3 Jan
2011
3 Jan
'11
11:39 p.m.
On 2011 Jan 3, at 12:49 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote:
On 2011 Jan 2, at 10:49 AM, Tony Duell wrote:
As I said, Janurary 1st has no particular cignificance. It's close to
the
winter solstice, but it is not the winter solstice. It is aribtrary.
It's not arbitrary. It was intended to mark the winter solstice /
beginning of the seasonal cycle, and originally coincided with the
solstice. It now marks 10/11 days after the winter solstice. ANAICF,
periodic errors in the Julian calendar accumulated over the centuries,
the cumulative error was accounted for in the switch to the Gregorian
calendar but for religious reasons Easter took precedence over the
solstice, and the displacement of Jan 1st from the solstice was fixed
at 10/11 days.
Researching a little further, and not surprisingly there are some
inconsistent sources out there on the net. Pardon the rambling, but for
the record: another ref suggests Jan 1st was traditionally the day the
Roman senate took office. At the time the Julian calendar was being set
(45BC), Caesar was attempting to change the beginning of the calendar
year to either the spring equinox or the winter solstice, but Jan 1st
in that year was the 1st New Moon after the winter solstice. It was
politically untenable to alter it in that year, so it was left for one
more year after which it was to change. However Caesar was assassinated
shortly thereafter and the change never took place.
(http://www.hermetic.ch/cal_stud/tobin.html)
For that matter a new yrear is meaningless. AFAIK
January 1st
doesn't
correspond exactly to any special point in the earth's orbit.
The beginning/end of a year is in relationship to the winter
solstice -
a natural phenomenon of significant consequence to humans and human
society - albeit displaced slightly for historical reasons
(cumulative
error before a better way of dealing with the error was developed).