Time Frame

• A fortnight is a measurement of time that is equal to the span of 14 days. It takes 336 hours for a fortnight to pass. In one year there are a little over 26 fortnights.
  
  

Geography

• Although rarely used in the United States, the fortnight is heard in Britain and countries that used to have a heavy British influence, such as India and Australia. Rather than use the term "biweekly," many people in those nations use fortnight, especially in regards to a pay period at work. There are portions of Canada that still employ the word.
  
  

Considerations

• Many countries do not have a word that corresponds to a fortnight. In Spain, Portugal and Italy they come close, with a word in each nation for a 15-day passage of time.The Greeks also have a word for the 15-day time frame, but the Arabs and the Hebrews simply have a term that in essence means two weeks.
  
  

Size

• There is an off-the-wall system of measurement that was invented to be a joke that uses a fortnight as a key component. The Furlong/Firkin/Fortnight system uses obscure and no-longer-in-use terms. A furlong is 660 feet and a firkin is an old English measurement that equals 90 pounds. The system has increments such as a microfortnight, which is 1.209 seconds.
  
  

History

• Fortnight is derived from the old English phrase "feowertiene niht." The English had borrowed the term from Germanic folks who had a habit of measuring time not in days but in nights. These people also had a term that describes seven nights--"seofon niht," contracted to form "sennight"--but it is hardly in usage even in Britain today.