Century

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A century is a period of 100 years. Centuries are numbered ordinally in English and many other languages. The word century comes from the Latin centum, meaning one hundred. Century is sometimes abbreviated as c. [1]

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A centennial or centenary is a hundredth anniversary, or a celebration of this, typically the remembrance of an event which took place a hundred years earlier.

Start and end of centuries

Although a century can mean any arbitrary period of 100 years, there are two viewpoints on the nature of standard centuries. One is based on strict construction, while the other is based on popular perception.

According to the strict construction, the 1st century AD began with AD 1 and ended with AD 100, the 2nd century spanning the years 101 to 200, with the same pattern continuing onward. [note 1] In this model, the n-th century starts with the year that ends with "01", and ends with the year that ends with "00"; for example, the 20th century comprises the years 1901 to 2000 in strict usage. [2]

In popular perception and practice, centuries are structured by grouping years based on sharing the 'hundreds' digit(s). In this model, the n-th century starts with the year that ends in "00" and ends with the year ending in "99"; [3] for example, the years 1900 to 1999, in popular culture, constitute the 20th century. [4] (This is similar to the grouping of "0-to-9 decades" which share the 'tens' digit.)

To facilitate calendrical calculations by computer, the astronomical year numbering and ISO 8601 systems both contain a year zero, with the astronomical year 0 corresponding to the year 1 BC, the astronomical year -1 corresponding to 2 BC, and so on. [5] [6]

Strict vs Popular usage
Year 2 BC 1 BC 1 2 ... 99 100 101 102 ... 199 200 201 202 ... 1899 1900 1901 1902 ... 1999 2000 2001 2002 ... 2024 ...2099210021012102...
Strict 1st century BC 1st century 2nd century 3rd century ... 19th century 20th century 21st century 22nd century...
Popular 1st century BC 1st century 2nd century 3rd century ... 19th century 20th century 21st century 22nd century...

Alternative naming systems

Informally, years may be referred to in groups based on the hundreds part of the year. In this system, the years 1900–1999 are referred to as the nineteen hundreds (1900s). Aside from English usage, this system is used in Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, Icelandic, Finnish and Hungarian. The Swedish nittonhundratalet (or 1900-talet), Danish nittenhundredetallet (or nittenhundredetallet), Norwegian nittenhundretallet (or 1900-tallet), Finnish tuhatyhdeksänsataaluku (or 1900-luku) and Hungarian ezerkilencszázas évek (or 1900-as évek) refer unambiguously to the years 1900–1999. In Swedish, however, a century is in more rare cases referred to as det n-te seklet/århundradet ("the n-th century") rather than n-hundratalet, i.e. the 17th century is (in rare cases) referred to as 17:(d)e seklet/sjuttonde seklet rather than 1600-talet, [7] and the years 1501 to 1600 is (according to Svenska Akademiens ordbok) referred to as sextonde århundradet ("the sixteenth century") and also distinctly separated from femtonhundratalet ("the 1500s"; the years 1500 to 1599). [8]

Italian also has a similar system, but it only expresses the hundreds and omits the word for 'thousand'. This system mainly functions from the 11th to the 20th century:

il Quattrocento (that is 'the four hundred', the 15th century)
il Cinquecento (that is 'the five hundred', the 16th century).

These terms are often used in other languages when referring to the history of Italy.

Similar dating units in other calendar systems

While the century has been commonly used in the West, other cultures and calendars have utilized differently sized groups of years in a similar manner. The Hindu calendar, in particular, summarizes its years into groups of 60, [9] while the Aztec calendar considers groups of 52. [10]

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ AD and CE year numbering, which are numerically equivalent, are now commonly used to number years, including those which occurred before these notations were invented; AD did not become widespread in Europe until early in the 2nd millennium.

Related Research Articles

Astronomical year numbering is based on AD/CE year numbering, but follows normal decimal integer numbering more strictly. Thus, it has a year 0; the years before that are designated with negative numbers and the years after that are designated with positive numbers. Astronomers use the Julian calendar for years before 1582, including the year 0, and the Gregorian calendar for years after 1582, as exemplified by Jacques Cassini (1740), Simon Newcomb (1898) and Fred Espenak (2007).

A calendar date is a reference to a particular day represented within a calendar system. The calendar date allows the specific day to be identified. The number of days between two dates may be calculated. For example, "25 April 2024" is ten days after "15 April 2024". The date of a particular event depends on the observed time zone. For example, the air attack on Pearl Harbor that began at 7:48 a.m. Hawaiian time on 7 December 1941 took place at 3:18 a.m. Japan Standard Time, 8 December in Japan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">ISO 8601</span> International standards for dates and times

ISO 8601 is an international standard covering the worldwide exchange and communication of date and time-related data. It is maintained by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and was first published in 1988, with updates in 1991, 2000, 2004, and 2019, and an amendment in 2022. The standard provides a well-defined, unambiguous method of representing calendar dates and times in worldwide communications, especially to avoid misinterpreting numeric dates and times when such data is transferred between countries with different conventions for writing numeric dates and times.

The Julian calendar is a solar calendar of 365 days in every year with an additional leap day every fourth year. The Julian calendar is still used as a religious calendar in parts of the Eastern Orthodox Church and in parts of Oriental Orthodoxy as well as by the Amazigh people.

0 (zero) is a number representing an empty quantity. Adding 0 to any number leaves that number unchanged. In mathematical terminology, 0 is the additive identity of the integers, rational numbers, real numbers, and complex numbers, as well as other algebraic structures. Multiplying any number by 0 has the result 0, and consequently, division by zero has no meaning in arithmetic.

The Julian day is the continuous count of days since the beginning of the Julian period, and is used primarily by astronomers, and in software for easily calculating elapsed days between two events.

English number words include numerals and various words derived from them, as well as a large number of words borrowed from other languages.

A millennium is a period of one thousand years, sometimes called a kiloannum (ka), or kiloyear (ky). Normally, the word is used specifically for periods of a thousand years that begin at the starting point of the calendar in consideration and at later years that are whole number multiples of a thousand years after the start point. The term can also refer to an interval of time beginning on any date. Millennia sometimes have religious or theological implications.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Date of Easter</span> Calculation of its date

As a moveable feast, the date of Easter is determined in each year through a calculation known as computus. Easter is celebrated on the first Sunday after the Paschal full moon. Determining this date in advance requires a correlation between the lunar months and the solar year, while also accounting for the month, date, and weekday of the Julian or Gregorian calendar. The complexity of the algorithm arises because of the desire to associate the date of Easter with the date of the Jewish feast of Passover which, Christians believe, is when Jesus was crucified.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Swedish calendar</span> Calendar in use in Sweden from 1700 to 1712

The Swedish calendar or Swedish style was a calendar in use in Sweden and its possessions from 1 March 1700 until 30 February 1712. It was one day ahead of the Julian calendar and ten days behind the Gregorian calendar. Easter was calculated astronomically, with a minor exception, from 1740 to 1844.

A calendar era is the period of time elapsed since one epoch of a calendar and, if it exists, before the next one. For example, it is the year 2024 as per the Gregorian calendar, which numbers its years in the Western Christian era.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mesoamerican calendars</span>

The calendrical systems devised and used by the pre-Columbian cultures of Mesoamerica, primarily a 260-day year, were used in religious observances and social rituals, such as divination.

A decade is a period of ten years. Decades may describe any ten-year period, such as those of a person's life, or refer to specific groupings of calendar years.

Tore Ingvar Uppström was a Swedish pianist, composer and author.

A year zero does not exist in the Anno Domini (AD) calendar year system commonly used to number years in the Gregorian calendar ; in this system, the year 1 BC is followed directly by year AD 1. However, there is a year zero in both the astronomical year numbering system, and the ISO 8601:2004 system, the interchange standard for all calendar numbering systems. There is also a year zero in most Buddhist and Hindu calendars.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mesoamerican Long Count calendar</span> Calendar used by several pre-Columbian Mesoamerican cultures

The Mesoamerican Long Count calendar is a non-repeating base-20 and base-18 calendar used by several pre-Columbian Mesoamerican cultures, most notably the Maya. For this reason, it is often known as the MayaLong Count calendar. Using a modified vigesimal tally, the Long Count calendar identifies a day by counting the number of days passed since a mythical creation date that corresponds to August 11, 3114 BCE in the proleptic Gregorian calendar. The Long Count calendar was widely used on monuments.

The Gregorian calendar is the calendar used in most parts of the world. It went into effect in October 1582 following the papal bull Inter gravissimas issued by Pope Gregory XIII, which introduced it as a modification of, and replacement for, the Julian calendar. The principal change was to space leap years differently so as to make the average calendar year 365.2425 days long, more closely approximating the 365.2422-day 'tropical' or 'solar' year that is determined by the Earth's revolution around the Sun.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">August Hagborg</span>

Vilhelm Nikolaus August Hagborg was a Swedish painter who spent most of his life in France.

References

  1. ↑ "Oxford English Dictionary – List of Abbreviations".
  2. ↑ "When Did the 21st Century Start?". timeanddate.com. Retrieved 23 November 2020.
  3. ↑ "century". Oxford Dictionaries. Archived from the original on December 30, 2019. Retrieved 20 January 2021.
  4. ↑ "Centuries and How to Refer to Them". Merriam-Webster. Retrieved 27 April 2021.
  5. ↑ "Calendars". L.E. Doggett. Archived from the original on 10 February 2012. Retrieved 27 April 2021.
  6. ↑ "Year Dating Conventions". National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Retrieved 27 April 2021.
  7. ↑ "Decennium | svenska.se".
  8. ↑ "Femton | SAOB | svenska.se".
  9. ↑ "www.vedavidyalaya.com". Archived from the original on 17 December 2013. Retrieved 4 September 2013.
  10. ↑ "www.aztec-history.com" . Retrieved 4 September 2013.

Bibliography

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