Editing Lady Day

{{Short description|Feast of the Annunciation, usually 25 March}}
{{About|a religious festival|the jazz singer|Billie Holiday|other uses|Lady Day (disambiguation)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=February 2020}}
{{Infobox holiday
|holiday_name  = Lady Day
|official_name = [[Feast of the Annunciation]]
|type          =  Religious, with later secular effects
|image         = Annunciation (Leonardo) (cropped).jpg
|imagesize  =350px
|caption       = ''The Annunciation'' c. 1472<br>[[Leonardo da Vinci]] (1472–1475)<br>[[Uffizi Gallery]]
|observedby    = [[English-speaking people|Anglophone]] and [[Scandinavian people|Scandinavian]] Christians internationally
|date          = 25 March
|celebrations  = 
|observances   = 
|relatedto     = [[Christmas]], [[March equinox]]
|frequency     = Annual
|duration      = 1 day
}}

In the Western [[liturgical year]], '''Lady Day''' is the common name in some English-speaking and Scandinavian countries{{clarify|date=February 2025}} of the [[Feast of the Annunciation]], celebrated on 25 March to commemorate the [[annunciation]] of the [[archangel]] [[Gabriel]] to the [[Virgin Mary]] that she would bear [[Jesus Christ]], the [[Son of God]].

==Religious significance==
The commemorated event is known in the [[Book of Common Prayer (1549)|1549 prayer book]] of [[Edward VI]] and the [[Book of Common Prayer (1662)|1662 ''Book of Common Prayer'']] as "The Annunciation of the (Blessed) Virgin Mary" but more accurately (as in the modern Calendar of the [[Church of England]]) termed "The Annunciation of our Lord to the Blessed Virgin Mary". It is the first of the four traditional English [[quarter days]]. The "(Our) Lady" is the [[Virgin Mary]]. The term derives from [[Middle English]], when some nouns lost their [[genitive]] inflections. "Lady" would later gain an -s genitive ending, and therefore the name means "(Our) Lady's day". The day commemorates the tradition of archangel [[Gabriel]]'s announcement to Mary that she would give birth to the [[Christ]].

It is celebrated on 25 March each year. In the [[Catholic Church]]'s [[Latin liturgical rites]], when 25 March falls during [[Holy Week]] or [[Easter week]], it is transferred forward to the first suitable day during [[Eastertide]].<ref>{{Cite web|title=BBC - Religions - Christianity: The Feast of the Annunciation|url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/christianity/holydays/annunciation.shtml|access-date=2020-07-03|website=www.bbc.co.uk|language=en-GB}}</ref> In [[Eastern Orthodoxy]] and [[Eastern Catholicism]], it is never transferred, even if it falls on Pascha ([[Easter]]). The concurrence of these two feasts is called [[kyriopascha]].

The Feast of the Annunciation is observed almost universally throughout Christianity, especially within [[Eastern Orthodox Church|Orthodoxy]], [[Anglicanism]], [[Catholicism]], and [[Lutheranism]].<ref name="Melton2011">{{cite book|last=Melton|first=J. Gordon|title=Religious Celebrations: An Encyclopedia of Holidays, Festivals, Solemn Observances, and Spiritual Commemorations |url=https://archive.org/details/religiouscelebra00melt|url-access=limited|date=13 September 2011|publisher=ABC-CLIO|language=English |isbn=9781598842067|page=[https://archive.org/details/religiouscelebra00melt/page/n64 39]}}</ref> It is a major [[Veneration of Mary|Marian]] feast, classified as a [[solemnity]] in the [[Catholic Church]], a [[Liturgical calendar (Lutheran)#Festivals|Festival]] in the Lutheran Churches, and a [[Principal Feast]] in the [[Anglican Communion]]. In [[Eastern Orthodox Church|Orthodox Christianity]], because it announces the [[Incarnation (Christianity)|incarnation]] of Christ, it is counted as one of the 8 great feasts of the Lord, and not among the four great [[Marian feast days|Marian feasts]], although some prominent aspects of its liturgical observance are Marian.<ref>[http://www.ewtn.com/library/FAMILY/MARCH25.TXT Feast of the Annunciation at EWTN]</ref><ref>[[Annunciation#Eastern Christianity]]</ref>{{Better source needed|reason=per WP:CIRCULAR|date=February 2018}} Two examples in liturgical Christianity of the importance attached to the Annunciation are the [[Angelus]] prayer and, especially in Roman Catholicism, the event's position as the first [[Rosary#Mysteries of the Rosary|Joyful Mystery]] of the [[Dominican Rosary]].<ref name="cna">n.d. [http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/saint.php?n=188 "Solemity of the Annunciation of the Lord,"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130326064517/http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/saint.php?n=188 |date=26 March 2013 }} ''Catholic News Agency''. Retrieved 26 May 2019.</ref>

==Secular significance==
{{see also|History of taxation in the United Kingdom#Start of tax year}}
In England, Lady Day was [[New Year's Day]] (i.e., the new year began on 25 March) from 1155<ref name="Cath">Catholic Encyclopedia, [http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03738a.htm#beginning General Chronology (Beginning of the Year)]</ref> until 1752, when the [[Calendar (New Style) Act 1750|Gregorian calendar was adopted in Great Britain and its Empire]] and with it the first of January as the official start of the year in England, Wales and Ireland.<ref name="Cath" /> (Scotland changed its new year's day to 1 January in 1600, but retained the Julian calendar until 1752.) A vestige of this remains in the United Kingdom's [[Fiscal year|tax year]], which ends on 5 April, or "Old Lady Day" (i.e., Lady Day adjusted for the eleven "lost days" of the calendar change in 1752). Until this change Lady Day had been used as the start of the legal year but also the [[History of taxation in the United Kingdom#Start of tax year|end of the fiscal and tax year]]. This should be distinguished from the liturgical and historical year.

As a year-end and [[Quarter days|quarter-day]] that conveniently did not fall within or between the seasons for ploughing and harvesting, Lady Day was a traditional day on which year-long contracts between landowners and [[tenant farmer]]s would begin and end in England and nearby lands (although there were regional variations). Farmers' time of "entry" into new farms and onto new fields was often this day.<ref>Adams, Leonard P. ''Agricultural Depression and Farm Relief in England, 1813–1852''. Reviewed in ''[[Journal of the Royal Statistical Society]]'', 95(4):735–737 (1932).</ref><ref>"The Tenant League v. Common Sense". ''Irish Quarterly Review'' 1(1):25–45 (March 1851)</ref> As a result, farming families who were changing farms would travel from the old farm to the new one on Lady Day. In 1752, the British empire finally followed most of western Europe in [[adoption of the Gregorian calendar|switching to the Gregorian calendar]] from the Julian calendar. The Julian lagged 11 days behind the Gregorian, and hence 25 March in the Old Style calendar became 5 April ("Old Lady Day"), which assumed the role of contractual year-beginning. (The date is significant in some of the works of [[Thomas Hardy]], such as ''[[Tess of the d'Urbervilles]]'' and ''[[Far from the Madding Crowd]]'', and is discussed in his 1884 essay "The Dorset Farm Labourer".)

==See also==
* {{Annotated link |International Women's Day}}
* {{Annotated link |Mother's Day}}
* {{Annotated link |Mothering Sunday}}
* {{Annotated link |National Women's Day}}
* {{Annotated link |Quarter days}}, one of which is (or was) Lady Day

==References==
{{Reflist}}

{{Authority control}}

[[Category:March observances]]
[[Category:April observances]]
[[Category:August observances]]
[[Category:Saints' days|Lady]]
[[Category:Holidays in England]]
[[Category:Quarter days]]