page_title: Autumn
section_title: Etymology
hierarchical_section_title: Autumn / Etymology
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Wildpark, Dülmen, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland English: Wildpark, Dülmen, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany This image shows a heritage building in Germany, located in the North Rhine-Westphalian city Dülmen&#160;(no.&#160;61). This is a picture of the protected area listed at WDPA under the ID 555560857
context_page_description: Autumn, also known as fall in North American English, is one of the four temperate seasons. Autumn marks the transition from summer to winter, in September or March, when the duration of daylight becomes noticeably shorter and the temperature cools considerably. Day length decreases and night length increases as the season progresses until the Winter Solstice. One of its main features in temperate climates is the shedding of leaves from deciduous trees.
  Some cultures regard the autumnal equinox as "mid-autumn", while others with a longer temperature lag treat it as the start of autumn. Meteorologists use a definition based on Gregorian calendar months, with autumn being September, October, and November in the northern hemisphere, and March, April, and May in the southern hemisphere. Persians celebrate the beginning of the autumn as Mehregan to honor Mithra.
  In North America, autumn traditionally starts with the September equinox and ends with the winter solstice. Popular culture in the United States associates Labor Day, the first Monday in September, as the end of summer and the start of autumn; certain summer traditions, such as wearing white, are discouraged after that date.
context_section_description: The word autumn /ˈɔːtəm/ is derived from Latin autumnus, archaic auctumnus, possibly from the ancient Etruscan root autu- and has within it connotations of the passing of the year. Alternative etymologies include Proto-Indo-European *h₃ewǵ- (“cold”) or *h₂sows- (“dry”).
  After the Roman era, the word continued to be used as the Old French word autompne (automne in modern French) or autumpne in Middle English, and was later normalised to the original Latin. In the Medieval period, there are rare examples of its use as early as the 12th century, but by the 16th century, it was in common use.
  Before the 16th century, harvest was the term usually used to refer to the season, as it is common in other West Germanic languages to this day (cf. Dutch herfst, German Herbst and Scots hairst). However, as more people gradually moved from working the land to living in towns, the word harvest lost its reference to the time of year and came to refer only to the actual activity of reaping, and autumn, as well as fall, began to replace it as a reference to the season.
  The alternative word fall for the season traces its origins to old Germanic languages. The exact derivation is unclear, with the Old English fiæll or feallan and the Old Norse fall all being possible candidates. However, these words all have the meaning "to fall from a height" and are clearly derived either from a common root or from each other. The term came to denote the season in 16th-century England, a contraction of Middle English expressions like "fall of the leaf" and "fall of the year". Compare the origin of spring from "spring of the leaf" and "spring of the year".
  During the 17th century, English emigration to the British colonies in North America was at its peak, and the new settlers took the English language with them. While the term fall gradually became nearly obsolete in Britain, it became the more common term in North America.
  The name backend, a once common name for the season in Northern England, has today been largely replaced by the name autumn.
caption: Autumnal scene with yellow, orange and red leaves on trees and fallen on the ground
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