We're about to observe the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, and the government has chosen the official adjective, which has been endorsed by the media: semiquincentennial. Broken into its parts, this represents -centennial (100), -quin- (five), and semi -(half). In other words, half of 500 years.,
These word parts are borrowed from Latin, which forms the pool for all anniversary terms in English required for formal or academic use -- or, to be brutally honest, for impressing people with your erudition. Most other languages stick with words like observance, anniversary, celebration, and the like, preceded by the number: 250th anniversary. Perhaps if someone feels an urgent need for formality, quarter-millennial (1/4th of 1,000) is as far as they might go. In fact, the Romans themselves probably would have considered the long words as non-standard fabrications rather barbaric in nature.
Theoretically, there are other fabricated words or neologisms that could have been created to convey the same idea. Sestercentennial would be based on sesterce, an ancient Roman coin worth 2 and 1/2 units called asses, and centennial (100).
Another possibility would be bisesquicentennial, formed by combining -centennial (100), -sesqui- (1 and 1/2), and bis-(twice).
There are a few reasons why Latin is the go-to language for anniversary numbers. For centuries, Latin was the primary (and easier, though not exclusive), scholarly language. Its number system was thus more readily understandable. So Latin word parts seemed more natural for time and ceremonial observations. Greek tended to be the star for scientific terms. Think of kilometer, hexagon, and megaton.
If you wanted to construct a word for 250 from Greek word parts, it would be quite clunky. It might look like this: diakosiopentekontaetia. This would break down into -aetia (period of time), -pentakonta- (fifty), and diakosioi- (200).
I'm going to stick with 250th anniversary.
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