Why is Leap Day in February? Why not during summer?

So we all know why Leap Year happens in the first place, right? Basically, during the course of a year, the Earth revolves 365 days and 6 hours (5 hours, 48 minutes, 45 seconds to be exact). To compensate for the 6 hours, an extra day is counted every 4 years. But why does it have to be in February? Why can’t we have an extra day during the summer?

Well, in order to answer this, we have to look back at history.

Benjamin Gold, Astronomy and Physics Professor at Hamline University, tells us in a CBS Minnesota interview that it started with the Romans. The Romans despised the long winter and considered it to an unlucky time of the yaer. So they didn’t even want to count it. Back in the 8th century BC, the Romans had a calendar that was just 10 months long. Obviously, it didn’t work out very well for them.

The Romans then added two more months, Ianuarius and Februarius, leaving February as the leftover month. When Julius Caesar took to the throne, he tweaked the calendar once again by adding Leap Day. It wasn’t perfect until 1582, when the Gregorian calendar was established.

Unfortunately, since the Sun and the Earth don’t care about our calendars, we can’t really have more sunshine by adding the Leap Day during the summer.

So there you have it! February is just a leftover month that nobody really wanted to begin with. As for the theories that Roman emperors stole days from February to add to the month names after them are probably a just a myth, historians say.