calendarul

Calendarul is the Romanian term for the calendar, the system used to organize time by dividing the year into days, weeks, and months. It provides a framework for scheduling civil, religious, and cultural activities and for identifying recurring dates such as holidays and anniversaries.

Calendars are categorized by their underlying astronomical basis. Solar calendars are aligned with the tropical year, with the Gregorian calendar being the most widely used example. Lunar calendars base months on lunar cycles, as seen in the Islamic calendar. Lunisolar calendars combine both cycles, matching lunar months to the solar year; examples include the Hebrew and traditional Chinese calendars. Most cultures also define a seven-day week and assign names to months and days.

Historically, diverse civilizations created calendars to predict seasons and organize agricultural work. The Roman world developed the Julian calendar, introduced by Julius Caesar in 45 BCE, which corrected prior drift. In 1582, the Gregorian reform refined the year’s length and skipped ten days to realign the calendar with the seasons. Adoption spread gradually across Europe and the world, with some regions transitioning in the 18th–20th centuries. Romania, for example, adopted the Gregorian calendar in the early 20th century, aligning with neighboring countries.

In modern use, calendarul appears in printed almanacs, wall calendars, and digital applications. A standard year in the Gregorian system has 365 days, with a leap day added to February every four years, except centuries not divisible by 400, yielding 366 days in leap years. The calendar regulates scheduling, holidays, and public timekeeping worldwide.