 |
Bringing in the New Year Happy New year, from all of us at Medieval Collectibles. Of course, the New Year seems like quite the obvious holiday, but throughout the ages, it has experienced quite a few changes. Today's informative newsletter is all about the New Year, and the changes it has made, starting with when it was first celebrated. The Very First New Year Celebrations Some of the earliest New Year celebrations are reported to have occurred in ancient Mesopotamia, circa 2000 B.C. These celebrations were held around the vernal equinox, which occurs sometime around mid-March. The vernal equinox generally marks the beginning of spring and the end of winter, thus making it the point that planting would begin. So older cultures very likely marked the beginning of the year with the beginning of their planting season! Other cultures used other dates to mark their New Year celebrations. The Egyptians, Phoenicians, and Persians all began their new year on the autumnal equinox, which occurs in September and likely begins harvest season. And the Greeks celebrated the beginning of their new year on the winter solstice, right when winter begins (in mythology, this corresponds to when the Earth is barren, as Demeter morns the loss of her daughter Persephone, who will return in about 3-4 months to begin spring). |
|
| | | |
|
The Roman Change-Up Originally, the Roman New Year started on March 1. An interesting fact is that January and February, as months, did not even exist up to a certain point. The Romans used a 10 month calendar, and the first two months were created sometime around 700 B.C., when Roman king Numa Pontilius (the second king of Rome) added the two months. The reason for the beginning of the New Year being moved was a simple and political one: Roman consuls, the highest officials in the Roman Republic, took office in January. This, the move made tracking their one-year tenure easy. The date wasn't enforced, though, and so many New Year celebrations remained on March 1. In 46 B.C., Julius Caesar changed that. A new, solar based calendar was introduced (the ancient Roman one being lunar-based), and the start of the New Year was officially changed to January 1. This became known as the "Julian calendar", and within the Roman world, January 1 became the commonly celebrated start of the New Year. |
|
| | | |
|
A Bit of Medieval Confusion The biggest change to the New Year came in 567. For some reason, celebrations of the new year in medieval Europe were viewed as pagan and unchristian-like, and in that year, the Council of Tours (a religious body that made important decisions regarding the church), made a decree that abolished January 1 as the beginning of the year (and in doing so, removed the celebrations that were viewed as "pagan"). After that, New Year celebrations varied. At various points, it was celebrated on Dec. 25, on March 1, on March 25, and after another Council of Tours in 755, on Easter. Still, March 1 remained a popular date, and it remained the start of the New Year for quite some time. |
|
Black Templar Knight Ball Point Pen View Item | | |
|
The New Year, When We Know It And then, in 1582, the Gregorian calendar was approved by papal bull. Initially issued to help correct holiday dates in regards to Easter (and other Christian holidays), this calendar set January 1 as the start of the New Year. The funny thing about this is that while Catholic countries accepted this calendar almost immediately, Protestant countries did not, and this made the spread of what is today's current calendar somewhat slow. An example of this is the British: they did not accept the Gregorian calendar until 1752 (200 years later), and thus, they, their Empire, and by extension, the American Colonies continued to celebrate the beginning of the new year in March! The Resolution And now you've got some history to go with the holiday. As a bonus, here's a fun fact to wrap the whole thing up. The act of making a resolution goes back thousands of years. Babylonians made oaths to their gods on New Year's Day to pay debts and returned borrowed objects. Romans made promises to the god Janus, who presided over beginnings and transitions, on New Year's Day. And knights, in the medieval era, were said to take a "peacock vow" at the end of the Christmas season to re-affirm their commitment to chivalry. |
|
| Help Box | Popular Categories | What's New | | |
|
No comments:
Post a Comment
Keep a civil tongue.