Happy New Year everyone.  But did you know that New Year used to be on March 1?  That explains why the extra day for leap year is added at the end of February; it used to be the last day of the year.

Also, that would explain why September (Latin for seven is septem) is now the 9th month, October (Latin for eight is octo) is the 10th month,  November (Latin for nine is novem) is the 11th month, and finally, December (Latin for 10 is decem) is the 12th month.

Originally, there were only 10 months in the Roman calendar, and each month had 30 or 31 days giving a calendar year 304 days.  I guess the Romans did not like winter very much, so they just left 61 days of winter out of the calendar!

It wasn’t until 753bc that the Roman ruler Numa Pontilius added Ianuarius (January) and Februarius (February) to the calendar finally including the winter days offically as part of the year.  Personally, I wouldn’t mind skipping over January and February and going straight to March.

So Happy New Year everyone!