A leap year occurs once every four years and has 366 days instead of 365. According to timeanddate.com, each year has approximately 356 ¼ days, and leap years were created to keep the calendar in alignment with the Earth’s revolution around the sun.

During leap years, an extra day is added to the month of February, the 29th. Leap days occur during years that are evenly distributed by four; however, years that are divisible by 100 are not leap years unless they can also be evenly divided by 400.

Julius Caesar, the father of the leap year, introduced the idea to the Julian calendar about 2,000 years ago and only had one rule: years had to be divisible by four.  However, this resulted in too many leap years and additional criteria were added years later in the new Gregorian calendar by Pope Gregory XIII.

Superstitions and traditions abound in leap years, particularly on Leap Day. A woman is allowed to propose to a man on Leap Day, and if the man rejects her, he must buy 12 pairs of gloves for her to wear, hiding the fact that she does not have an engagement ring.

On the other hand, Greek superstition states that couples will have bad luck if they marry during a leap year, especially on a leap day.

Leap Days were once ignored, thus developing the term “leap year.” Since Feb. 29 was ignored, it also had no legal status; therefore any crime committed during this day would not be penalized.

In European countries, a rhyme was chanted by children and adults that helped them to recount how many days there are in each month. There are many variations, but the oldest one found is the 15th-century medieval version which translates to, “Thirty days has November, April, June, and September: Of twenty-eight is but one, and all the remnant is thirty-one. Of course Leap year comes and stays, every four years got it right, and twenty-eight is but twenty-nine.”

The year of 2012 is a leap year.