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Islamic Lunar (Hijri) Calendar
The lunar Islamic, or Hijri, calendar is made up of twelve months, with a new month beginning after sunset with the sighting of the crescent of the new moon. Each month is 29 or 30 days long, and this length may vary depending on the moon sighting. There are also different views amongst Muslims as to how to determine the first of the month. Factors include, for example, whether the moon must be sighted locally or if a sighting in another part of the world is relevant; and whether calculations can be used or whether an actual sighting is required. This sometimes means that Muslims may start the month of Ramadan, for example, or celebrate Eid (the first of the month of Shawwal) on different days.
Term Variants: anno hegirae, hijri calendar, islamic calendar, lunar calendar
How this term should be used
When referring to Hijri years, it is good practice to include the Gregorian calendar year alongside. An example of this would be “1445 AH/2023 CE”, where CE stands for ‘common era’.
The Islamic calendar is unlike the Gregorian calendar, which is based on the Earth’s movement around the Sun, and in which the number of days in each month is fixed.
While the Gregorian calendar is 365 days long (or 366 in leap years), the Hijri calendar has 354 or 355 days in total, meaning that the months rotate through the seasons over time, e.g. the month of Ramadan began on Sunday, 5 May in 2019, and on Friday, 24 April in 2020.
The name of the calendar, Hijri, comes from the Arabic “hijrah” meaning migration. While the 12 months of the calendar were in use in pre-Islam Arabia, their use was fluid, and years were not counted. Rather, historical events were used to refer to years, for example the Year of the Elephant (King Abraha from Yemen attempted to attack Makkah to seize control of the Ka’aba in this year, which was also the year the Prophet Muhammad was born), the Year of Sadness (the year the Muslims were banished to a barren valley outside Makkah, and the year that the Prophet’s uncle Abu Talib and wife Khadijah both passed away), and so on. It was not until after the death of the Prophet that his successors realised the need for accurate dates for record keeping, and decided to start the Islamic era from the time of the migration of the Muslims from Makkah to Madinah. This event, the Hijrah, therefore gave the era its name, the Hijri calendar. Years are notated as anno hegirae or AH. 1 AH equates to 622 CE.
The twelve months of the Islamic calendar are as follows:
- Muharram
- Safar
- Rabi’ al-Awwal
- Rabi’ al-Thani
- Jumada al-Awwal
- Jumada al-Thani
- Rajab
- Sha’ban
- Ramadan
- Shawwal
- Dhu Al-Qa’da
- Dhu Al-Hijjah