NEW
YEAR’S
commemorates historical events and ushers in the new season.
Civilizations around the world have been celebrating the start of each New Year
for at least four millennia.
Modern times has brought on many traditions
include attending parties, making resolutions for the New Year, and watching
fireworks displays. New York City is the most influential, iconic American
metropolis New Year's celebrator. New Year’s festivities begin on December 31,
the last day of the Gregorian calendar, and continue into the early hours of
January 1 New Year’s Day. That’s tonight!!!!
With Christianity coming on the scene more
days were added carrying religious significance, such as December 25 the
anniversary of Jesus’ birth and March 25th Feast of the Annunciation.
Chinese New
Year has undergone many changes, the celebration of the Chinese New Year is the
most important and most anticipated holiday in China.
The
earliest recorded festivities in honor of a new year’s arrival date back some
4,000 years to ancient Babylon. For the Babylonians, the first new moon
following the vernal equinox—the day in late March with an equal amount of
sunlight and darkness heralded the start of a new year. They marked the
occasion with a massive religious festival called Alito (derived from the
Sumerian word for barley, which was cut in the spring) that involved a
different ritual on each of its 11 days. In addition to a goddess Tiamat, and
served an important political purpose: It was during this time that a new king
was crowned or that the current ruler’s divine mandate was symbolically
renewed.
Throughout antiquity, civilizations around the
world developed increasingly sophisticated calendars, typically pinning the
first day of the year to an agricultural or astronomical event. In Egypt, for
instance, the year began with the annual flooding of the Nile, which coincided
with the rising of the star Sirius.
The first day
of the Chinese New Year, meanwhile, occurred with the second new moon after the
solstice.
January 1 became New Year's Day; on the early
Roman calendar consisting of 10 months and 304 days, with each New Year
beginning at the vernal equinox. It was created by Romulus, the founder of Rome.
In the eighth
century B.C. a later king, known by the name of Numa Pompilius, is credited
with adding the months of Januarius and Februaries. Over the centuries, the
calendar fell out of sync with the sun, and in 46 B.C. the emperor Julius
Caesar decided to solve the problem. Did you know that in order to realign the
Roman calendar with the sun, Julius Caesar had to add ninety extra days to the
year 46 B.C. when he introduced the Julian calendar? The Julian calendar
closely resembles the more modern Gregorian calendar that most countries around
the world use today. Caesar instituted January 1 as the first day of the year,
partly to honor the month’s namesake: Janus, the Roman god of beginnings, whose
two faces allowed him to look back into the past and forward into the future.
Romans celebrated by offering sacrifices to Janus, exchanging gifts with one
another, decorating their homes with laurel branches and attending raucous
parties.
Pope Gregory XIII set January 1st as New
Year’s Day in 1582. In medieval Europe, thereafter January 1st stuck. The first
of the year carried religious significance, others, not so much, as December 25
the anniversary of Jesus’ birth and March 25th Feast of the Annunciation.
So there you have
it folks. HAPPY NEW YEAR! Please limit
your drinking, drive carefully because I’m a sleep walker.
DR. KARL WALLACE D.D.S.
To read more of my writing go to: w.w.w.karlwallaceblog.blogspot.com
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