Croatian months

The Croatian months used with the Gregorian calendar by Croats differ from the original Latin month names:

No.	Latin name	English name	Croatian name	Croatian meaning
1	Ianuarius	January	Siječanj	month of cutting (wood)
2	Februarius	February	Veljača	month of changing[dubious – discuss] Also, possibly from "Velja Noć" (Great Night), old Slavic pagan festival that falls in modern-day February
3	Martius	March	Ožujak	lying month
4	Aprilis	April	Travanj	month of grass
5	Maius	May	Svibanj	month of budding (svibovina = Cornel tree)
6	Iunius	June	Lipanj	month of the lipa (lime / linden tree)
7	Iulius	July	Srpanj	month of reaping (with a sickle)
8	Augustus	August	Kolovoz	month of driving the wagon (for harvest) — kolo + voziti
9	September	September	Rujan	month of animal mating (from archaic verb for animal roar "rjuti", referencing mating calls)
10	October	October	Listopad	month of falling leaves — list + padati
11	November	November	Studeni	cold month
12	December	December	Prosinac	the beginning of the Sun's shining (sinuti = to dawn). Also, possibly month of begging, from prositi = beg.

Some names are derived from archaic Croatian-Slavic words that are no longer found in standard Croatian dictionaries. In some cases even the meaning of those words is ambiguous.

In Macedonian, Listopad is also the (archaic) name for October but in Polish, Czech listopad and Ukrainian "lystopad" means November. Likewise, Polish sierpień, Czech srpen and Ukrainian "serpen'" mean August rather than July, and Polish lipiec (Ukrainian "lypen'") means July rather than June.

See also

• Czech months
• Macedonian months
• Polish months
• Ukrainian months
• Bulgarian months
• Belarusian months
• Slovenian months

External links

• http://projetbabel.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=7222 A comprehensive table of Slavic and Baltic month names, explanation in French.