Dec 30, 2008

New Years History :o)

Ancient New Years

The celebration of the New Year is the oldest of all holidays. It was first observed in ancient Babylon about 4000 years ago. In the years around 2000 BC, Babylonians celebrated the beginning of a new year on what is now March 23, although they themselves had no written calendar.

Late March actually is a logical choice for the beginning of a new year. It is the time of year that spring begins and new crops are planted. January 1, on the other hand, has no astronomical nor agricultural significance. It is purely arbitrary.

The Babylonian New Year celebration lasted for eleven days. Each day had its own particular mode of celebration, but it is safe to say that modern New Year's Eve festivities pale in comparison.

The Romans continued to observe the New Year on March 25, but their calendar was continually tampered with by various emperors so that the calendar soon became out of synchronization with the sun. In order to set the calendar right, the Roman senate, in 153 BC, declared January 1 to be the beginning of the New Year.

But tampering continued until Julius Caesar, in 46 BC, established what has come to be known as the Julian Calendar. It again established January 1 as the New Year. But in order to synchronize the calendar with the sun, Caesar had to let the previous year drag on for 445 days.

The History of New Year's Resolutions (See Yesterday's Post about Resolutions)

The tradition of the New Year's Resolutions goes all the way back to 153 B.C. Janus, a mythical king of early Rome was placed at the head of the calendar.

With two faces, Janus could look back on past events and forward to the future. Janus became the ancient symbol for resolutions and many Romans looked for forgiveness from their enemies and also exchanged gifts before the beginning of each year.

The Romans named the first month of the year after Janus, the god of beginnings and the guardian of doors and entrances. He was always depicted with two faces, one on the front of his head and one on the back. Thus he could look backward and forward at the same time. At midnight on December 31, the Romans imagined Janus looking back at the old year and forward to the new. The Romans began a tradition of exchanging gifts on New Year's Eve by giving one another branches from sacred trees for good fortune. Later, nuts or coins imprinted with the god Janus became more common New Year's gifts.

In the Middle Ages, Christians changed New Year's Day to December 25, the birth of Jesus. Then they changed it to March 25, a holiday called the Annunciation. In the sixteenth century, Pope Gregory XIII revised the Julian calendar, and the celebration of the New Year was returned to January 1.

The Julian and Gregorian calendars are solar calendars. Some cultures have lunar calendars, however. A year in a lunar calendar is less than 365 days because the months are based on the phases of the moon. The Chinese use a lunar calendar. Their new year begins at the time of the first full moon (over the Far East) after the sun enters Aquarius- sometime between January 19 and February 21.

Although the date for New Year's Day is not the same in every culture, it is always a time for celebration and for customs to ensure good luck in the coming year.

Tomorrow: Auld Lang Syne

8 comments:

  1. Cool that you included Janus! I always loved that bit of mythology, of Janus having two faces, one looking forward and one back. It's a very apt analogy for leaving one year behind as we look forward to the new one.

    B.

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  2. I liked that you noted that in ALL cultures, a new year symbolizes the same thing.

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  3. I like to watch how the rest of the world rings in the new year. Seems at least one day of the year we have something in common.

    Looking forward to hearing about Auld Lang Syne as I have no idea how that came to be.

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  4. How nice that you thought to give us some history. Like Lisa, I like to check out the whole world as they usher in the New Year.
    Hugs, Joyce

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  5. As usual, Ken, you are a wealth of information. Interesting!

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  6. That was very interesting...thanks!

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  7. Ken, did you hear about Osama bin Laden's New Year's resolution? It's "From now on no more Mr. Nice Guy."

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  8. my employer's fiscal year ends on 1/31 of every year so that is the date i always think of because if our store made no $, we get no bonus! Very interesting entry about the history.

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