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American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

year       (yîr)  Pronunciation Key  n.   The period of time during which Earth completes a single revolution around the sun, consisting of 365 days, 5 hours, 49 minutes, and 12 seconds of mean solar time. In the Gregorian calendar the year begins on January 1 and ends on December 31 and is divided into 12 months, 52 weeks, and 365 or 366 days. Also called calendar year. A period approximately equal to a year in other calendars. A period of approximately the duration of a calendar year: We were married a year ago. A sidereal year. A solar year. A period equal to the calendar year but beginning on a different date: a tax-reckoning year; a farming year. A specific period of time, usually shorter than 12 months, devoted to a special activity: the academic year. years Age, especially old age: I'm feeling my years. years An indefinitely long period of time: it's been years since we saw her. [Middle English yere, from Old English gēar; see yēr- in Indo-European roots.]

Online Etymology Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
year 

WordNet - Cite This Source - Share This

year
noun
1.	a period of time containing 365 (or 366) days; "she is 4 years old"; "in the year 1920"
2.	a period of time occupying a regular part of a calendar year that is used for some particular activity; "a school year"
3.	the period of time that it takes for a planet (as, e.g., Earth or Mars) to make a complete revolution around the sun; "a Martian year takes 687 of our days"
4.	a body of students who graduate together; "the class of '97"; "she was in my year at Hoehandle High" [syn: class]

American Heritage Dictionary of Idioms - Cite This Source - Share This

year

In addition to the idiom beginning with year, also see all year round; along in years; by the day (year); donkey's years.

Investopedia - Cite This Source - Share This

Year

In taxation, year refers to the calendar year that runs from January 1st to December 31st. However, corporations can generally set the time period for which they report financial results to be different than the calendar year.

Investopedia Commentary

For example, a business might have their fiscal year end in September.

See also: Accounting Period, Calendar Year, Fiscal Year, Tax Year, YTD

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

Year

Year\, n. [OE. yer, yeer, [yogh]er, AS. ge['a]r; akin to OFries. i?r, g?r, D. jaar, OHG. j[=a]r, G. jahr, Icel. [=a]r, Dan. aar, Sw. [*a]r, Goth. j?r, Gr. ? a season of the year, springtime, a part of the day, an hour, ? a year, Zend y[=a]re year. [root]4, 279. Cf. Hour, Yore.]

1. The time of the apparent revolution of the sun trough the ecliptic; the period occupied by the earth in making its revolution around the sun, called the astronomical year; also, a period more or less nearly agreeing with this, adopted by various nations as a measure of time, and called the civil year; as, the common lunar year of 354 days, still in use among the Mohammedans; the year of 360 days, etc. In common usage, the year consists of 365 days, and every fourth year (called bissextile, or leap year) of 366 days, a day being added to February on that year, on account of the excess above 365 days (see Bissextile).

Of twenty year of age he was, I guess. --Chaucer.

Note: The civil, or legal, year, in England, formerly commenced on the 25th of March. This practice continued throughout the British dominions till the year 1752.

2. The time in which any planet completes a revolution about the sun; as, the year of Jupiter or of Saturn.

3. pl. Age, or old age; as, a man in years. --Shak.

Anomalistic year, the time of the earth's revolution from perihelion to perihelion again, which is 365 days, 6 hours, 13 minutes, and 48 seconds.

A year's mind (Eccl.), a commemoration of a deceased person, as by a Mass, a year after his death. Cf. A month's mind, under Month.

Bissextile year. See Bissextile.

Canicular year. See under Canicular.

Civil year, the year adopted by any nation for the computation of time.

Common lunar year, the period of 12 lunar months, or 354 days.

Common year, each year of 365 days, as distinguished from leap year.

Embolismic year, or Intercalary lunar year, the period of 13 lunar months, or 384 days.

Fiscal year (Com.), the year by which accounts are reckoned, or the year between one annual time of settlement, or balancing of accounts, and another.

Great year. See Platonic year, under Platonic.

Gregorian year, Julian year. See under Gregorian, and Julian.

Leap year. See Leap year, in the Vocabulary.

Lunar astronomical year, the period of 12 lunar synodical months, or 354 days, 8 hours, 48 minutes, 36 seconds.

Lunisolar year. See under Lunisolar.

Periodical year. See Anomalistic year, above.

Platonic year, Sabbatical year. See under Platonic, and Sabbatical.

Sidereal year, the time in which the sun, departing from any fixed star, returns to the same. This is 365 days, 6 hours, 9 minutes, and 9.3 seconds.

Tropical year. See under Tropical.

Year and a day (O. Eng. Law), a time to be allowed for an act or an event, in order that an entire year might be secured beyond all question. --Abbott.

Year of grace, any year of the Christian era; Anno Domini; A. D. or a. d.

Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

Year

Heb. shanah, meaning "repetition" or "revolution" (Gen. 1:14; 5:3). Among the ancient Egyptians the year consisted of twelve months of thirty days each, with five days added to make it a complete revolution of the earth round the sun. The Jews reckoned the year in two ways, (1) according to a sacred calendar, in which the year began about the time of the vernal equinox, with the month Abib; and (2) according to a civil calendar, in which the year began about the time of the autumnal equinox, with the month Nisan. The month Tisri is now the beginning of the Jewish year.