Both the first day of winter and the shortest day of the year began early this morning, the morning of the winter solstice.  The word solstice is relatively old in English, dating back to the 13th century.  Solstice derives from the Latin word solstitium meaning very literally the point at which the sun stands still, a combination of the words sol meaning sun and the past participial stem of sistere meaning to come to a stop, make stand still.  Celebrated thoughout history as either a secular or religious day, the solstice marks the point on the ecliptic when the Northern Hemisphere is pointed most away from the sun and therefore has the shortest day. 

Image of solstices and equinoxes courtesy NASA.  Meme of ‘axial tilt’ authorship unknown.

Today’s post is for my B.  Happy First Day of Winter, B!