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Subject: [PACE-L] Julian and Gregorian Calendar
Date: Thu, 30 Aug 2001 21:10:20 -0400

----- Original Message -----
From: "Michael Bruff" <>
To: <>
Sent: Sunday, August 26, 2001 2:06 PM
Subject: Re: [WAR] Lady Day

> Unless people are talking about Billie Holliday :-), Lady Day is
> March 25, and until 1752 was the start of the New Year in Britain.
>
> From Peter Meyer's super Julian and Gregorian Calendar site at:
>
> http://serendipity.magnet.ch/hermetic/cal_stud/cal_art.htm
>
> which has much, much more on the topic, and links to date converters.
>
> 'The Gregorian Calendar was adopted immediately upon the promulgation
> of Pope Gregory's decree (April 1582) in the Catholic countries of
> Italy, Spain, Portugal and Poland, and shortly thereafter in France
> and Luxembourg. During the next year or two most Catholic regions of
> Germany, Belgium, Switzerland and the Netherlands came on board.
> Hungary followed in 1587. The rest of the Netherlands, Denmark,
> Germany and Switzerland made the change during 1699 to 1701. By the
> time the British were ready to go along with the rest of Europe, the
> old calendar had drifted off by one more day, requiring a correction
> of eleven days, rather than ten. The Gregorian Calendar was adopted
> in Britain (and in the British colonies) in 1752, with (Wednesday)
> September 2, 1752, being followed immediately by (Thursday) September
> 14, 1752.
>
> In many countries the Julian Calendar was used by the general
> population long after the official introduction of the Gregorian
> Calendar. Thus events were recorded in the 16th to 18th Centuries
> with various dates, depending on which calendar was used. Dates
> recorded in the Julian Calendar were marked "O.S." for "Old Style",
> and those in the Gregorian Calendar were marked "N.S." for "New
> Style".
>
> To complicate matters further New Year's Day, the first day of the
> new year, was celebrated in different countries, and sometimes by
> different groups of people within the same country, on either January
> 1, March 1, March 25 or December 25. January 1 seems to have been the
> usual date but there was no standard observed. With the introduction
> of the Gregorian Calendar in Britain and the colonies New Year's Day
> was generally observed on January 1. Previously in the colonies it
> was common for March 24 of one year to be followed by March 25 of the
> next year. This explains why, with the calendrical reform and the
> shift of New Year's Day from March 25 back to January 1, the year of
> George Washington's birth changed from 1731 to 1732. In the Julian
> Calendar his birthdate is 1731-02-11 but in the Gregorian Calendar it
> is 1732-02-22.'
>
> Russia and Eastern Europe continued to use the Julian calendar right
> up until the First World War. The discrepancy between the two could
> cause real problems, even affect the course of world history. In 1805
> the Austrians and Russians agreed a rendezvous date for their forces
> and forgot to take the date difference into account, with the result
> that Napoleon forced an entire Austrian army to surrender at Ulm
> before the Russians turned up!
>
> BTW, birth, marriage and burial dates between January 1 and March 24
> inclusive should, strictly speaking, be entered as, say, February 2
> 1603/04 when they occur prior to 1752. This is cumbersome (and annoys
> my FH programme no end!), but the only way to avoid ambiguity.
>
> Mick
>
> Tottenham
> Middlesex UK

> ==== WARWICK Mailing List ====

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