January 1st is the beginning of the year, but it was not always like that and even today it is not everywhere

The Babylonians are already celebrating

Welcoming the next year in early January, as is done in most of the world, is a relatively new phenomenon. This was not always the case.

It is believed that the New Year was welcomed festively already in Mesopotamia about 2 thousand years ago. m. Ave. me This took place around the spring equinox.

On the first new moon after the vernal equinox, the Babylonians used to celebrate The New Year is an 11-day holiday called Quitduring which a separate ceremony was held every day.

Other ancient cultures also used different dates related to the changing of the seasons. The Egyptians, Phoenicians and Persians started the next year on the autumnal equinox, while the Greeks celebrated on the winter solstice.

In the early in the Roman calendar there were only ten months and the year was 355 days long and began on March 1st. This is still reflected in the names of some months.

September-December – the current ninth-twelfth months, originally the seventh-tenth (septem Latin for “seven”, octo – “eight”, novem – “nine”, decem – “ten”, hence the names of these months in some languages, such as English – September, October, November, Decemberthey are called similarly in Italian, German, Russian).

Encyclopaedia Britannica states that for the current New Year in part we can thank you to the second king of Rome Only Pompiliu. During his reign (about 715-673 BC) it is said Calendar of the Roman Republic has been adjusted to make January the first month.

Then the civil year began, when the two newly elected Roman consuls, the highest officials of the Roman republic, began their one-year terms.

It used to be a good choice because January was named Johnin honor of the Roman god of beginnings, whose two faces allowed us to see both the future and the past, and March, the god of war March on behalf of Some sources claim that Numa invented the month of January in general, but there is evidence that it did not become the official start of the year until 153. Ave. me

The new ones were pushed back and forth

46 years old Ave. Emperor Julius Caesar introduced more changes in the 5th century BC, as the previously used lunar calendar became inaccurate over time, but January 1 remained the starting date of the year. As the Roman Empire expanded, so did this calendar.

Wikimedia Commons photo/Julius Caesar

However, in the 5th century after the fall of the Roman Empire, many Christian countries adapted the calendar to reflect religion more. There were holidays related to the New Year are considered pagan and non-Christian, therefore in 567 The meeting of the tour canceled the 1st of January. like the beginning of the year.

In medieval Christian Europe, in various periods and places, the new year was celebrated on December 25. – On the day of Jesus’ birth, March 1, March 25. (via Feast of the Annunciation) and Easter.

Even later, it turned out that the Julian calendar needed to be changed again due to an erroneous calculation of the leap year (in it the year was 11 min. 14 s for trump). Due to a mistake that lasted for several centuries, various events took place at the wrong time. As a result, there were also problems in determining the date of Easter.

Therefore, in 1582 Pope Gregory XIII introduced a revised calendar. Not only did he solve the leap year problem, but he also brought back January 1st. as the beginning of the New Year.

Italy, France and Spain adopted the new calendar immediately, while Protestant and Orthodox nations took their time. Great Britain and its American colonies did not start following the Gregorian calendar until 1752. Until then, they welcomed the New Year on March 25.

Over time, the Gregorian calendar began to be used by non-Christian countries as well. One such example is China (since 1912), although it continued to celebrate the Chinese New Year according to the lunar calendar.

It can be celebrated throughout the year

Many countries that follow the Gregorian calendar have other traditional or religious calendars. Some nations never adopted the Gregorian calendar, so they start the year on other dates instead of January 1.

For example, Ethiopia New Year (called Enkutatash) celebrates in September.

For the Chinese, the new year of the Dragon will not begin on Monday, as, for example, in Lithuania, but on February 10. This holiday is usually in February, sometimes at the end of January (the current Year of the Rabbit started on January 22 last year).

Jewish New – Rosh Hashana (literally – the head of the year) – celebrated in September or October, on the first or second day of the lunar month. Also, their changing date depends on both the Solar and Lunar calendars.

In India, there is even more confusion, because its people follow different traditions and welcome the New Year at different times in different regions, for example, in March in Kashmir, in April in West Bengal. Only some holidays are common to all. One of the most popular and best known – Holiis celebrated during the full moon in February or March and is often considered the New Year.

Muslims welcome the New Year according to the lunar calendar, in which a month lasts 29.5 days and a year lasts 354 or 355 days. They are now living in 1445, which began on July 19 last year and will last until early July next year. Muslims count the year from the year 622, when the Hijra took place – the Prophet Muhammad and his followers moved from Mecca to Medina.

However, Persian descendants in Afghanistan, Iran and Tajikistan celebrate the turn of the year on the vernal equinox on March 21. According to the Persian calendar, it is now 1402.

Also read: When does the New Year really come and we live in a few years?

The Japanese and Koreans welcome the new year with the rest of the world, but they have special traditions for this occasion. Other customs can also be found in cultures that have “their own” New Years.