Klarinet Archive - Posting 000770.txt from 2000/06

From: "Edwin V. Lacy" <el2@-----.edu>
Subj: [kl] Re: Who is buried in Grant's tomb?
Date: Tue, 20 Jun 2000 00:03:40 -0400

Tony Wakefield wrote,

> Tag line - When does Christmas Day and New Years Day fall in the
> <same> year?>

Aside from the fact that this is one of those well-known trick questions,
for much of the first 1582 years (or more) of the Christian era, in many
parts of the world, New Year's Day always came in the same year as the
Christmas Day which preceded it by only a week. That's because in the
Julian calendar which was in effect, March 1 was considered the first day
of the year. Julius Caesar had actually decreed that the beginning of the
year should be changed from March 1 to January 1, but while the rest of
the calendar which was devised for him by the astronomer Sosigenes was
adopted, this provision was often ignored. That's why we sometimes still
see dates listed such as "February 15, 1675/76. (That refers to the date
which we would now call February 15, 1676. However, at that time, the new
year had not yet begun.) The Gregorian calendar was adopted immediately
by the Roman Catholic church, and by most of the Catholic countries of
Western Europe. However, it subsequently was adopted at different times
by other countries: some German states in 1700, Great Britain (and the
American colonies) in 1752, Russia in 1918 and Turkey in 1927.

Ed Lacy
el2@-----.edu

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