While Christmas was officially celebrated on December 25th as early as 336 CE under Emperor Constantine; for a period of about 170 years, people disagreed about WHICH DAY was December 25th. Let's talk about 10 days in history that never happened. - ThreadSky

c0nc0rdance.bsky.social • 68 days ago

While Christmas was officially celebrated on December 25th as early as 336 CE under Emperor Constantine; for a period of about 170 years, people disagreed about WHICH DAY was December 25th.

Let's talk about 10 days in history that never happened.

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zealws.bsky.social•68 days ago

Fun fact: Isaac Asimov was born in 1919-1920 during the Russian Revolution which was also the Julian/Gregorian switch in Russia so he didn't know his exact birthdate. His mother said he was born in September 1919 so she could get him into school early.

zealws.bsky.social•68 days ago

Later he corrected his birthday to a more accurate day in January 1920. In September 1945, he was drafted. If he had used the birthday his mother had originally used, he would have been 26 and not eligible for the draft. He wound up not serving for other reasons.

c0nc0rdance.bsky.social•68 days ago

The Julian calendar was one of Julius Caesar's reforms, moving from a 10 month system to a 12 month system of 365.25 days, aligning solar days to calendar days.

This system worked very well, except for one fact: the solar or 'tropical year' is 365.242 days. Meaning it drifted 1 day per 314 years.

c0nc0rdance.bsky.social•68 days ago

This created issues with certain saint days tied to moon phase and equinox relative to the Catholic Church's recognized calendar day.

Pope Gregory XIII issued papal bull 'Inter gravissimas', 1582, creating the Gregorian calendar we use today.

Non-Catholic countries continued using the Julian.

c0nc0rdance.bsky.social•68 days ago

A fun side effect of this is you could cross a country border and travel back in time 10 days, and also 10 calendar days were never observed: the sun set on October 4th, 1582 and then rose on October 15th, with no calendars day between.

In England and other Protestant countries...

c0nc0rdance.bsky.social•68 days ago

... the Julian calendar remained in use for another century (until 1752), meaning the UK and Italy celebrated Christmas on the same calendar day 10-11 days apart.

Today, you can convert from Julian to Gregorian by adding 13-14 days to the Julian date because of additional 'slippage'.

c0nc0rdance.bsky.social•68 days ago

All of which to say: Isaac Newton was born on December 25th, 1642 in England... which was January 4th, 1643 (?) on the Gregorian calendar.

Merry Netwonmas Eve Eve Eve Eve etc...!

c0nc0rdance.bsky.social•68 days ago

For more reading about the missing 10 days:

peiferlabunc.bsky.social•68 days ago

This is a nice piece about the choice of December 25 and its antecedents
https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/people-cultures-in-the-bible/jesus-historical-jesus/how-december-25-became-christmas/

peiferlabunc.bsky.social•68 days ago

and it offers an alternate theory for choosing the date--he was conceived and crucified on the same day.....

c0nc0rdance.bsky.social•68 days ago

There's an old joke about a man with no watch never knowing what time it is, while a man with two watches is never certain.

We have too many historical calendars to ever be certain what day things occurred.

skepteis.bsky.social•68 days ago

Reminds me of the phantom time conspiracy theory, which is one of my favourites

shireenj.bsky.social•68 days ago

I hadn’t heard of this theory before. Interesting.

Of course, it’s a fallacy that Mary was always a virgin. Jesus had brothers and sisters after all, and one wrote James in the NT.

lccamano.bsky.social•68 days ago

📌

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