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/year/, n.1. a period of 365 or 366 days, in the Gregorian calendar, divided into 12 calendar months, now reckoned as beginning Jan. 1 and ending Dec. 31 (calendar year or civil year). Cf. common year, leap year.2. a period of approximately the same length in other calendars.3. a space of 12 calendar months calculated from any point: This should have been finished a year ago.4. Astron.a. Also called lunar year. a division of time equal to 12 lunar months.b. Also called astronomical year, equinoctial year, solar year, tropical year. a division of time equal to about 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 46 seconds, representing the interval between one vernal equinox and the next.c. Also called sidereal year. a division of time equal to the equinoctial year plus 20 minutes, representing the time required for the earth to complete one revolution around the sun, measured with relation to the fixed stars. Cf. anomalistic year.5. the time in which any planet completes a revolution round the sun: the Martian year.6. a full round of the seasons.7. a period out of every 12 months, devoted to a certain pursuit, activity, or the like: the academic year.8. years,a. age.b. old age: a man of years.c. time; period: the years of hardship and frustration.d. an unusually long period of time of indefinite length: I haven't spoken to them in years.9. a group of students entering school or college, graduating, or expecting to graduate in the same year; class.10. a year and a day, a period specified as the limit of time in various legal matters, as in determining a right or a liability, to allow for a full year by any way of counting.11. from the year one, for a very long time; as long as anyone remembers: He's been with the company from the year one.12. year in and year out, regularly through the years; continually: Year in and year out they went to Florida for the winter.Also, year in, year out.[bef. 900; ME yeer, OE gear; c. D jaar, G Jahr, ON ar, Goth jer, Gk hôros year, hóra season, part of a day, hour]
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ITime required for the Earth to travel once around the Sun, slightly less than 36514 days.This fractional number makes necessary the periodic adjustment of days in any calendar that is to be kept in step with the seasons. In the Gregorian calendar, a common year contains 365 days, and every fourth year is a leap year of 366 days except for any year that is divisible by 100 but not divisible by 400 (e.g., 1900 was not a leap year).II(as used in expressions)Year IIIFive Year Planslight yearNew Year's DayYear 2000 bugHundred Years' WarSeven Years' WarThirty Years' War* * *
time required for the Earth to travel once around the Sun, about 365 1/4 days. This fractional number makes necessary the periodic intercalation of days in any calendar that is to be kept in step with the seasons. In the Gregorian calendar a common year contains 365 days, and every fourth year (with a few exceptions) is a leap year of 366 days.In astronomy, several kinds of year are distinguished, having slightly different lengths. The solar year (365 days 5 hours 48 minutes 46 seconds), also called tropical year, or year of the seasons, is the time between two successive occurrences of the vernal equinox (the moment when the Sun apparently crosses the celestial equator moving north). Because of the precession of the equinoxes (an effect of a slow wobble in the Earth's rotation), the solar year is shorter than the sidereal year (365 days 6 hours 9 minutes 10 seconds), which is the time taken by the Sun to return to the same place in its annual apparent journey against the background of the stars. The anomalistic year (365 days 6 hours 13 minutes 53 seconds) is the time between two passages of the Earth through perihelion, the point in its orbit nearest the Sun. A lunar year (used in some calendars) of 12 synodic months (12 cycles of lunar phases) is about 354 days long. A cosmic year is the time (about 225 million years) needed for the solar system to revolve once around the centre of the Milky Way Galaxy.* * *
Universalium. 2010.
