Months
In the modern Thai calendar, months (Deuan, Thai: เดือน, meaning "month" or "Lunation") are defined by lunar cycles. Successive months (or lunations) are numbered from 1 to 12 within the Thai year. As in other Buddhist calendars, these months have names that derive from Sanskrit, but for the most part are only known by Thai astrologers.
Two successive lunations take slightly more than 59 days. The Thai lunar calendar approximates this interval with "normal-month" pairs (ปรกติมาสฅ ปกกะติมาด Pok-ga-ti-mat) that are alternately 29 and 30 days long. 29-day "hollow months" (เดือนขาด deuan kàat) are odd-numbered (เดือนคี่ deuan kêe); 30-day "full months" (เดือนถ้วน deuan tûan) are even-numbered (เดือนคู่ deuan kôo).
To keep the beginning of the month in sync with the new moon, from time to time either the normally "hollow" Month 7 takes an extra day, or an extra "full" Month 8 follows a normal "full" Month 8.
Months 1 and 2 are named in archaic alternate numbers, with the remainder being named in modern numbers.
Read more about this topic: Thai Lunar Calendar
Famous quotes containing the word months:
“Here lies interred in the eternity of the past, from whence there is no resurrection for the days—whatever there may be for the dust—the thirty-third year of an ill-spent life, which, after a lingering disease of many months sank into a lethargy, and expired, January 22d, 1821, A.D. leaving a successor inconsolable for the very loss which occasioned its existence.”
—George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)
“When the hounds of spring are on winter’s traces,
The mother of months in meadow or plain
Fills the shadows and windy places
With lisp of leaves and ripple of rain;”
—A.C. (Algernon Charles)
“My doctor gave me six months to live but when I couldn’t pay the bill, he gave me six months more.”
—Walter Matthau (b. 1920)