Autumn (also known as Fall in North American English) is one of the four temperate seasons. Autumn marks the transition from summer into winter. In the northern hemisphere, the start of autumn is generally considered to be around September and in the southern hemisphere, its beginning is considered to be around March. There exists however a number of different definitions of autumn some of which are based on the months of the year while others are based on the equinox and solstice.Glossary of Meteorology (from the American Meteorological Society)

Around this time, deciduous trees shed their leaves, with the leaves changing to a reddish or brownish hue before falling. Such coloured leaves have come to be colloquially called ''"fall foliage"''. In the temperate zones, autumn is the season during which most crops are harvested, and deciduous trees lose their leaves. It is also the season during which days get shorter and cooler, the nights get longer, and precipitation gradually increases (in some parts of the world).

The word 'autumn' is derived from the French word "automne", and became popular in usage for the season since the 16th century. The North American name for the season, 'fall', probably derived as a contraction of the phrase "fall of the leaves", and since became used interchangeably.

Definitions

Astronomically, some Western countries consider autumn to begin with the autumnal equinox (around September 23 in the northern hemisphere and March 21 in the southern hemisphere) and end with the winter solstice (around December 21 in the northern hemisphere and June 21 in the southern hemisphere). Such conventions are by no means universal, however. In Chinese astronomy, for example, the autumnal equinox marks the middle of autumn, which is deemed to have begun around the time of Liqiu (around August 7).

Other definitions are based on counting entire months. Meteorologists, for example, count March, April and May in the southern hemisphere, and September, October and November in the northern hemisphere as autumn, while in the Irish Calendar, which still follows the Celtic cycle, autumn is counted as the whole months of August, September and October.

Although the days begin to shorten after the summer solstice, it is usually in September (northern hemisphere) or March (southern hemisphere) when twilight becomes noticeably shorter and the change more abrupt in comparison with the more lingering ones of summer.

All of these definitions, as with those of the seasons generally, are somewhat flawed because they assume that the seasons are all of the same length, and begin and end at the same time throughout the temperate zone of each hemisphere.

Etymology

The word ''autumn'' comes from the Old French word ''autompne'' (''automne'' in modern French), and was later normalized to the original Latin word ''autumnus''.''Etymology of 'autumn' '' - New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, 1997 Edition There are rare examples of its use as early as the 14th century, but it became common only in the 16th, around the same time as ''fall'', and the two words appear to have been used interchangeably.

Before the 16th century ''harvest'' was the term usually used to refer to the season. However as more people gradually moved from working the land to living in towns (especially those who could read and write, the only people whose use of language we now know), the word ''harvest'' lost its reference to the time of year and came to refer only to the actual activity of reaping, and ''fall'' and ''autumn'' began to replace it as a reference to the season.

The alternative word ''fall'' is now mostly a North American English word for the season. It traces its origins to old Germanic languages. The exact derivation is unclear, the Old English ''fiæll'' or ''feallan'' and the Old Norse ''fall'' all being possible candidates. However, these words all have the meaning "to fall from a height" and are clearly derived either from a common root or from each other. The term only came to denote the season in the 16th century, a contraction of Middle English expressions like "fall of the leaf" and "fall of the year".

During the 17th century, English immigration to the colonies in North America was at its peak and the new settlers took their language with them. While the term ''fall'' gradually obsolesced in Britain, it became the more common term in North America, where ''autumn'' is nonetheless preferred in scientific and, often, literary contexts.

Historic usage

Many ancient civilizations (such as the Amerindians and the ancient Hebrews) computed the years by autumns,The Amerindians: Stars were... (from the ASTROLab, Mont-Mégantic National Park, Canada website)Multiple Calendars (from Brigham Young University website) while the Anglo-Saxons did so by winters. Tacitus tells us that the ancient Germans were acquainted with all the other seasons of the year, but had no notion of autumn — though this is likely to be wrong, especially as a blanket statement (Tacitus wrote about Germanic tribes without firsthand knowledge, and thus promoted myths as well as actual information). Linwood observed of the beginning of the several seasons of the year, that:
:''"Dat Clemens Hyemem, dat Petrus Ver Cathedratus;
:Aestuat Urbanus, Autumnat Bartholomaeus"''.http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/HistSciTech/HistSciTech-idx?type=turn&entity=HistSciTech000900240221&isize=L

In alchemy, autumn is the time or season when the operation of the Philosopher's stone is brought to maturity and perfection. It is also symbolised by the Metal element in Chinese astrology.

Harvest association

Autumn's association with the transition from warm to cold weather, and its related status as the season of the primary harvest, has dominated its themes and popular images. In Western cultures, personifications of autumn are usually pretty, well-fed females adorned with fruits, vegetables and grains and wheat that ripen at this time. Most ancient cultures featured autumnal celebrations of the harvest, often the most important on their calendars. Still extant echoes of these celebrations are found in the mid-autumn Thanksgiving holiday of the United States, and the Jewish Sukkot holiday with its roots as a full moon harvest festival of "tabernacles" (huts wherein the harvest was processed and which later gained religious significance). There's also the many North American Indian festivals tied to harvest of autumnally ripe foods gathered in the wild, the Chinese Mid-Autumn or Moon festival, and many others. The predominant mood of these autumnal celebrations is a gladness for the fruits of the earth mixed with a certain melancholy linked to the imminence of harsh weather.

This view is presented in Keats' poem ''To Autumn'' where he describes the season as a time of bounteous fecundity, a time of 'mellow fruitfulness'.

Melancholy association

Autumn in poetry has often been associated with melancholy. The possibilities of summer are gone, and the chill of winter is on the horizon. Skies turn grey, and people turn inward, both physically and mentally.Cyclical Regenerative Time - (c) Autumn (from 'Symbolism of Place', symbolism.org website) Rainer Maria Rilke, a famous German-language poet, has expressed such sentiments in one of his most famous poems, ''Herbsttag'' (''Autumn Day''), which reads in part:

:''Wer jetzt kein Haus hat, baut sich keines mehr.''
:''Wer jetzt allein ist, wird es lange bleiben,''
:''wird wachen, lesen, lange Briefe schreiben''
:''und wird in den Alleen hin und her''
:''unruhig wandern, wenn die Blätter treiben.''

This translates roughly (there is no official translation) to:

:''Who now has no house, will not build one (anymore).''
:''Who now is alone, will remain so for long,''
:''will wake, and read, and write long letters''
:''and back and forth on the boulevards''
:''will restlessly wander, while the leaves blow.''

Similar examples may be found in Yeats' poem ''The Wild Swans at Coole'' where the maturing season that the poet observes symbolically represents his own ageing self. Like the natural world that he observes he too has reached his prime and now must look forward to the inevitability of old age and death. Paul Verlaine's "''Chanson d'automne''" ("Autumn Song") is likewise characterized by strong, painful feelings of sorrow.

Other associations

In the US, autumn is also associated with the Halloween season (which in turn was influenced by Samhain, a Celtic autumn festival),Halloween (from the Microsoft Encarta encyclopedia) and with it a widespread marketing campaign that promotes it. The television, film, book, costume, home decoration, and confectionery industries use this time of year to promote products closely associated with such holiday, with promotions going from early September to 31 October, since their themes rapidly lose strength once the holiday ends, and advertising starts concentrating on Christmas.

Tourism

Although colour change in leaves occurs wherever deciduous trees are found, coloured autumn foliage is most famously noted in two regions of the world: most of Canada and the United States; and Eastern Asia, including China, Korea, and Japan. It can also be very significant in Australia and New Zealand, but not to the same degree.

Eastern Canada and the New England region of the United States are famous for the brilliance of their "fall foliage", and a seasonal tourist industry has grown up around the few weeks in autumn when the leaves are at their peak. Some television and web-based weather forecasts even report on the status of the fall foliage throughout the season as a service to tourists. Fall foliage tourists are often referred to as "leaf peepers" or simply "leafers". In the bushier parts of Victoria, Australia, foliage occurs significantly, and is also popular with tourists.