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Archiver > TMG > 2000-03 > 0951920800


From: Lee Hoffman/KY <>
Subject: Re: TMG-L: verifying a date 1665/66 or 1666/67
Date: Wed, 01 Mar 2000 09:26:40 -0500


Norb Bankert wrote:
>In trying to convert to Julian I do believe (I could be wrong) that 10 days
>were added to the date. By the time New England converted in 1752 enough
>time had gone by that they had lost another day. So, if I'm correct, it
>wasn't untill 1752 that the 11'th day was added.

Yes, it was 1752 that Britain (and its possessions) made the change (i.e.
_subtracted_ 11 days). But that means that the calendar we us now is 11
days off from that used before 14 Sep 1752. So if you use our current
calendar and project it backwards to before 1752 (regardless of the earlier
year), you are essentially converting to the calendar system in use then
and that system had lasted 1600 years. There will be some that will
nitpick on this, but for our discussion here it is good enough.

So if you use our current calendar as projected back to 1666 (or any year
around there), then you need to remember that our current calendar is
"missing" 11 days for all years prior to 14 Sep 1752. In that case you can
convert a date before 14 Sep 1752 by adding 11 days to the date given for
that earlier year and the find the "converted" date on our calendar. In
your case, 19 Jan plus 11 days is 30 Jan. The only years when 30 Jan
(using our calendar system) fell on Saturday during the period in question
was 1655, 1666, and 1672. So if our calendar system has 30 Jan 1666 as
Saturday, you can figure that it was 19 Jan 1666 using the old calendar.

Because of the way the goverment calculated its year then, the new year
started on 25 March. Thus the usual method of designating the year was to
show both years, i.e. 1666/1667. The U.S. Goverment does similarly now.
We are in the 1999-2000 fiscal year and the 2001 fiscal year will start in
October --- unless Congress changes things again like the way they did some
years ago when they decreed a special three month year to change the older
July through June year to October through September.


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Lee Hoffman/KY
E-mail:
TMG Tips: <http://www.tmgtips.com>;
My website: <http://www.tmgtips.com/lhoffman>;
--------------
A user of the best genealogy program, The Master Genealogist (TMG)

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