diff --git a/collects/scribblings/reference/time.scrbl b/collects/scribblings/reference/time.scrbl
index ac484daaa8..ca72c8637b 100644
--- a/collects/scribblings/reference/time.scrbl
+++ b/collects/scribblings/reference/time.scrbl
@@ -33,7 +33,7 @@ portability is needed.}
                  [hour (integer-in 0 23)]
                  [day (integer-in 1 31)]
                  [month (integer-in 1 12)]
-                 [year exact-nonnegative-integer?]
+                 [year exact-integer?]
                  [week-day (integer-in 0 6)]
                  [year-day (integer-in 0 365)]
                  [dst? boolean?]
diff --git a/src/mzscheme/src/struct.c b/src/mzscheme/src/struct.c
index 1f0472e9a7..8c0c3d0753 100644
--- a/src/mzscheme/src/struct.c
+++ b/src/mzscheme/src/struct.c
@@ -3694,9 +3694,8 @@ static Scheme_Object *check_date_fields(int argc, Scheme_Object **argv)
   if (!SCHEME_INTP(a) || (SCHEME_INT_VAL(a) < 1) || (SCHEME_INT_VAL(a) > 12))
     scheme_wrong_field_type(argv[10], "integer in [1, 12]", a);
   a = argv[5];
-  if ((!SCHEME_INTP(a) || (SCHEME_INT_VAL(a) < 0))
-      && (!SCHEME_BIGNUMP(a) || !SCHEME_BIGPOS(a)))
-    scheme_wrong_field_type(argv[10], "nonnegative exact integer", a);
+  if (!SCHEME_INTP(a) && !SCHEME_BIGNUMP(a))
+    scheme_wrong_field_type(argv[10], "exact integer", a);
   a = argv[6];
   if (!SCHEME_INTP(a) || (SCHEME_INT_VAL(a) < 0) || (SCHEME_INT_VAL(a) > 6))
     scheme_wrong_field_type(argv[10], "integer in [0, 6]", a);