Thank you for that reminder, Frank! I will be the first to say that it made me learn something.
I live in France, but I can tell you that no one, in a quick survey of a half dozen people, could explain what, literally, "bissextile" actually refers to in the calendar, except that it is the leap year. How is it abbreviated differently, then, from "a. d. VI Kal Mar"? Perhaps with a "bis" added after the VI, or "diem"? (i.e. "a. d. VI bis Kal Mar", or "a. d. bis VI Kal Mar") I will henceforth adopt your erudite custom on the 24th of February of leap years, in order to stimulate conversation and love of learning. Ross Caldwell Béziers, France ________________________________________ De : sundial <sundial-boun...@uni-koeln.de> de la part de Frank King <f...@cl.cam.ac.uk> Envoyé : mercredi 24 février 2016 09:11 À : Sundial Mailing List Objet : A Happy Leap Year Day to everyone Dear All, As is my four-yearly custom, I wish readers of this list a Happy Leap Year Day. I was delighted, in 2012, when I sent out a similar greeting, that not a single reader queried why I had sent out the message on 24 February. I will add my four-yearly lament that the perfectly good English term "bissextile year" seems to be almost obsolete. Around 100 years ago it was in fairly common use. I continue to applaud the French, the Italians and the Portuguese (just to give three examples) who still use année bissextile, anno bisestile and ano bissexto. Let us hope that they do not indulge in the dumbing-down from which we in the U.K. seem to suffer. Frank King Cambridge, U.K. --------------------------------------------------- https://lists.uni-koeln.de/mailman/listinfo/sundial --------------------------------------------------- https://lists.uni-koeln.de/mailman/listinfo/sundial
