NIELS JØRGEN THØGERSEN
FEBRUARY And all its 28-29 days Niels Jørgen Thøgersen Where does the name February come from ? It comes from the Latin word FEBRUARE, which means PURIFICATION. It was in this month that the Romans organised their purification parties. The main one took place on February 15. Some people believe that the name rather comes from the pre-Roman Etruscan god FEBRUUS. But the one does not exclude the other. The old Danish word for this month was BLIDEMÅNED. Blid normally means soft. But in this case it meant light and white ( snow ). Originally the Romans only had ten months in a year. The first month was March. The two winter months did not count. But around 713 BC king Numa Pompilius introduced January as well as February. In this way the year was more in line with the lunar year. This calendar was many centuries later replaced by the Gregorian calendar, where February is the second month of each year. It was introduced in Denmark around 1700. See more about the names of the 12 months: http://www.pantheon.org/miscellaneous/origin_months.html