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I am looking for a proper single work term to describe one third of a calendar year. Trimester does not seem correct as it seems to refer to a period of three months (one third of a pregnancy or one third of an academic year).

tchrist
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Joe Kuemerle
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4 Answers4

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Tertile.

Daniel
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compman
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    +1 for the find, but if almost nobody knows the word, then almost nobody knows the word. Why use a word that most readers will have to look up in a dictionary to understand? "three months" is pretty succinct :) – e.James Apr 29 '11 at 20:39
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    I had a tertile once we used to feed it flies but it died. The end. – Robusto Apr 29 '11 at 21:10
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    @e.james: Erm... "three months" is pretty succinct, but "four months" is more like a third of a year. Not that I think much of tertile, which is really just a ridiculously uncommon high-falutin alternative to third. Would we seriously want to call a two-month span a sextile? I think not. – FumbleFingers Apr 29 '11 at 21:14
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    @FumbleFingers we use quartile all the time! – corsiKa Apr 29 '11 at 21:25
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    @glowcode: Back in the Old Country we're still connected to nature. A season does well enough for a generic 3-month term, when the exact start date and duration don't matter too much. If greater accuracy is needed (such as the billing period for my electicity), it's just "three-monthly". Quartiles are for socio-statisticians graphing off the top or bottom quarter to prove how unequal society is. – FumbleFingers Apr 29 '11 at 21:33
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    @glowcoder: DO you really use quartile for three months, rather than for order statistics? Season or trimester are rather more common, and 3 months even more so. – Henry Apr 29 '11 at 21:56
  • @Henry trimester does not mean three months, it means one third of a duration (the most typical of which happens to be pregnancy, with a duration of 9 months, making one third of the total duration happen to be three months.) I've often heard "quartile" figures in regard to business terminology. I'll grant that "quarterly" is more common, but I still do hear quartile from time to time. – corsiKa Apr 29 '11 at 22:10
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    @glowcoder: Trimester certainly does mean three months, from the Latin tres meaning three and menses meaning months. – Henry Apr 29 '11 at 22:17
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    In Italian we use "Trimester" (3), "Quadrimester" (4), "Semester" (6) pretty much commonly (if this expression makes any sense lol)... Although it depends on the situation, the moment I guess... – Alenanno Apr 29 '11 at 22:50
  • @Henry I stand corrected. I was also thinking "semester" was derived from "semi", not from "sex". I'll concede that point. I have, however, still heard quartile to refer to a period of time as opposed to a grouped range of data. I'll admit it was odd at first, but when in Rome... (Alenanno may have something to say about the whole "when in Rome" thing... :) – corsiKa Apr 29 '11 at 23:02
  • @FumbleFingers: Oops. Yes, I definitely meant four months. :) – e.James Apr 29 '11 at 23:11
  • @glowcoder and the others: well, "mester" is the part that means "month", so "semester" can't be derived from "semi", but instead from "sex" which means "six". What about that "when in Rome"? I couldn't get that part... – Alenanno Apr 29 '11 at 23:24
  • @Alenanno oh, well you know the saying "when in Rome, do as the Romans do" so, I just kind of went along with the definition assuming it was simply one I hadn't heard before. You said in an earlier comment you were Italian (or at least speak it.) It umm... it was just me being bad at humor :-) – corsiKa Apr 29 '11 at 23:29
  • @glowcoder: I couldn't get the joke eheh, I didn't know the saying either... Anyway, I'm Italian and, obviously, I speak it. :) (I said "WE use" so...) – Alenanno Apr 29 '11 at 23:31
  • @Henry - Quartile is regularly used in business, e.g. "Q2 results" is "2nd quartile results", or results for the months April to June. – Mark Booth Apr 30 '11 at 14:05
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    @Mark Booth: For April to June, I would say Quarter 2 results or the second quarter results and read Q2 acordingly. Google seems to agree with me: "2nd quartile results" is rare and seems to mean a little better than the middle of the distribution. – Henry Apr 30 '11 at 14:16
  • @Henry - Personally I expect it's just people trying be clever. *8') I do note though that most of those results are from UK or commonwealth countries, so it may be more common in UK business language than elsewhere. – Mark Booth Apr 30 '11 at 14:24
  • @Alenanno I love it that an Italian has never heard the "When in Rome" thing! You might find it interesting that the phrase first occurs (in Latin) in the writings of St. Ambrose in the 4th Century: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/when_in_Rome,_do_as_the_Romans_do – Cyberherbalist Oct 21 '14 at 00:25
  • How can I combine this with the word "annual"? Would it be "tertannual"? – Aaron Franke Oct 19 '23 at 00:30
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The term for a four month period is quadrimester. Quad = 4 mense= month

Sophia
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    You are correct, but it would be good if you backed this up with further references to help people, because it is not a word commonly used in today’s English. It comes from Latin quadrimestris, with the meaning you give it. The French spell it quadrimestre as the British do, but the Spanish spell this word cuatrimestre in their language, with the d>t change explained by influence of their word for four, cuatro. – tchrist Oct 21 '14 at 00:18
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    The french spell it quadrimestre, not quadrimester. Just like we say trimestre and not trimester – Amandine FAURILLOU Aug 25 '15 at 08:37
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There is a difference between a duration period of three months as in "trimester" and an event occurring every 3 months as in "quarterly". In the same vein you would have a quadrimester or tri-annually(which means three times a year; not every 3 months) both being correct in the right context.

Community
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Karen
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triannually, triannually ,1/3 of the year

s kanagaraj
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    You've written triannually twice. Could you please provide a quote or a reference to back up your suggestion. – Mari-Lou A May 13 '14 at 06:57
  • Triannual would be once every 3 years though, like how biannual is once every 2 years and semiannual is once every half year (aka twice per year). – Aaron Franke Oct 19 '23 at 00:31