Thirty days hath September, April, June, and November; All the rest
have thirty-one, Except February alone, And that has twenty-eight days
clear And twenty-nine in each leap year.Old Nursery Rhyme
Twelve months make a year
What is a month? Why do we have twelve months in a year? And why doesn’t
each month have the same number of days?
Our word month comes from the Old English word monath. And monath
comes from mona, which means \”moon.” So, a month is a \”moon.”
Long ago, a month really was a \”moon.” That is, a month was the time
from one new moon to the next. But twelve such \”moons” add up to only
about 354 days. This is about eleven days less than a year, which is the
time it takes the earth to go around the sun.
To make the moon-months the same number of days as a sun-year, we have
months of different lengths. A regular year adds up to 365 days and a
leap year comes to 366 days. In this way, the months keep time with the
seasons.
The rest of this book is divided into twelve sections—one for each
month. At the front of each section you will discover how the month got
its name, what the name means, and other interesting facts about that
month.
