Athenaeum
A Place for study of the arts

At the end of February this year, in addition to all of the other unusual calendrical and astronomical events that are happening, we will also experience a Leap Day.  But, not any ordinary Leap Day!  February 29, 2000 will be quite a remarkable occurrence, one which none of us will see again in this lifetime.  Sure, you may think that Leap Years happen with regularity every four years, but not so.
According to the Gregorian calendar (the calendar the world defers to as standard) a Leap Year only occurs on years that may be divisible by four, and not on a turn-of-the-century year.  Yet, the year 2000 CE is a turn-of-the-century year, so why does it contain 29 days in February?  It is because there seems to be one small exception to every rule, and the exception in this case is that a Leap Year may only occur in years that end in a double zero that are divisible by 400. Therefore this is the first turn-of-the-century Leap Year since the year 1600 CE!
And, if you'd like to get really picky and precise, it is the very first
turn-of-the-century Leap Year ever for North Americans!  This is because the "colonists" did not accept the Gregorian calendar for their new settlements until the year 1752.  Of course, the next turn-of-the-century Leap Year will happen in 2400 CE, unless they come up with yet another calendar system by then.  After all, I just bet that in what we now refer to as the 6th Century, a little Roman monk named Dionysius Exiguous (aka: Dennis the Short...) had no idea we would be making this much fuss over the calendar he designed!

         Bright Blessings! ~SHE