Annual calendar years. An annual timepiece calendar is less complicated and expensive than a perpetual timepiece calendar, which will not require manual adjustment till 2100. That year will not be a leap year, even though its number is evenly divisible by 4. Ancient calendars (static) may always have been annual, even after the length of the calendar year was fixed at (avg.) 365.25 days by the Julian Calendar (46 BC). Early Romans observed an 8-day market week, called the nundinal cycle, until the seven-day week was adopted during the reign of Emperor Constantine the Great (306-337). A goal of modern calendar reform
Leap year leap day "every" four years amounts to about three extra days. The Gregorian calendar therefore drops three leap days every 400 years, which is the length of its "leap cycle". This is done by dropping February 29 in the three century years (multiples of 100) that cannot be exactly divided by 400. The years 1600, 2000 and 2400 are leap years, while 1700, 1800, 1900, 2100, 2200 and 2300 are common years. By this rule, the average number of days per year is 365 + − + = 365.2425. The rule can be applied to years before the Gregorian reform