leap year

Meaning

1. A year in the Julian or Gregorian calendar with an intercalary day added to February (in the Gregorian calendar, February 29), used to adjust for the extra hours of the solar year; a 366-day year.
2. (broadly) Any other year featuring intercalation, such as a year in a lunisolar calendar with 13 months instead of 12, used to maintain its alignment with the seasons of the solar year.

Synonyms

intercalary year

bissextile year

bissextile

embolismic year

366 days

Translations

Schaltjahr

année bissextile

anno bisestile

ano bissexto

schrikkeljaar

año bisiesto

bisiesto

any de traspàs

artık yıl

any bixest

any bissextil

δίσεκτο έτος

سنة كبيسة

annus bissextus

Pronounced as (IPA)

/ˈliːp ˌjɪə/

Etymology

Inherited from Middle English: lepe-yer

Inherited from Old English: hlīep

Inherited from Old English: ġēar

Cognate with Old Norse: hlaup-ár

In summary

PIE word
*yóh₁r̥
From Late Middle English lepe-yer, lep-yer (“year with 366 days, leap year”), from lep, lepe (“act of jumping, jump, leap”) (from Old English hlīep, hlȳp, probably ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *klewp- (“to spring; to stumble”)) + yer (“calendrical unit based on a complete revolution of the Earth around the Sun, year”) (from Old English ġēar, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *yóh₁r̥ (“year”)). The English term is analysable as leap (noun) + year, and possibly relates to the phenomenon that any fixed date of a 365-day calendar advances one weekday each year but every date of a 366-day year after February 29 (often seen as the leap day) advances by two weekdays instead. For example, Christmas (December 25) fell on a Saturday in 2004, a Sunday in 2005, a Monday in 2006, and a Tuesday in 2007 but then “leapt” over Wednesday to fall on a Thursday in 2008 which was a leap year.
Compare also Old English mōnan hlȳp (“moon’s leap”) and Medieval Latin saltus lūnae (literally “leap moon”), an additional day added every 19 years (a Metonic cycle) to bring the lunar and solar calendars into alignment.
Cognates
* Old Norse hlaup-ár (“leap year”)