Anniversary
Webster's Dictionary [1]
(1): (a.) Returning with the year, at a stated time; annual; yearly; as, an anniversary feast.
(2): (n.) The annual return of the day on which any notable event took place, or is wont to be celebrated; as, the anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
(3): (n.) The day on which Mass is said yearly for the soul of a deceased person; the commemoration of some sacred event, as the dedication of a church or the consecration of a pope.
(4): (n.) The celebration which takes place on an anniversary day.
Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature [2]
in the Greek and Romish Churches, a name given to the day on which a martyr or saint is commemorated. Also, those days on which special prayer is made, year by year, for the souls of deceased persons, and masses said and alms distributed, are in the Romish Church called anniversaries. The anniversary office (officium anniversarium) is a double office, said only on the first anniversary day after the death. On all succeeding anniversary days, the simple office is said, as in the daily office for the dead.Landon, Eccl. Dict. s.v.
