intercalate
Sep. 21st, 2022 08:04 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
prettygoodwordintercalate (in-TUR-kuh-layt) - v., to insert (something, such as a day) into a calendar; to insert, interpose, or interpolate between or among existing elements or layers.
And there's a host of technical uses for that second sense -- but that first sense is the original and, as far as I can tell, the most common sense. Leap days are an example of regularly scheduled intercalations, plus every few years, we insert an extra second to two to keep our our time scales in sync with what the Earth actually does. From Latin intercalātus, past participle of intercalāre, to insert a day or month into the calendar, from inter-, between/among + calā-, stem of calāre, to proclaim, because a Roman calendar was originally a proclamation from the relevant priests of what the good and bad days would be in the upcoming months.
---L.
And there's a host of technical uses for that second sense -- but that first sense is the original and, as far as I can tell, the most common sense. Leap days are an example of regularly scheduled intercalations, plus every few years, we insert an extra second to two to keep our our time scales in sync with what the Earth actually does. From Latin intercalātus, past participle of intercalāre, to insert a day or month into the calendar, from inter-, between/among + calā-, stem of calāre, to proclaim, because a Roman calendar was originally a proclamation from the relevant priests of what the good and bad days would be in the upcoming months.
---L.
