February 29, 1288

According to legend, St. Brigid of Kildare once complained to St. Patrick that it was unfair that a woman could not propose, therefore the two struck a deal marking February 29, leap day, as the date when a woman could propose to a man. The tradition has held in Ireland and much of the British Isles. The first documentation of this tradition was seen in 1288, when a law was supposedly passed by Queen Margaret of Scotland which required that the man pay a fine if he refused the woman’s leap day proposal. The 2010 movie Leap Year, set in Ireland and starring Amy Adams and Matthew Goode, is based on this same tradition.