Date and time notation in Spain
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InSpain,date notationfollows the DD/MM/YYYY format.Time notationdepends on the level of formality and varies in written and spoken formats. Official time is given using the24-hour clock,and the12-hour clockis often used in informal speech.
Date
[edit]"Seis de diciembre de mil novecientos setenta y ocho"(formal, legal)
"Seis de diciembre del setenta y ocho"(informal, two-digit year abbreviation)
6 December 1978, date of the1978 Spanish constitutional referendum
In Spain, thedate orderis invariably day, month, year. In abbreviated notation,Roman numeralsare sometimes used to represent months. Aslash,ahyphenor occasionally afull stopcan be used to separate the units of time.
Years are often notated in two-digit format in mainly informal contexts where this would not cause confusion, such as handwritten letters, notes or diaries. Official documents, however, always include all four digits.
InSpanish,the suffixes for BC and AD are "AC" (antes de Cristo,"before Christ" ) and "DC" (después de Cristo,"after Christ" ), respectively. "AD" for "Anno Domini"in Latin is sometimes used instead of" DC ", but it is rare." DC "is commonly omitted for years after 200 AD.
Leading zeroesare rare, and are more frequently used in the months column:21/04/1980to allow for consistency in a tabular format. The format02/04/1980is more commonplace in automated output, such as tickets, forms, etc.
Names of months and weekdays are written in lower case, as they are consideredcommon nounsrather thanproper nouns,except at the start of a sentence, when they are capitalized following the regular rules of Spanish. Exceptions include some specificCatholicholy dates,such asMiércoles de Ceniza( "Ash Wednesday") orDomingo de Resurrección( "Resurrection Sunday"), which are always written in upper case letters.
In Spanish,abbreviationsof month names are usually three letters long, to avoid confusion betweenmarzo(March) andmayo(May), and betweenjunio(June) andjulio(July).
In Spain, the week runs from Monday to Sunday. The Spanish language also has an established convention for days of the week using one letter. These are:L–lunes(Monday);M–martes(Tuesday);X–miércoles(Wednesday);J–jueves(Thursday);V–viernes(Friday),S–sábado(Saturday); andD–domingo(Sunday). Each day of the week is written using its first letter except Wednesday, which is represented by the letterXin order to avoid confusion betweenmartes(Tuesday) andmiércoles(Wednesday), which both begin with anm.Some public vehicles, such astaxicabs,attach a letter to their vehicle to denote the driver's weekly day off.
Time
[edit]| Common names for hours inSpanish | ||
|---|---|---|
| Time | Hour name | Common suffix |
| 00:00 | Las doce | de la noche |
| 01:00 | La una | de la madrugada |
| 05:00 | Las cinco | |
| 06:00 | Las seis | de la mañana |
| 11:00 | Las once | |
| 12:00 | Las doce | del mediodía |
| 13:00 | La una | de la tarde |
| 20:00 | Las ocho | |
| 21:00 | Las nueve | de la noche |
| 23:00 | Las once | |
Official time is always given in 24-hour format. A full stop was originally used to separate the hours and minutes (18.20). Whilst this method is still in use in some areas such as the press, thecolonis preferred in most modern usage (18:20). The use of leading zeroes to mark the hour is optional (these zeroes are most commonly found in situations involving automation), but leading zeroes must be used to mark minutes and seconds, if seconds are included at all (e. g., 08:09:07). In speech, a time given in 24-hour format is always followed by the wordhoras:el concierto comenzará a las 15:30 "quince y treinta" horas( "the concert will start at 15:30" ).
Fractional secondsare given indecimalnotation, with punctuation marks used to separate the units of time (full stop,commaorsingle quotation marks). For elapsed time, the letter "h" represents 'hours', a single quotation mark (') represents 'minutes' and a double quotation mark ( ") represents seconds: 8h 7' 46" means "eight hours, seven minutes and forty-six seconds have elapsed". In this instance, leading zeroes are not used. The letters "m" and "s" are occasionally used to denote minutes and seconds instead of the quotation marks: 8h 7m 46s.
| Common names for minutes inSpanish | ||
|---|---|---|
| Time | Hour name | Common minutes name |
| 00:00 | Las doce | en punto |
| 00:05 | y cinco | |
| 00:10 | y diez | |
| 00:15 | y cuarto | |
| 00:20 | y veinte | |
| 00:25 | y veinticinco | |
| 00:30 | y media | |
| 00:35 | La una | menos veinticinco |
| 00:40 | menos veinte | |
| 00:45 | menos cuarto | |
| 00:50 | menos diez | |
| 00:55 | menos cinco | |
In commonspoken language,times are given using the12-hour clock.After midnight, hours are labeledde la madrugada( "in the early morning" ), which is used exclusively beforesunrise,andde la mañana( "in the morning" ), which can be used either before or after sunrise. Times after 12 noon are labeledde la tarde( "in the afternoon" ) beforesunsetandde la noche( "at night" ) after sunset. The system for minutes is similar to the one used in theEnglish language,with hours expressed first, followed by minutes. The wordy( "and" ) is used to denote minutespastorafterthe hour (e.g.las cinco y diezfor "ten minutes past five" ). If more than thirty minutes have elapsed since the last full hour, minutestothe hour are expressed using the wordmenos( "minus" ) (e.g.las diez menos cinco;"five minutes to ten" ). As in English, the clock face is also split into four quarters: times exactly on the hour are expressed usingen punto( "o'clock" ); "quarter past" or "quarter after" is expressed using the phrasey cuarto;a time thirty minutes past the hour is expressed using the phrasey media( "half past" or "-thirty" ); and a time 15 minutes before the hour is expressed usingmenos cuarto( "quarter to" ).
There are no traditional suffixes forante meridiemandpost meridiemin Spanish; "AM" and "PM" are used when writing the time in the12-hour format,in any of their variations: "A.M./P.M.", "a.m./p.m.", "AM/PM", "am/pm", "a/p" etc. The suffix forante meridiemis often omitted completely.
References
[edit]- https://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/SSEPGG_11.5.0/com.ibm.db2.luw.admin.nls.doc/doc/r0004572.html
- Diccionario panhispánico de dudas. Author - Real Academia Española.; Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española. Publisher - Real Academia Española 2005.