summer

Geographic

2022

We explain what summer is and the main characteristics of this annual season. Also, the seasons into which the year is divided.

Summer is linked to the harvest and the holiday period.

What is summer

Summer is one of the four climatic seasons of the temperate zones: the warmest of them, which takes place between the spring and fall. It is a season linked to the harvest (although this depends on the type of seeds sown) and the holiday period, since in many regions the population run away from heat overwhelming towards cooler latitudes.

Summer it takes place from June to August in the Northern Hemisphere and from December to February in the Southern Hemisphere. However, these limits are not always exact. The season generally begins with the solstice summer (June 21 in the northern hemisphere and December 21 in the southern hemisphere) and ends in the equinox fall (September 22 in the northern hemisphere and March 21 in the southern hemisphere).

The term summer is also frequently used to refer to all the warm seasons and winter to the cold ones. In the intertropical zone, similarly, it is usual to refer to the dry season by summer and the rainy season by winter.

In the western imaginary, summer is associated with Sun, with the vintage, the abundance and the adulthood of the human being. Ancient civilizations used to worship their solar gods during the solstice, since these used to be the main ones of their mythologies.

For example, in Assyrian mythology, the death of the god Baal at the hands of his brother Mot caused the advent of drought, that is, of summer. In the Greek mythologySimilarly, this season was personified by Carpus, one of the Hours, goddess of the fruits of heat and daughter of Breeze, one of the names of the god of the west wind, Zephyr.

In later Roman representations the summer was represented as a maiden crowned with golden ears of corn and holding a torch; or like a stocky young man holding the horn of plenty (cornucopia) over his man.

Summer features

Summer is the warmest season of the year.

Summer is the season characterized by the greatest intensity of heat and the sun (since the region of the planet receives direct solar rays), which is why droughts also occur. It is not uncommon, however, for summer storms to occur, especially in the humid regions of the planet.

On the other hand, the days in summer become longer, with greater duration and light intensity, unlike what happens in winter. The nights, therefore, become shorter and the morning rises earlier.

Seasons

In temperate regions the seasons are well defined.

As is well known, the year in temperate regions is divided climatically into four defined seasons: spring, summer, autumn and winter. The first two are the warmest and most flowering of the plant life, in which the day lasts longer and is brighter. The last two, on the other hand, are darker, colder and in certain regions characterized by frost, snow or freezing.

This repetitive cycle every year led human civilizations to understand the world as an eternal and repetitive cycle, in which life dies and is reborn and dies and is reborn again.

In accordance with their respective mythologies, this cycle of four successive periods was imagined as a constant battle between divine or mythical forces, as is the case of the arrangement between the Greek deities Hades and Demeter by the company of Persephone, wife of the former and daughter of the second.

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