A blog for my students and all English learners.

It deals with various everyday issues, news, curiosities

and things that arouse my interest every day.

środa, 29 lutego 2012

'A leap year' czyli rok przestępny

A leap year (also called a bissextile year) is a year that contains (=zawiera) one additional (=dodatkowy) day. Do you know why we do so? The reason for adding one day is to keep the calendar year synchronized (=zsynchronizowany) with the astronomical and seasonal year. In the Gregorian calendar (=kalendarz gregoriański) it is February that has 29 instead of (=zamiast) 28 days. What's interesting it is not the 29th that is the extra day - the additional day is the day inserted between the 23rd and the 24th. In the Hebrew Calendar (=kalendarz hebrajski) a leap year contains 13 months (an extra month is usually added every (=co) 3 years).
In Great Britain and Ireland there is an interesting tradition  - women can propose (=oświadczyć się) to their beloved (=ukochany) only on leap years. A funny titbit (=ciekawostka) here is that a law passed in 1288 during the reign (=panowanie) of Queen Margaret of Scotland required that a man who turned down (=odrzucić) a proposal of marriage (=oświadczyny) be punished (=ukarany) with a fine - compensation (=zadośćuczynienie) for a woman was established (=określona) as pair of leather gloves, a rose, £1 and a kiss!





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