How Did They Know When To Start?

[crokett]

Preface: This thread is NOT intended to discuss religion. Any off-topic posts will be deleted. Now on to the question....

The current western calendar is the Gregorian calender, proposed in 1582. So if it was proposed 582 years after the birth of Christ, how did they know it was 582 years after? The Gregorian calendar is a reform of the Julian Calendar. The Julian calendar was enacted before the birth of Christ, so it obviously wouldn't have his birth on it as a starting point.

[cabinetman]

Preface: This thread is NOT intended to discuss religion. Any off-topic posts will be deleted. Now on to the question....

The current western calendar is the Gregorian calender, proposed in 1582. So if it was proposed 582 years after the birth of Christ, how did they know it was 582 years after? The Gregorian calendar is a reform of the Julian Calendar. The Julian calendar was enacted before the birth of Christ, so it obviously wouldn't have his birth on it as a starting point.

The subjective answer may border on what was BELIEVED at the time, which seems religious to me, and puts this topic in the RED ZONE.
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[Mr__Bill]

I think, the same way they knew when the earth was created and when it's going to end. But you have to give them credit, only off by a few years according to current historians. Who used pretty much the same methodology as Pope Gregory did.

[crokett]

The subjective answer may border on what was BELIEVED at the time, which seems religious to me, and puts this topic in the RED ZONE.
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I thought long and hard about that before posting this thread. However, the belief could just as easily have been that the flying purple people eater came from space. Or something. The point of this thread is not to debate what (or wasn't) believed but how they picked the date. It is a fine line I know, but an important one. I just want to know how the date was picked.

For example, was it an arbitrary papal edict? Was it reviewing whatever historical data was available regarding the position of stars, planets, etc?

[cgallery]

Preface: This thread is NOT intended to discuss religion. Any off-topic posts will be deleted. Now on to the question....

The current western calendar is the Gregorian calender, proposed in 1582. So if it was proposed 582 years after the birth of Christ, how did they know it was 582 years after? The Gregorian calendar is a reform of the Julian Calendar. The Julian calendar was enacted before the birth of Christ, so it obviously wouldn't have his birth on it as a starting point.

You said 582 twice, I think you mean 1582, right?

And the Gregorian is based on the Julian calendar. So they were counting years before then.

[Alex Franke]

They know when other historical events took place on the Julian calendar, and they place accounts of Jesus on that calendar in relation to those events. For example, we know from historical accounts of Jesus that he must have been born before Herod died, and Herod's death was most certainly recorded in the Julian calendar. This gets them within a few years probable, and it's probably a guess (or divine inspiration, or whatever) to nail it down specifically.

Then when they converted to Gregorian, they already had a good idea of how many years had passed (because of the Julian calendar, which wasn't took far off), so they could use that to set the date.

Edit: C'mon guys, this is hardly a religious topic. Not too many people deny that a someone named Jesus was alive at some point, or that there are a couple versions of calendars in our history.

One more edit: As to the specific date, I think they compare historical accounts of this birth or things that happened around the same time as the birth to other historical accounts of society, culture, etc. So if, for cultural reasons for example, one would never even consider traveling during the months of January-March -- even for a census -- then those months could be ruled out.

[germdoc]

Then when they converted to Gregorian, they already had a good idea of how many years had passed (because of the Julian calendar, which wasn't took far off), so they could use that to set the date.

In other words, when listening to a Gregorian chant, does it FEEL like 5 minutes or FIVE HUNDRED YEARS...

[cabinetman]

I thought long and hard about that before posting this thread. However, the belief could just as easily have been that the flying purple people eater came from space. Or something. The point of this thread is not to debate what (or wasn't) believed but how they picked the date. It is a fine line I know, but an important one.

It could have been the flying purple people eater. In determining the dates, BELIEFS do matter. There are those that question whether Christ lived at all. There are some that don't believe he existed. I'm not interjecting my beliefs whatsoever. But to establish a timeline, there is no provable fact establishing the dates. It is accepted by what was transcribed at the time, and whether that is accurate and true or not is pertinent to that date.

So, to keep religion out of this discussion, the timeline is the variable. The possibility of that timeline being a cog or two off (which could be an indeterminate length of time), could mean we have been royally duped.

Maybe a good discussion would be on how and who figured out that 365 days was one year, 12 months became a calendar year, and that the variables in the days in the months to make it all come out right. Well, something went amiss, as every four years we have to play with a day in February. It is the shortest month and the only month with fewer than 30 days. The month has 29 days in leap years, when the year number is divisible by four (except for years that are divisible by 100 and not by 400 in the Gregorian calendar). In common years the month has 28 days. Wow, we let that slide on by.
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[crokett]

You said 582 twice, I think you mean 1582, right?
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Yes. I hadn't had my tea yet.

Thanks Alex, that is the answer I was looking for.

It could have been the flying purple people eater. In determining the dates, BELIEFS do matter. There are those that question whether Christ lived at all. There are some that don't believe he existed. I'm not interjecting my beliefs whatsoever. But to establish a timeline, there is no provable fact establishing the dates. It is accepted by what was transcribed at the time, and whether that is accurate and true or not is pertinent to that date.
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I know what believed at the time is relevant. I already knew it was s the basis for the start of our current calendar. What I am NOT doing is debating those beliefs (or any other), because THAT would make this a religous thread. I'm not even arguing the accuracy of the calendar. I'm just asking how they arrived at the original start date.

[dbhost]

Actually what intrigues me more than the start date on either the Julian, or Gregorian calendars, is the END date of the long count calendar. Translated to the Gregorian calendar, the end date of the long count, or Mayan Calendar is 12/21/2012. At least according to some accepted calculations that may, or may not be accurate...


All About 2012.

And of course Hollywood is getting all over this and is actually making a movie about it...

[diamondman]

Gregorian Calendar

Actually the Gregorian calendar came in to being for a totally non-religious reason. Each year, farmers who have to plant on a certain date relative to the beginning of spring, noticed that the first day of spring seemed to be occurring later on the calendar. This is because the Julian calendar was based on a year which is exactly 365 1/4 days long. Actually, the solar year is 365 days 5 hours and about 44 minutes long. This discrepancy adds up to a day every 103 years. So by the 1500's the spring equinox was occurring in April. Pope Gregory instituted the fix. First he dropped 10 days from that year's calendar. Then he instituted new rules to add leap years. They are now added every 4 years except for years which are divisible by 100. Also years divisible by 400 are exceptions to the exception and are made leap years. The starting year was 2009 years ago. Since when the Christian calendar was instituted, it was many years after Christ's lifetime, a guess was made as to how many years had passed. Many scholars today think the actual birth of Christ occurred in the year 4 AD.

[Russianwolf]

And from what I recall, The exact date 12/25 was chosen to coincide with a pagan holiday that was being absorbed. Many scholars now think the actual birth was in the spring (March-April) timeframe.

[pelligrini]

I really think it involved a blindfold and a dart.

The more plausable explanation is that they laid out all the calander pages and assigned the letters and numbers to the rows and colums. Numbered and lettered balls were placed in a tumbler and one was drawn at random. Coincidentally, someone did exclaim 'Bingo!' when the ball was called out and the corresponding spot was found on the pages.

[jonmulzer]

And from what I recall, The exact date 12/25 was chosen to coincide with a pagan holiday that was being absorbed. Many scholars now think the actual birth was in the spring (March-April) timeframe.

More likely is that date was chosen because it is where the astro-theologic hybrid representing the birth and death/crucifixion/resurrection story comes from. This same story and same timeframe is littered through ancient mythology all throughout history.

[Eagan]

As I understand it, some biship was empowered to rewrite the calendar and start it at the birth of Jesus. In a sense, the Roman empire is also a calendar... If someone said something happened in the 3rd year of the reign of Nero, you could pretty well figure out when that was.

What is also interesting is that the first year was 1 and not 0. There fore the end of the decade is year 10 and the start of the new decade is year 11. Similarly, the last century ended in 2000 and started with the year 2001. But that is all old news, no?