to somehow protect themselves from this day.

1. I tried to finish all the important things before the 29th of February.
2. Some did not dare to leave the house.
3. On February 29, if the sun came out, it was called Kasyan's Eye or Kasyanov's Eye. Then they tried not to fall under the sun, so that the saint would not… jinx them! And he did not bring suffering and disease to the poor person.

As in ancient times, in today's world, superstitions and omens often come across that do not define leap years of the 21st century from the best side. We list some of them:

Why is a leap year considered bad?

Such an attitude is quite understandable: the appearance of the 29th day in February characterizes the whole year differently from others, psychologically distinguishes it from among the others. This can be important for a person who is unsure of their abilities. It will be much easier for him, referring to this special period, to refuse something new than to expend energy for self-development or the start of some business.

For the same reason, it will be easier not to get pregnant, so as not to give birth later, because the fear that the birth will be difficult increases, the baby may be born painful. And if not, then suddenly his life will be bleak or hard.

See our resourceful people and the threat in the very name of the leap year, saying that it “mows down” people, in other words, takes them away, leads to death. Therefore, the holiday is met with apprehension (or, conversely, on a special scale - you never know who will die ...). This is a very common belief that tries to infiltrate the statistics. It is becoming accepted that the death rate increases every 4th year. At the same time, the statistics themselves do not confirm these data in any way.

Mushrooms can not be collected either, and even more so they can be eaten or sold to people. No, not so as not to get poisoned, but so that with the “bad earth” a person does not get “something bad”.

It is believed that a leap year entails cataclysms in nature and all sorts of disasters: drought, floods, fires.

What years are leap years

In the last century, as well as in the present, such calendar periods also terrified. A list of them can be seen in the image or found on the Internet. Also, the year 2000, the same millennium, in turn was a leap year, opening a whole millennium.

Despite the fact that with the development of technology, information has become more accessible and it has become possible to learn more and expand one's horizons, getting rid of primitive fears, many continue to anxiously expect a leap year, internally setting themselves up for problems and troubles, and when they come (if they come), this is perceived as doomed: well, it's a leap year... An extra day in February. Deadly!

There are special calendars that indicate exactly when the leap year occurs. It is enough to carefully look at the table and find (or not find) the actual numbers there. It is enough to know at least one leap year, after which, through elementary arithmetic, it will be possible to calculate them yourself. Let's say you're interested in leap years in the 21st century. Find a calendar and view it. Knowing that 2016 is a leap year, it is easy to understand that the next one will come in 2020.

If you trust the statistics, a very small number of all catastrophes and misfortunes falls on leap years. The superstitions that exist today can be interpreted by the fact that people, who were closely following the misfortunes and misfortunes that occurred at leap years, communicated an exaggerated meaning to what was happening only because of the unflattering reputation of the latter. Persons who extremely trust superstitions about leap years would like to wish to pay more attention to positive events and changes. And then, perhaps, there will be a list of good and joyful signs restoring the reputation of the leaps.

I hope you had a great New Year's Eve and are now in a great holiday mood. At least this is how it is with me - we didn’t drink any alcohol, and at midnight we clinked glasses of water from a five-liter canister, so we woke up, took a walk, and then I remembered one of yesterday’s New Year greetings:

I wish that at the end of each year, remembering what happened over the past 366 if ((year%4 == 0 and year%100 != 0) or (year%400 == 0)) else 365 days, think about myself:

Oh, nifiga yourself, what an action was. I will definitely tell my grandchildren or write a book about it later.

So, above is a fairly simple inline way to determine the number of days in a year (year variable), which, in fact, fully reveals their essence: in the Gregorian calendar, leap years are those years whose serial number is either a multiple of 4, but not a multiple of 100 , or a multiple of 400. In other words, if the year is divisible by 4 without a remainder, but divisible by 100 only with a remainder, then it is a leap year, otherwise it is not a leap year, except if it is divisible by 400 without a remainder, then it is still a leap year.

For example, 2013 is a common year, 1700, 1800 and 1900 are again common years, but 2000, 2004, 2008 and 2012 are leap years.

But what if we don't remember how many days there are in leap years (366 days) and common years (365 days), or we just want to write the definition of the number of days in a year as quickly as possible? Is it possible to do this in Python? Of course you can.

So, Python has a calendar module. It is just great for finding out if a particular year is a leap year (or, for example, how many leap years are in a certain interval), determining the number of days in a month, getting the number of the day of the week for a certain date, and so on.

In particular, we can get the number of days in each month of the year, and simply add them up.

The calendar.monthrange function takes the year number as the first argument and the month number as the second argument. Returns the number of the day of the week on the first day of the given month and the number of days in the given month:

>>> import calendar >>> calendar.monthrange(2013, 1) (1, 31)
Accordingly, we can calculate the total number of days for all 12 months, and thus obtain the number of days for a given year:

>>> import calendar >>> year = 2013 >>> sum(map(lambda x: calendar.monthrange(year, x), range(1, 13))) 365
But if you think about how exactly this line is executed, it becomes obvious that this solution is very inefficient if you need to count the number of days for a large number of years.

We check with the timeit module.

To complete it 1 million times, it takes 13.69 seconds if import calendar is done once at the beginning. If import calendar is done every time then 14.49 seconds.

Now let's try another option. It requires knowing how many days there are in leap and non-leap years, but it is very short:

>>> import calendar >>> year = 2013 >>> 365+calendar.isleap(year) 365
And, as you might guess, it is already much faster: 0.83 seconds, including import calendar, and 0.26 seconds if import calendar is done once at the beginning.

Let's also see how long the very first option takes, with a "manual" approach: 0.07 seconds for 2012 and 2013 and 0.12 seconds for 2000 (I think everyone understands where such a difference in speed for these years comes from).

It turns out that this is the fastest option out of these three:

>>> import calendar >>> year = 2013 >>> 366 if ((year%4 == 0 and year%100 != 0) or (year%400 == 0)) else 365 365
Of course, in most cases you can use any of these options - after all, when determining the number of days in one, two, ten or a hundred years, you are unlikely to feel any difference.

Write, optimize, improve, test and evaluate performance - but don't forget about the readability of your program sources.

Happy New Year! Good luck, happiness, joy and self-improvement in the new year.

How many days are in a leap year?

Once every four years we observe an interesting calendar phenomenon. Every year it is customary for us to count 365 days, but once every four years we count 366 days. This has been the case historically, since 45 BC, when a Roman dictator named Gaius Julius Caesar created the calendar. Later, such a calendar began to be called the Julian.

The history of the leap year.

Gaius Julius Caesar's new calendar began on January 1, 45 BC. Astronomers of that time calculated the exact number of days during which the Earth completes a cycle called a year. The exact number of days was 365.25. In other words, there were 365 full days and 6 hours in a year. Since it was inconvenient to count incomplete days, we decided to introduce a special one to even out the balance.

For three years in a row, 365 days are counted, and in each subsequent fourth year they are added 24 hours (6 hours in 4 years) in February. Thus, a new day of February appeared, only one, appearing every four years. This month was not chosen by chance. It was he who was considered the last Roman month of the year. 45 BC became the first leap year.

The current year 2016 is a leap year. The next one will be in 2020, then in 2024, and so on.

Signs of a leap year.

Since ancient times, a year in which one day more than in other years was considered significant and even difficult. Some events were associated with it, it was believed that if it was in this year that winter was a day longer, it means that this year affects the human body in a special way.

Leap year, signs which scares a lot of people, is actually not so scary. The human body is not imprisoned for changes in the calendar and numbers. Rather, a person runs the risk of being influenced by the location of the planets, the moon and other external factors that affect the person as a whole.

Among the signs that many people have in this long year, the main ones are the prohibitions on various buildings.

Leap year: what not to do?

Many of us are interested in what cannot be done on a leap year. Among these activities are:

• carol,
• make real estate transactions,
• divorce.

It is not recommended to go far, and if this happens, it is advised to say certain prayers. All this, of course, has nothing to do with religion, so if the soul asks for prayer, it is better to pray without any signs.

Leap year is not terrible.

Such a year can bring a lot of wonderful moments to a person. In leap years, such great figures of art and culture were born as: M. Glinka, I. Strauss, L. Tolstoy, I. Goncharov, as well as modern actors: K. Diaz, K. Khabensky, T. Hanks.

A leap year gives rise to many superstitions and rumors, which boil down mainly to the fact that this year is unlucky and rich in negative events. Let's see if this is the case.

Leap year: a bit of history

The word "leap" is of Latin origin, translated as "second sixth". According to the Julian calendar, the year lasted 365.25 days, while every year the day shifted by 6 hours. Such an error could confuse the ancient men, so that this did not happen, it was decided that every fourth year would consist of 366 days, and February would become a day longer. This year is called a leap year.

In Russia, there were many legends about the appearance of leap years, each of which was considered unlucky.

Legends about the appearance of a leap year in Russia

February 29 is also called in honor of St. Kasyan Kasyanov Day. Being a bright angel, he was tempted by the tricks of evil spirits and went over to the side of the devil. However, later he repented and prayed to the Lord for mercy. Having mercy on the traitor, God assigned an angel to him. He put Kasyan in chains and, at the behest from above, beat him on the forehead with an iron hammer for 3 years, and let him go on the fourth.

According to another legend, Kasyanov's day is the day of his name day. However, the saint each time got dead drunk for three years and came to his senses only in the fourth year. Therefore, he is supposed to celebrate his day so rarely.

There is a third legend: walking along the road, Saint Kasyan and Nicholas the Wonderworker met a peasant. He asked for help, as his wagon got stuck in the mud. To which Kasyan replied that he was afraid to stain the riza, and Nikolai helped. The saints came to paradise, God noticed that Nicholas's robe was dirty and asked what was the matter. The Miracle Worker told him what had happened. Then God noticed that Kasyan's robe was clean, and asked if they weren't walking together? Kasyan replied that he was afraid to get his clothes dirty. God understood that the saint was cunning and made it so that his name day comes every 4 years. And the birthday of Nikolai for his kindness - twice a year.

Leap years were notorious in Russia: we will not continue the list of legends for a long time, here is one example: honest people tried to complete all their affairs before February 29th. Many did not dare to leave the house, the sun on this day was called the "Eye of Kasyan", they were afraid to fall under the sun, so that Kasyan would not jinx them and send illness and suffering.

Leap year superstitions

As in ancient times, in the modern world there are often signs and superstitions that do not characterize leap years in the best way (the list is given below):

• We need to postpone marriage in a leap year. Such a marriage will not be lasting, the young will quarrel, and the newly created family will incur troubles and misfortunes.
• You need to wait with the sale, purchase, exchange of real estate or building a house. The deals made this year will not be profitable and will inevitably lead to the ruin of the parties. The new home won't last long.
• Any undertakings are dangerous - job change, moving, starting a business. The sign is understandable: the presence of the 29th day in one of the winter months can characterize the whole year as not being what it should be. Therefore, it is easier for a person who is unsure of his own abilities to refuse something new than to make efforts to start and develop a business.
• You can not get pregnant and give birth, as the birth will be difficult, the baby may be born unhealthy. Or his life will be hard and joyless.
• A leap year "mows down" people, that is, it takes them away. It is generally accepted that mortality increases every fourth year, although this superstition is not statistically confirmed.
• You can’t pick mushrooms, eat them or sell them to people, so as not to raise bad things from the earth.
• It is believed that leap years entail natural disasters and disasters: fires, floods, drought.

What are leap years? List of leap years in the 20th century

In the last century, as well as in the 21st century, leap years have been terrifying for superstitious people. A list of them is given below:

• 1900s: -00; -04; -08; -12, and so on, every fourth year.
• The year 2000 was also a leap year.

Leap years: 21st century list

To this day, many fearfully wait for a leap year, psychologically setting themselves up for trouble and explaining misfortune by the presence of an extra day in February.

Leap years, list since 2000: -04; -08; -12; -16, and then - every fourth year.

Instead of a conclusion

According to statistics, only a small number of all the troubles and disasters occur in leap years. The superstitions that exist to this day can be explained by the fact that people who closely follow the troubles and misfortunes that happened in leap years, attached exaggerated significance to what was happening solely because of the unflattering glory of the latter.

People who believe too much in leap year superstitions would like to wish to pay more attention to positive changes and events. And then, perhaps, a list of good signs rehabilitating leap years will appear.

2016 is a leap year. This is not such a rare occurrence, because every 4 years in February there is a 29th day. There are many superstitions associated with this year, but is it really so dangerous? Let's try to figure it out if leap years are different. The 21st century list for leap years follows the same principle as before.

Leap year definition

We all know that there are 365 days in a year, but sometimes there are 366. What does it depend on? First of all, it should be noted that we live according to the Gregorian calendar, in which ordinary years are those that contain 365 days, and leap years are those that are one day more, respectively, 366 days. This is because periodically in February there are not 28, but 29 days. This happens once every four years, and this very year is usually called a leap year.

How to determine a leap year

Those years, the numbers of which can be divided without a remainder by the number 4, are classified as those that are called leap years. A list of them can be found in this article. Let's say the current year is 2016, if we divide it by 4, then we get a number without a remainder as a result of division. Accordingly, it is a leap year. In a normal year, there are 52 weeks and 1 day. Each subsequent year is shifted by one day in relation to the days of the week. After a leap year, the shift occurs immediately by 2 days.

It is counted from the first day of the spring equinox to the beginning of the next. This period, just, does not have exactly 365 days, which are indicated in the calendar, but somewhat more.

Exception

The exception is the zero years of centuries, that is, those at the end of which there are two zeros. But if such a year number can be divided without a remainder by 400, then it is also considered a leap year.

If we take into account that there are not exactly six hours extra in a year, then the missing minutes also affect the calculation of time. It was calculated that for this reason, in 128 years, one extra day will run in this way. In this regard, it was decided that not every fourth year be considered a leap year, but to exclude from this rule those years that are a multiple of 100, except for those that are divisible by 400.

The history of the leap year

To be more precise, according to the Egyptian solar calendar introduced by Julius Caesar, there are not exactly 365 days in a year, but 365.25, that is, plus another quarter of a day. The extra quarter of the day in this case is 5 hours 48 minutes and 45 seconds, which are rounded up to 6 hours, which is the fourth part of the day. But adding such a small unit of time every year is not practical.

In four years, a quarter of the day turns into a full day, which are added to the year. So February, which has fewer days than normal months, adds an extra day - and only in a leap year does it have February 29th.

Leap years: a list of years of the past and the 21st century. Example:

It was decided to adjust the calendar year in accordance with the astronomical one - this was done so that the seasons always come on the same day. Otherwise, the boundaries would shift over time.

From the Julian calendar, we switched to the Gregorian, which differs from the previous one in that a leap year occurs once every four years, and according to the Julian - once every three years. The Russian Orthodox Church still lives according to the old style. It is 13 days behind the Gregorian calendar. Hence the celebration of dates in the old and new style. So, Catholics celebrate Christmas according to the old style - December 25, and in Russia according to the Gregorian calendar - January 7.

Where did the fear of a leap year come from?

The word "leap year" comes from the Latin phrase "bis sextus", which translates as "the second sixth".

Most people associate a leap year with something bad. All these superstitions have gone back to ancient Rome. In the modern world, days are counted from the beginning of the month, but in ancient times it was different. They counted the days that remained until the beginning of the next month. Suppose, if we say February 24, then the ancient Romans in this case used the expression "the sixth day before the beginning of March."

When there was a leap year, an extra day appeared between the numbers of February 24 and 25. That is, in a normal year, there were 5 days left until March 1, and already 6 in a leap year, which is why the expression “second sixth” went.

With the onset of March, the fast ended, which lasted five days, if you start from February 24, but when you add an extra day, the fast already lasted, respectively, 1 day longer. Therefore, they considered such a year to be bad - hence the superstition about the unluckyness of leap years.

In addition, superstition came from the fact that only in a leap year is Kasyanov's Day celebrated, which falls on February 29th. This holiday is considered mystical. In this regard, for a long time people have been trying not to do big things in such years, not to get married, not to have children, and so on. Despite the simplicity of the algorithm for determining a leap year, some may wonder: "What years are leap years?".

Leap years of the 19th century: a list

1804, 1808, 1812, 1816, 1820, 1824, 1828, 1832, 1836, 1840, 1844, 1848, 1852, 1856, 1860, 1864, 1868, 1872, 1876, 1880, 1884, 1888, 1892, 1896.

Leap years of the 20th century: their list is as follows:

1904, 1908, 1912, 1916, 1920, 1924, 1928, 1932, 1936, 1940, 1944, 1948, 1952, 1956, 1960, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996

What are leap years? The list of years of the current century will be constructed similarly to the previous ones. Let's get to know him. Leap years (list) of the 21st century will be calculated in the same way. That is, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020, etc.

Signs associated with a leap year

This year, it is believed, it is impossible to change the familiar environment. This can be understood as moving to a new place of residence, looking for a new job.

It was believed that marriages entered into this year could not bring happiness, and it was not recommended to hold weddings.

It is also impossible to do something, start new business. This includes starting a business, building a house.

Let's answer the question of what years are leap years? List of 19th, 20th and 21st centuries:

It is better to postpone long trips and travel.

You can't celebrate a child's first tooth.

From ancient times, such years were considered dangerous, bringing many deaths, diseases, wars and crop failures. People, especially superstitious ones, fear the onset of such a year, having already prepared in advance for the worst. But are they really that dangerous?

Opinion on established superstition

The Church does not see anything wrong with these years, explaining such a phenomenon as a leap year, just by changes in the calendar that were once made. Based on statistics, such years are no different from ordinary ones. Even if we take the question of marriage in a leap year, which prophesies a short life in marriage, then the number of divorces of "leap marriages" is nothing more than among those couples who got married in ordinary years.