- Leap week calendar
A leap week calendar is a
calendar system with a whole number of weeks every year, and with every year starting on the same weekday. Most leap week calendars are proposed reforms to the civil calendar, but some - such as the ISO week number calendar - are simply conveniences for specific purposes.The ISO calendar in question is a variation of the
Gregorian calendar that is used (mainly) ingovernment andbusiness forfiscal year s, as well as in timekeeping. In this system a year (ISO year) has 52 or 53 full weeks (364 or 371 days).Leap week calendars vary on whether the concept of month is preserved and whether the month (if preserved) has a whole number of weeks.
Most leap week calendars take advantage of the fact that 400
Gregorian Calendar years have exactly 20,871 weeks, so with non-leap years of 52 weeks, this means there are 71 leap weeks every 400 years. These include thePax Calendar , CCC&T as well as theISO week date s.Advantages
*There are no variations between day of week between years for a specific date.
*The calendar starts on the same day and week every year.
*Unlike the regular calendar, variations of years are limited to a possible addition of a leap week.
*There are no fragments of weeks at the end of the year.
*Unlike certain proposed calendar reforms such as theWorld Calendar andInternational Fixed Calendar , there is no need to modify the week. This avoids opposition from religious groups who object to interruption of the seven-weekday sequence.Disadvantages
A year with a leap week is at least 7 days longer than a year without a leap week, consequently the equinoxes and solstices must vary over 7 days, (i.e. ±3 of the average date), or even more, such as 19 days in the
Pax Calendar .Year structures
Note that the new years of the calendars shown need not be synchonised.
External links
* [http://www.hermetic.ch/cal_stud/palmen/lweek1.htm Leap Week Calendars]
* [http://henry.pha.jhu.edu/calendarDir/newton.html List of ISO leap years] - here the leap weeks are called Newton
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