Book of Indian Eras, with Tables for Calculating Indian Dates c30.2

c30.2

The year was the same as the Julian year, and consisted of 365¼ days, the fraction being arranged by making three consecutive years of 365 days, and adding a whole day to the 4th year. But after the lapse of many centuries it was discovered that this value of the solar or sidereal year was too much. In A.D. 1582, when the amount of excess was ten days, the calendar was corrected by order of Pope Gregory XIII by striking out ten days in October from the 5th to the 14th. In England the correction was not made until A.D. 1752, when, the error having still further increased, eleven days were struck out from 3rd to 14th September. The true length of the year is 365·24219 days, but for convenience it is made 365·2425 days, or three days less than the Julian reckoning in 400 years. This is effected by omitting the extra day in the three odd hundred periods of four centuries. Thus the years 1600 and 2000 are leap years, but 1700, 1800 and 1900, are common years.