As we all know, leap years, in which we bump up our standard 365-day Gregorian calendar to 366 with the addition of February 29, arrive once every four years. This is to accommodate the fact that the Earth actually takes 365.2422 days to orbit the Sun. If we didn’t, at some point in the future (about 750 years, to be precise), we would find ourselves enjoying winter in June.
The arrival of a leap year is marked in various ways around the world, not only by those celebrating their rare, yet true birthdays—‘leaplings’, if you will. In Ireland, Leap Day is also known as Bachelor’s Day, thanks to the tradition whereby women are ‘allowed’ (perhaps ‘encouraged’ might be more appropriate these days) to propose to the man in their life. This supposedly stems from a complaint made by nun St Brigid of Kildare , in the 5th century, that women were having to wait too long for their prospective husbands to get down on one knee.
この記事は Country Life UK の February 26, 2020 版に掲載されています。
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この記事は Country Life UK の February 26, 2020 版に掲載されています。
7 日間の Magzter GOLD 無料トライアルを開始して、何千もの厳選されたプレミアム ストーリー、9,000 以上の雑誌や新聞にアクセスしてください。
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