(Another long post!) Tomorrow marks the day in 1752 when Britain and the American colonies switched from the Julian dating system to the Gregorian calendar (which we use today). The calendar dates had fallen behind the related cosmic events like the equinoxes and solstices, due to miscalculating the true length of the solar year. Basically, the Julian system had added too many “leap days” over the years and centuries, and by the 1700s the calendar was “off” by eleven days for those seasonal events. Changing to the Gregorian system required losing 11 days, and so in 1752 the day following 2 September was the 14th. This was quite confusing to the whole society! You may see the letters "O.S.” attached to some dates for George Washington, etc., to show that they are calculated on the “Old Style.” Other countries in Europe adopted the “New Style” quite a bit earlier than Britain, beginning in 1582. The Julian calendar continued to be used in Russia until 1918, and is still followed in some Eastern Orthodox churches. In the Old System, today is 18 August – it’s now 13 days behind. So my tie celebrates the way we try to count the days, months and years!
No comments:
Post a Comment