We get used to writing Sunday or July with a capital letter. And naturally, we also want to capitalize any other periods of time. But is that really so? Let us find out in the article. After all, we often use the names of seasons in written language.
Should Seasons be Capitalized?
Many American schoolchildren doubt whether to capitalize seasons or not. In general, the names of seasons are common nouns. And because of this, they follow the rules of writing caps for common nouns.
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So the basic rule is that the names of seasons are written with a lowercase letter. If we turn to the etymology of these words, we will reveal that they all came from the common names. Let us take a closer look at them.
- The word "spring" in its current form began to be used since the 16th century, and the basis for this was "springing" from under the ground, that plants usually do in spring.
- Just as the name "fall" comes from an association with falling leaves.
- The noun "summer" has even deeper roots that stretch back to the Proto-Indo-European period. In particular, from the root "sem-", which means "together/one".
- And in the origin of "winter" philologists define two options – the Proto-Indo-European root "wed-", that is "wet" and "wind-", that is "white".
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When to Сapitalize Seasons?
Any rule has its exceptions.
- If the name of one of the seasons is part of the proper noun:
- personal name or surname: Jessica Spring;
- nicknames of a person or character: Sam the Seeker of Summer Adventures. Is summer capitalized here? Of course, yes.
- titles of planned events, festivals and other occasions: Winter Olympic Games, Parade of Winter Figures, event "The First Spring Exhibition of Mosaics";
- geographical names: Summer Street, Spring Rainbow Village;
- titles of works of art: paintings, books, songs, sculptures etc.: the novel "Tears of Fall";
- names of organizations, institutions, social movements: Summer Language Camp;
- names of holidays: Spring Day.
- Names of seasons in headlines: Spring Bank Holidays in Britain, Summer Breaks UK.
- When seasons are personified, most often in poetry: Winter sighs; The Iron Hand of Fall; Hello, Summer! Hello, Sun!
Grammatical rules are best understood and accepted with the help of an English tutor. Then you will have no doubts or questions. It is also good to practice pronunciation and conversational skills during individual classes.