month
/mʌnθ/ noun
Forms months moneth
- noun A period into which a year is divided, historically based on the phases of the moon. “July is my favourite month.”
- noun A period of 30 days, 31 days, or some alternation thereof. “We went on holiday for two months.”
- noun (obsolete, in the plural) A woman's period; menstrual discharge.
Synonyms
Etymology
From Middle English mon(e)th, from Old English mōnaþ, from Proto-West Germanic *mānōþ, from Proto-Germanic *mēnōþs (“month”), from Proto-Indo-European *mḗh₁n̥s (“moon, month”), probably derived from *meh₁- (“measure”) with moon-cycles being used to measure time. Related to moon. Cognate with Saterland Frisian Mound (“month”), Dutch maand (“month”), German Low German Maand (“month”), German Monat (“month”), Danish måned (“month”), Swedish månad (“month”), Icelandic mánuður (“month”).
Eclipsed non-native Old English calend (“month”), borrowed from Latin calendae.
Webster’s 1913
- noun One of the twelve portions into which the year is divided; the twelfth part of a year, corresponding nearly to the length of a synodic revolution of the moon, --whence the name. In popular use, a period of four weeks is often called a month.
Etymology [OE. month, moneth, AS. mon, mona; akin to mona moon, and to D. maand month, G. monat, OHG. manod, Icel. manu, mana, Goth. meno. *272. See Moon.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “month”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details