Month
A month is a unit of time, used with calendars, which was first used and invented in Mesopotamia, as a natural period related to the motion of the Moon; month and Moon are cognates. The traditional concept arose with the cycle of moon phases; such months (lunations) are synodic months and last approximately 29.53 days. From excavated tally sticks, researchers have deduced that people counted days in relation to the Moon's phases as early as the Paleolithic age. Synodic months, based on the Moon's orbital period, are still the basis of many calendars today, and are used to divide the year.
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Famous quotes containing the word month:
“January, month of empty pockets!... Let us endure this evil month, anxious as a theatrical producer’s forehead.”
—Colette [Sidonie Gabrielle Colette] (1873–1954)
“One non-revolutionary weekend is infinitely more bloody than a month of permanent revolution.”
—Graffiti, School of Oriental Languages, London (1968)
“The climate of Ohio is perfect, considered as the home of an ideal republican people. Climate has much to do with national character.... A climate which permits labor out-of-doors every month in the year and which requires industry to secure comfort—to provide food, shelter, clothing, fuel, etc.—is the very climate which secures the highest civilization.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)