Year 2000 (
MM) was a
leap year starting on Saturday (link will display full 2000
Gregorian calendar). It is generally pronounced as "two thousand"; however, in keeping the tradition of previous centuries (
e.g. 1900s,
1800s) could also be referred to as "twenty hundred" since, mathematically speaking, 2000=
20×100. In the
Chinese Calendar, it is the
Year of the Dragon, and in the western
astrological calendar, it is the year of
Leo, the Lion. Popular culture also holds the year 2000 as the first year of the
twenty first century and the
third millennium. In the Gregorian Calendar, however, this distinction falls to the year
2001. This is because the first century began with the year 1 (there was no
year zero), the first century (or first 100 years AD) was from
January 1, in the year one (
AD 1) through
December 31, in the year one-hundred (AD 100). The second century began on
January 1, in the year one-hundred and one (101 AD). (The selection of AD 1 may be up to seven years from
Jesus' birth, and
January 1 is a historical choice for
New Year's Day.). The same reasoning applies to millenniums, where the first ends on the year one-thousand (
1000 AD).
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