autumn equinox
1
6.1
- noun
- /ˈɔːtəm ˈiːkwɪnɒks/
:
equinoccio de otoño
- During the autumn equinox, day and night are of roughly equal length.
Examples
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The decrease has been so gradual that we barely noticed the almost imperceptible shift, the subtle loss, until the autumn equinox when the light of the day and the dark of the night were of the same duration.
Blog text (18) -
If you do not find Zed's firstborn by the time of the autumn equinox, life in this world shall cease to exist.
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Twice each year, at the spring and autumn equinox, the King selects a new victim - virgins.
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The autumn equinox occurs on September 23, marking the start of autumn.
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Many cultures celebrate the autumn equinox as a time of balance and harvest.
Synonyms
15
7.4
A time twice a year when day and night are about the same length
1
7.4
The time in autumn when day and night are about equal
The time when day and night are almost the same length, marking the start of autumn in the Northern Hemisphere
A time in late September when day and night are about equal, marking autumn north and spring south
The time when autumn begins
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase is a straightforward noun–noun combination: an 'equinox' that occurs in 'autumn', so its meaning (the equinox marking the start of autumn with roughly equal day and night) is directly derivable from the constituents. This compositional pattern is cross-linguistically common (e.g. Spanish 'equinoccio de otoño'), so a learner who knows both words would readily understand it.
Etymology
Autumn equinox is the moment each year when the sun sits over Earth's middle line, so day and night are about the same length. People long ago used that clear change in light to mark the 'start of autumn', so the term means the first day of autumn.