Since by this time the difference between the old and new styles was 13 days, the decree ordered that after January 31, 1918, not February 1, but February 14 be counted. By the same decree, until July 1, 1918, after the number of each day according to the new style, in brackets, write the number according to the old style: February 14 (1), February 15 (2), etc.
From the history of chronology in Russia.
The ancient Slavs, like many other peoples, initially based their calendar on the period of change in the lunar phases. But already by the time of the adoption of Christianity, that is, by the end of the tenth century. n. e., Ancient Rus' used the lunisolar calendar.
Calendar of the ancient Slavs. It was not finally possible to establish what the calendar of the ancient Slavs was. It is only known that initially time was counted according to the seasons. Probably, the 12-month lunar calendar was also used at that time. In later times, the Slavs switched to the lunisolar calendar, in which an additional 13th month was inserted seven times every 19 years.
The oldest monuments of Russian writing show that the months had purely Slavic names, the origin of which was closely connected with natural phenomena. At the same time, the same months, depending on the climate of those places in which different tribes lived, received different names. So, January was called where the cross section (the time of deforestation), where it was blue (after the winter cloudiness, a blue sky appeared), where it was jelly (because it became cold, cold), etc .; February - cut, snow or fierce (severe frosts); March - berezosol (there are several interpretations here: birch begins to bloom; they took sap from birches; burned birch on coal), dry (the poorest in precipitation in ancient Kievan Rus, in some places the earth was already drying up, sokovik (a reminder of birch sap); April - pollen (flowering gardens), birch (beginning of birch flowering), oak tree, oak tree, etc.; May - grass (grass turns green), summer, pollen; June - worm (cherries turn red), isok (grasshoppers chirp - "isoki ”), milky; July - Lipets (linden blossom), worm (in the north, where phenological phenomena are late), sickle (from the word “sickle”, indicating harvest time); August - sickle, stubble, glow (from the verb “roar "- the roar of deer, or from the word "glow" - cold dawns, and possibly from "pazori" - polar lights); September - veresen (heather bloom); ruen (from the Slavic root of the word meaning tree, giving yellow paint); october - leaf fall, "pazdernik" or "kastrychnik" (pazders - hemp bonfires, the name for the south of Russia); November - breast (from the word "pile" - a frozen rut on the road), leaf fall (in the south of Russia); December - jelly, breast, blueberry.
The year began on March 1, and from about that time they started agricultural work.
Many of the ancient names of the months later passed into a number of Slavic languages and have largely survived in some modern languages, in particular in Ukrainian, Belarusian and Polish.
At the end of the tenth century Ancient Rus' adopted Christianity. At the same time, the chronology used by the Romans passed to us - the Julian calendar (based on the solar year), with the Roman names of the months and the seven-day week. The account of years in it was conducted from the "creation of the world", which allegedly occurred 5508 years before our reckoning. This date - one of the many options for eras from the "creation of the world" - was adopted in the 7th century. in Greece and has long been used by the Orthodox Church.
For many centuries, March 1 was considered the beginning of the year, but in 1492, in accordance with church tradition, the beginning of the year was officially moved to September 1 and was celebrated this way for more than two hundred years. However, a few months after the Muscovites celebrated their regular New Year on September 1, 7208, they had to repeat the celebration. This happened because on December 19, 7208, a personal decree of Peter I was signed and promulgated on the reform of the calendar in Russia, according to which a new beginning of the year was introduced - from January 1 and a new era - the Christian chronology (from the "Christmas").
Petrovsky's decree was called: "On writing henceforth Genvar from the 1st of 1700 in all papers of the summer from the Nativity of Christ, and not from the creation of the world." Therefore, the decree ordered the day after December 31, 7208 from the “creation of the world” to be considered January 1, 1700 from the “Christmas”. In order for the reform to be adopted without complications, the decree ended with a prudent clause: “And if anyone wants to write both those years, from the creation of the world and from the Nativity of Christ, in a row freely.”
Meeting of the first civil New Year in Moscow. The day after the announcement on Red Square in Moscow of the decree of Peter I on the reform of the calendar, i.e. December 20, 7208, a new decree of the tsar was announced - "On the celebration of the New Year." Considering that January 1, 1700 is not only the beginning of a new year, but also the beginning of a new century (Here a significant mistake was made in the decree: 1700 is the last year of the 17th century, and not the first year of the 18th century. The new century began on January 1 1701. A mistake that is sometimes repeated even today.), the decree ordered to celebrate this event with special solemnity. It gave detailed instructions on how to organize a holiday in Moscow. On New Year's Eve, Peter I himself lit the first rocket on Red Square, thus signaling the opening of the holiday. The streets were illuminated with illumination. The ringing of bells and cannon fire began, the sounds of trumpets and timpani were heard. The king congratulated the population of the capital on the New Year, the festivities continued all night. Multi-colored rockets flew up from the courtyards into the dark winter sky, and “along the large streets, where there is space,” fires burned - bonfires and tar barrels attached to poles.
The houses of the inhabitants of the wooden capital were dressed up in needles “from trees and branches of pine, spruce and juniper”. For a whole week the houses stood decorated, and at nightfall the lights were lit. Shooting "from small cannons and from muskets or other small weapons", as well as launching "rockets" were entrusted to people "who do not count gold." And the “meager people” were offered “everyone, at least a tree or a branch on the gate or over his temple.” Since that time, the custom has been established in our country every year on January 1 to celebrate New Year's Day.
After 1918, there were more calendar reforms in the USSR. In the period from 1929 to 1940, calendar reforms were carried out in our country three times, caused by production needs. Thus, on August 26, 1929, the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR adopted a resolution "On the transition to continuous production in enterprises and institutions of the USSR", in which it was recognized as necessary from the 1929-1930 financial year to begin a systematic and consistent transfer of enterprises and institutions to continuous production. In the autumn of 1929, a gradual transition to "continuous work" began, which ended in the spring of 1930 after the publication of a resolution by a special government commission under the Council of Labor and Defense. This resolution introduced a single production time sheet-calendar. The calendar year provided for 360 days, i.e. 72 five-day periods. It was decided to consider the remaining 5 days as holidays. Unlike the ancient Egyptian calendar, they were not located all together at the end of the year, but were timed to coincide with Soviet memorable days and revolutionary holidays: January 22, May 1 and 2, and November 7 and 8.
The employees of each enterprise and institution were divided into 5 groups, and each group was given a day of rest every five days for the whole year. This meant that after four days of work there was a day of rest. After the introduction of the "continuity" there was no need for a seven-day week, since days off could fall not only on different days of the month, but also on different days of the week.
However, this calendar did not last long. Already on November 21, 1931, the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR adopted a resolution "On the Intermittent Production Week in Institutions", which allowed the people's commissariats and other institutions to switch to a six-day interrupted production week. For them, regular days off were set on the following dates of the month: 6, 12, 18, 24 and 30. At the end of February, the day off fell on the last day of the month or was postponed to March 1. In those months that contained but 31 days, the last day of the month was considered a full month and paid separately. The decree on the transition to a discontinuous six-day week came into force on December 1, 1931.
Both the five-day and six-day days completely broke the traditional seven-day week with a common day off on Sunday. The six-day week was used for about nine years. Only on June 26, 1940, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR issued a decree "On the transition to an eight-hour working day, to a seven-day working week and on the prohibition of unauthorized departure of workers and employees from enterprises and institutions", In the development of this decree, on June 27, 1940, the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR adopted the resolution, in which he established that “beyond Sundays, non-working days are also:
January 22, May 1 and 2, November 7 and 8, December 5. The same decree abolished the six special days of rest and non-working days that existed in rural areas on March 12 (Day of the overthrow of the autocracy) and March 18 (Day of the Paris Commune).
On March 7, 1967, the Central Committee of the CPSU, the Council of Ministers of the USSR and the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions adopted a resolution “On the transfer of workers and employees of enterprises, institutions and organizations to a five-day work week with two days off”, but this reform did not in any way concern the structure of the modern calendar.
But the most interesting thing is that the passions do not subside. The next round happens already in our new time. Sergey Baburin, Viktor Alksnis, Irina Savelyeva and Alexander Fomenko submitted a bill to the State Duma in 2007 - on the transition of Russia from January 1, 2008 to the Julian calendar. In the explanatory note, the deputies noted that "the world calendar does not exist" and proposed to establish a transitional period from December 31, 2007, when within 13 days the chronology will be carried out simultaneously according to two calendars at once. Only four deputies took part in the voting. Three are against, one is for. There were no abstentions. The rest of the elect ignored the vote.
On the doorstep new years When one year follows another, we don’t even think about what style we live in. Surely, from the lessons of history, many of us remember that there was once a different calendar, later, people switched to a new one and began to live in a new way style.
Let's talk about how these two calendars differ: Julian and Gregorian .
History of the creation of the Julian and Gregorian calendars
To make time calculations, people came up with a system of chronology, which was based on the periodicity of the movement of celestial bodies, so it was created calendar.
Word "calendar" derived from the Latin word calendarium, which means "debt book". This is due to the fact that the debtors paid their debt on the day calendar, so called the first days of each month, they coincided with new moon.
Yes, at ancient romans had every month 30 days, or rather, 29 days, 12 hours and 44 minutes. At first this calendar had ten months, hence, by the way, the name of our last month of the year - December(from Latin decem- tenth). All months were named after Roman gods.
But, starting from the 3rd century BC, a different calendar was used in the ancient world, based on a four-year period. lunisolar cycle, he gave an error in the value of the solar year in one day. In Egypt they used solar calendar compiled on the basis of observations of the Sun and Sirius. The year for it was three hundred sixty five days. It consisted of twelve months thirty days every.
It was this calendar that became the basis julian calendar. It is named after the emperor Gaius Julius Caesar and was introduced into 45 BC. The beginning of the year according to this calendar began 1st of January.
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Gaius Julius Caesar (100 BC-44 BC)
Existed Julian calendar over sixteen centuries, until 1582 G. Pope Gregory XIII did not propose a new system of reckoning. The reason for the adoption of the new calendar was the gradual shift in relation to the Julian calendar of the day of the vernal equinox, according to which the date of Easter was determined, as well as the discrepancy between the Easter full moons and astronomical ones. The head of the Catholic Church believed that it was necessary to determine the exact calculation of the celebration of Easter so that it fell on a Sunday, and also return the day of the spring equinox to the date of March 21.
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Pope Gregory XIII (1502-1585) |
However, in 1583 year Cathedral of the Eastern Patriarchs in Constantinople did not accept the new calendar, since it contradicted the basic rule by which the day of the celebration of Christian Easter is determined: in some years, Christian Easter would come earlier than the Jewish one, which was not allowed by the canons of the church.
However, most European countries followed the call of Pope Gregory XIII and switched to a new style chronology.
The transition to the Gregorian calendar led to the following changes :
1. to correct accumulated errors, the new calendar at the time of adoption immediately shifted the current date by 10 days;
2. a new, more precise rule about a leap year began to operate - a leap year, that is, it contains 366 days, if:
The year number is a multiple of 400 (1600, 2000, 2400);
The year number is a multiple of 4 and not a multiple of 100 (… 1892, 1896, 1904, 1908…);
3. The rules for calculating the Christian (namely Catholic) Easter were changed.
The difference between the dates of the Julian and Gregorian calendars increases by three days for every 400 years.
History of chronology in Russia
In Rus', before Baptism, the new year began in March, but from the 10th century, they began to celebrate the New Year in September, according to the Byzantine church calendar. However, people, accustomed to the centuries-old tradition, continued to celebrate the New Year with the awakening of nature - in the spring. Until the king Ivan III V 1492 year did not issue a decree, which reported that the New Year was officially postponed to beginning of autumn. But this did not help either, and the Russian people celebrated two New Years: in spring and autumn.
Tsar Peter the First, striving for everything European, December 19, 1699 issued a decree that the Russian people, together with the Europeans, celebrate the New Year 1st of January.
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But, at the same time, in Russia it still remained valid Julian calendar adopted from Byzantium with baptism.
February 14, 1918, after the coup, all of Russia switched to a new style, now the secular state began to live according to Gregorian calendar. Later, in 1923 year, the new authorities tried to transfer to a new calendar and the church, however His Holiness Patriarch Tikhon succeeded in preserving the traditions.
Today Julian and Gregorian calendars continue to exist together. Julian calendar enjoy Georgian, Jerusalem, Serbian and Russian churches, whereas Catholics and Protestants guided Gregorian.
The Roman calendar was one of the least accurate. At first, it generally had 304 days and included only 10 months, starting from the first month of spring (March) and ending with the onset of winter (Dekember - the "tenth" month); In winter, time was simply not kept. King Numa Pompilius is credited with introducing two winter months (January and February). An additional month - mercedonia - was inserted by the pontiffs at their own discretion, quite arbitrarily and in accordance with various momentary interests. In 46 BC. e. Julius Caesar carried out a reform of the calendar, according to the development of the Alexandrian astronomer Sosigen, taking the Egyptian solar calendar as a basis.
In order to correct the accumulated errors, he, by his power as the great pontiff, inserted in the transitional year, in addition to mercedony, two additional months between November and December; and from January 1, 45, a Julian year of 365 days was established, with leap years every 4 years. At the same time, an extra day was inserted between February 23 and 24, as earlier mercedony; and since, according to the Roman system of reckoning, the day of February 24 was called “the sixth (sextus) from the March calends,” the intercalary day was also called “twice the sixth (bis sextus) from the March calends” and the year, respectively, annus bissextus - hence, through the Greek language, our word "leap". At the same time, the month of quintiles (in Julius) was renamed in honor of Caesar.
In the IV-VI centuries, in most Christian countries, uniform Easter tables were established, made on the basis of the Julian calendar; thus, the Julian calendar spread to the whole of Christendom. In these tables, March 21 was taken as the day of the vernal equinox.
However, as the error accumulated (1 day in 128 years), the discrepancy between the astronomical spring equinox and the calendar became more and more pronounced, and many in Catholic Europe believed that it could no longer be ignored. This was noted by the Castilian king of the 13th century Alphonse X the Wise, in the next century the Byzantine scholar Nicephorus Gregory even proposed a reform of the calendar. In reality, such a reform was carried out by Pope Gregory XIII in 1582, based on the project of the mathematician and physician Luigi Lilio. in 1582: the day after October 4th was October 15th. Secondly, a new, more precise rule about a leap year began to operate in it.
Julian calendar was developed by a group of Alexandrian astronomers led by Sosigenes and introduced by Julius Caesar in 45 BC. uh..
The Julian calendar was based on the culture of ancient Egyptian chronology. In Ancient Rus', the calendar was known as the "Peaceful Circle", "Church Circle" and "Great Indiction".
The year according to the Julian calendar begins on January 1, since it was on this day from 153 BC. e. newly elected consuls took office. In the Julian calendar, a regular year has 365 days and is divided into 12 months. Once every 4 years, a leap year is declared, to which one day is added - February 29 (previously a similar system was adopted in the zodiac calendar according to Dionysius). Thus, the Julian year has an average duration of 365.25 days, which is 11 minutes different from the tropical year.
The Julian calendar is commonly referred to as the old style.
The calendar was based on static monthly holidays. Kalends were the first holiday with which the month began. The next holiday, falling on the 7th (in March, May, July and October) and on the 5th of the rest of the months, were nones. The third holiday, falling on the 15th (in March, May, July and October) and the 13th of the remaining months, was the Ides.
Removal by the Gregorian calendar
In Catholic countries, the Julian calendar was replaced by a decree of Pope Gregory XIII with the Gregorian calendar in 1582: the day after October 4, October 15 came. Protestant countries abandoned the Julian calendar gradually, over the course of the 17th-18th centuries (the last were Great Britain from 1752 and Sweden). In Russia, the Gregorian calendar has been used since 1918 (it is usually called the new style), in Orthodox Greece - since 1923.
In the Julian calendar, a year was a leap year if it ended in 00. 325 AD. The Council of Nicaea decreed this calendar for all Christian countries. 325 g is the day of the spring equinox.
Gregorian calendar was introduced by Pope Gregory XIII on October 4, 1582 to replace the old Julian: the day after Thursday, October 4 became Friday, October 15 (there are no days from October 5 to October 14, 1582 in the Gregorian calendar).
In the Gregorian calendar, the length of the tropical year is 365.2425 days. The length of a non-leap year is 365 days, a leap year is 366.
Story
The reason for the adoption of the new calendar was the shift of the vernal equinox, which determined the date of Easter. Before Gregory XIII, Popes Paul III and Pius IV tried to implement the project, but they did not achieve success. The preparation of the reform at the direction of Gregory XIII was carried out by the astronomers Christopher Clavius and Luigi Lilio (aka Aloysius Lily). The results of their work were recorded in a papal bull, named after the first line of lat. Inter gravissimas ("Among the most important").
Firstly, the new calendar immediately at the time of adoption shifted the current date by 10 days due to accumulated errors.
Secondly, a new, more precise rule about a leap year began to operate in it.
A leap year has 366 days if:
Its number is divisible by 4 without a remainder and is not divisible by 100 or
Its number is evenly divisible by 400.
Thus, over time, the Julian and Gregorian calendars diverge more and more: by 1 day per century, if the number of the previous century is not divisible by 4. The Gregorian calendar reflects the true state of affairs much more accurately than the Julian. It gives a much better approximation to the tropical year.
In 1583, Gregory XIII sent an embassy to Patriarch Jeremiah II of Constantinople with a proposal to switch to a new calendar. At the end of 1583, at a council in Constantinople, the proposal was rejected as not in accordance with the canonical rules for celebrating Easter.
In Russia, the Gregorian calendar was introduced in 1918 by a decree of the Council of People's Commissars, according to which, in 1918, January 31 was followed by February 14.
Since 1923, most of the local Orthodox churches, with the exception of the Russian, Jerusalem, Georgian, Serbian and Athos, have adopted a similar to the Gregorian New Julian calendar, coinciding with it until 2800. It was also formally introduced by Patriarch Tikhon for use in the Russian Orthodox Church on October 15, 1923. However, this innovation, although it was accepted by almost all Moscow parishes, generally caused disagreement in the Church, so already on November 8, 1923, Patriarch Tikhon ordered "the universal and mandatory introduction of the new style into church use is temporarily postponed." Thus, the new style was valid in the Russian Orthodox Church for only 24 days.
In 1948, at the Moscow Conference of the Orthodox Churches, it was decided that Easter, like all passing holidays, should be calculated according to the Alexandrian Paschalia (Julian calendar), and non-passing according to the calendar according to which the Local Church lives. The Finnish Orthodox Church celebrates Easter according to the Gregorian calendar.
JULIAN AND GRIGORIAN CALENDARSCalendar- the table of days, numbers, months, seasons, years familiar to all of us is the oldest invention of mankind. It fixes the periodicity of natural phenomena, based on the patterns of movement of celestial bodies: the Sun, Moon, stars. The earth rushes along its solar orbit, counting the years and centuries. In a day, it makes one revolution around its axis, and in a year - around the Sun. The astronomical or solar year lasts 365 days 5 hours 48 minutes 46 seconds. Therefore, there is no whole number of days, which is where the difficulty arises in compiling a calendar that should keep a correct count of time. Since the time of Adam and Eve, people have used the "circle" of the Sun and Moon to keep track of time. The lunar calendar used by the Romans and Greeks was simple and convenient. From one revival of the moon to the next, about 30 days pass, or rather, 29 days 12 hours 44 minutes. Therefore, according to the changes of the moon, it was possible to count the days, and then the months.
In the lunar calendar, at first there were 10 months, the first of which were dedicated to the Roman gods and supreme rulers. For example, the month of March was named after the god Mars (Martius), the month of May is dedicated to the goddess Maia, July is named after the Roman emperor Julius Caesar, and August is named after the emperor Octavian Augustus. In the ancient world, from the 3rd century BC, according to the flesh, a calendar was used, which was based on a four-year luni-solar cycle, which gave a discrepancy with the value of the solar year by 4 days in 4 years. In Egypt, a solar calendar was compiled from observations of Sirius and the Sun. The year in this calendar lasted 365 days, it had 12 months of 30 days, and at the end of the year 5 more days were added in honor of the “birth of the gods”.
In 46 BC, the Roman dictator Julius Caesar introduced an exact solar calendar following the Egyptian model - Julian. The solar year was taken as the value of the calendar year, which was slightly more than the astronomical one - 365 days 6 hours. January 1 was legalized as the beginning of the year.
In 26 BC. e. Roman emperor Augustus introduced the Alexandrian calendar, in which 1 more day was added every 4 years: instead of 365 days - 366 days a year, that is, 6 extra hours annually. For 4 years, this amounted to a whole day, which was added every 4 years, and the year in which one day was added in February was called a leap year. In essence, this was a refinement of the same Julian calendar.
For the Orthodox Church, the calendar was the basis of the yearly cycle of worship, and therefore it was very important to establish the simultaneity of holidays throughout the Church. The question of the time of the celebration of Easter was discussed at the First Ecumenical. Cathedral *, as one of the main ones. Paschalia (the rules for calculating the day of Easter) established at the Council, together with its basis - the Julian calendar - cannot be changed under pain of anathema - excommunication and rejection from the Church.
In 1582, the head of the Catholic Church, Pope Gregory XIII, introduced a new calendar style - Gregorian. The purpose of the reform was allegedly to more accurately determine the day of the celebration of Easter, so that the spring equinox would return by March 21. The Council of the Eastern Patriarchs of 1583 in Constantinople condemned the Gregorian calendar as violating the entire liturgical cycle and the canons of the Ecumenical Councils. It is important to note that the Gregorian calendar in some years violates one of the main church rules on the date of the celebration of Easter - it happens that the Catholic Easter falls earlier than the Jewish one, which is not allowed by the canons of the Church; also sometimes "disappears" Petrov post. At the same time, such a great learned astronomer as Copernicus (being a Catholic monk) did not consider the Gregorian calendar more accurate than the Julian, and did not recognize it. The new style was introduced by the authority of the Pope in place of the Julian calendar, or old style, and was gradually adopted in the Catholic countries. By the way, modern astronomers also use the Julian calendar in their calculations.
In Rus' Since the 10th century, the New Year has been celebrated on March 1, when, according to biblical tradition, God created the world. 5 centuries later, in 1492, in accordance with church tradition, the beginning of the year in Russia was moved to September 1, and they celebrated this way for more than 200 years. The months had purely Slavic names, the origin of which was associated with natural phenomena. Years were counted from the creation of the world.
December 19, 7208 ("from the creation of the world") Peter I signed a decree on the reform of the calendar. The calendar remained Julian, as before the reform, adopted by Russia from Byzantium along with baptism. A new beginning of the year was introduced - January 1 and the Christian chronology "from the Nativity of Christ." The decree of the king prescribed: “The day after December 31, 7208 from the creation of the world (the Orthodox Church considers the date of the creation of the world - September 1, 5508 BC) to be considered January 1, 1700 from the birth of Christ. The decree also ordered to celebrate this event with special solemnity: “And as a sign of that good undertaking and the new centenary century, in fun, congratulate each other on the New Year ... On the noble and passing streets at the gates and houses, make some decoration from pine trees and branches , spruce and juniper ... repair shooting from small cannons and guns, launch rockets, as many as anyone happens to, and light fires. The account of years from the Nativity of Christ is accepted by most states of the world. With the spread of atheism among the intelligentsia and historians, they began to avoid mentioning the name of Christ and replace the countdown of the centuries from His Nativity to the so-called "our era."
After the great October socialist revolution, the so-called new style (Gregorian) was introduced in our country on February 14, 1918.
The Gregorian calendar excluded three leap years within each 400th anniversary. Over time, the difference between the Gregorian and the Julian calendar increases. The initial value of 10 days in the 16th century subsequently increases: in the 18th century - 11 days, in the 19th century - 12 days, in the 20th and 21st centuries - 13 days, in the XXII - 14 days.
The Russian Orthodox Church, following the Ecumenical Councils, uses the Julian calendar, unlike the Catholics, who use the Gregorian.
At the same time, the introduction of the Gregorian calendar by the civil authorities led to some difficulties for Orthodox Christians. The New Year, which is celebrated by all civil society, has been moved to Advent, when it is inappropriate to have fun. In addition, according to the church calendar, January 1 (December 19, old style) commemorates the holy martyr Boniface, who patronizes people who want to get rid of alcohol abuse - and our entire vast country celebrates this day with glasses in their hands. Orthodox people celebrate the New Year "in the old way", on January 14th.
In Europe, starting in 1582, the reformed (Gregorian) calendar gradually spread. The Gregorian calendar gives a much more accurate approximation of the tropical year. For the first time, the Gregorian calendar was introduced by Pope Gregory XIII in Catholic countries on October 4, 1582 to replace the previous one: the next day after Thursday, October 4, was Friday, October 15.
The Gregorian calendar ("new style") is a system of time calculation based on the cyclic revolution of the Earth around the Sun. The duration of the year is taken equal to 365.2425 days. The Gregorian calendar contains 97 by 400 years.
The difference between the Julian and Gregorian calendars
At the time of the introduction of the Gregorian calendar, the difference between it and the Julian calendar was 10 days. However, this difference between the Julian and Gregorian calendars gradually increases over time due to the difference in the rules for determining leap years. Therefore, when determining which date of the “new calendar” falls on this or that date of the “old calendar”, it is necessary to take into account the century in which the event took place. For example, if in the XIV century this difference was 8 days, then in the XX century it was already 13 days.
From here follows the distribution of leap years:
- a year whose number is a multiple of 400 is a leap year;
- the remaining years, the number of which is a multiple of 100, are non-leap years;
- the rest of the years, the number of which is a multiple of 4, are leap years.
Thus, 1600 and 2000 were leap years, but 1700, 1800 and 1900 were not leap years. Nor will 2100 be a leap year. An error of one day compared to the year of the equinoxes in the Gregorian calendar will accumulate in about 10 thousand years (in the Julian - in about 128 years).
Time of approval of the Gregorian calendar
The Gregorian calendar, adopted in most countries of the world, was not immediately put into use:
1582
- Italy, Spain, Portugal, Poland, France, Lorraine, Holland, Luxembourg;
1583
- Austria (part), Bavaria, Tyrol.
1584
- Austria (part), Switzerland, Silesia, Westphalia.
1587
- Hungary.
1610
- Prussia.
1700
- Protestant German states, Denmark.
1752
- Great Britain.
1753
- Sweden, Finland.
1873
- Japan.
1911
- China.
1916
- Bulgaria.
1918
- Soviet Russia.
1919
- Serbia, Romania.
1927
- Türkiye.
1928
- Egypt.
1929
- Greece.
Gregorian calendar in Russia
As you know, until February 1918, Russia, like most Orthodox countries, lived according to the Julian calendar. The "new style" of chronology appeared in Russia in January 1918, when the Council of People's Commissars replaced the traditional Julian calendar with the Gregorian one. As stated in the Decree of the Council of People's Commissars, this decision was made "in order to establish in Russia the same time calculation with almost all cultural peoples." In accordance with the decree, the terms of all obligations were considered to have come 13 days later. Until July 1, 1918, a kind of transitional period was established, when it was allowed to use the old style chronology. But at the same time, the order of writing old and new dates was clearly established in the document: it was necessary to write “after the date of each day according to the new calendar, in brackets the number according to the calendar that was still in force”.
Events and documents are dated with a double date in cases where it is required to specify the old and new styles. For example, for anniversaries, major events in all biographical works and dates of events and documents on the history of international relations related to countries where the Gregorian calendar was introduced earlier than in Russia.
Date according to the new style (Gregorian calendar)
