Happy New Year? Yes, according to the Julian calendar New Year is March 25, but is it March 25th on the Gregorian calendar?

According to the Time and Date blog, there are many different calendars used around the world. No wonder some days I have to stop and ask myself what day it is. There are lunar calendars, solar calendars, and lunisolar calendars. Lunar calendars use the phases of the moon to mark time. Solar calendars are based on the time it takes the earth to make one rotation around the sun. Lunisolar calendars use both.

Both the Julian calendar and the Gregorian calendar are solar calendars. The difference is the way the year is calculated. The Julian calendar counts 365.25 days in the sun’s rotation. It came into use in 45BC. It seems accurate enough. The Gregorian calendar calculates the earth’s rotation around the sun as 365.2421 days. So what’s the big deal? This calendar was adopted by Pope Gregory XIII in 1582 to make sure the Catholic church was celebrating Easter on the correct date. Not all the world agreed. Parts of Europe, particularly England and other Protestant areas did not adopt the new calendar. By the time England adopted the Gregorian calendar in 1752 George Washington was already 21 years old, or was he? He was born February 11, 1731, but the adoption of the Gregorian calendar by England and the British Colonies caused September of 1732 to lose 11 days. That September only had 19 days. Confused yet? So were a lot of other people.

Eastern Europe, and particularly the Eastern Orthodox Church, still uses the Julian or Christian calendar to order Christmas and other religious holidays. The Hebrew calendar uses the phases of the moon for religious feasts and planting. Ethiopia has an entirely different calendar that is about seven years behind the Gregorian calendar and China has yet another calendar. So what day is it? Depends. It depends on what country you’re in, what religion or culture you’re dealing with, and what side of the international dateline you’re on. This was really interesting research that I haven’t gotten straight as of this writing, so maybe some of you or the young scientist in your home can make sense of this and figure out time travel while you’re at it.

Still wondering what day it is — Gail Cartee

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