Happy New Year !? April 1st! The beginning of time? World's oldest 'April Fools Joke' discovered and what that means for you!

in #history8 years ago (edited)

Great things are going on in the field of history and archeology. I had to share this story from an article I came across regarding the first human calendar and how it began in the land of Mesopotamia and at the hands of the Babylonian Chaldeans or early Fratians on April 1, 5300 BC.

The world's oldest 'calendar', was created by hunter-gatherer societies and dates back to around 8,000 BC.
A monument so happened to be excavated in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, with credit going to the National Trust for Scotland circa 2004. The University of Birmingham, published in Internet Archaeology, it is referred to a 'lunisolar device'.

Finding out about the origin of the calendars is pretty cool as it was thought that back in Mesopotamia about 5000 years ago was its true origins. That a monument created by hunter-gatherers in Aberdeenshire were able to follow the lunar cycles over the year nearly 10,000 years ago.

The Mesolithic site is at the Warren Field, near the Crathes Castle, and aligns with the Winter solstice, which according to the project lead is an 'annual astronomic correction in order to maintain the link between the passage of time, indicated by the Moon, the asynchronous solar year and the associated seasons'.

Project leader Vince Gaffney, Professor of Landscape Archaeology at the University of Birmingham further comments: 'The evidence suggests that hunter-gatherer societies in Scotland had both the need and sophistication to track time across the years, to correct for seasonal drift of the lunar year and that this occurred nearly 5,000 years before the first formal calendars known in the Near East.

'In doing so, this illustrates one important step towards the formal construction of time and therefore history itself.'

So this would put the beginning of the year according to this luni-solar clock at April 1 and in accordance with the Babylonians calendar. This looks to have been a well known or possibly globally understood as the monolith in Scotland is thousands of miles and cultures away from Mesopotamia which is today, Iraq.

What about January 1st?

Geez, then I find on History.com that 'in 45 B.C., New Year's Day is celebrated on January 1 for the first time in history as the Julian calendar takes effect. Soon after becoming Roman dictator, Julius Caesar decided that the traditional Roman calendar was in dire need of reform'.

We must have needed to be given a delay in our natural human and mammal rhythms and cycles.

I mean maybe we can have a bit more luck launching those resolutions into the Spring, 3 months later.

In the Spring, when we have replenished our savings and our energy in essence by 'hibernating' for that energy-shot from mother nature that rolls through around the Spring Equinox on 3/21 and reaches prevalence on April 1st.
Some interesting shit right there.

Like the whole Roman Empire could get any douchier?

Of course its the political leaders who are insane with power who think its always a good idea ... like how? and why?

On the History.com, about Jan. 1, page it states, 'Soon after becoming Roman dictator, Julius Caesar decided that the traditional Roman calendar was in dire need of reform. Introduced around the seventh century B.C., the Roman calendar attempted to follow the lunar cycle but frequently fell out of phase with the seasons and had to be corrected. In addition, the pontifices, the Roman body charged with overseeing the calendar, often abused its authority by adding days to extend political terms or interfere with elections'.

Yeah like I said, that emperor was a definite Douch.

Caesar and Sosigenes, an Alexandrian astronomer, changed the lunar cycle entirely and follow the solar year, like the Egyptians (under the Khazarian Pharoahs). The year went from 360 days to be 365 and 1/4 days, and Caesar added 67 days to 45 B.C., making 46 B.C. begin on January 1, rather than in April. He also decreed that every four years a day be added to February, thus theoretically keeping his calendar from falling out of step.

Its why we have a leap year, but this change has taken us wildly away from what year we really could be in. I did read that in an interesting book titled the Greenland Theory as well. Here is a quick summary by a fellow steemian from a few years back and the link to the online book reference is below as well. I did end up following their steem too btw, some good stuff.

https://steemit.com/greenlandtheory/@romonero/greenland-theory

Shortly before his assassination in 44 B.C., he changed the name of the month Quintilis to Julius (July) after himself. Later, the month of Sextilis was renamed Augustus (August) after his successor. Yeah, another dick move... which again shows the de-alignment job being done to the people of the empire just changing the record keeping as Quint which finds its Etymological root in Latin from 'the fifth' and Sextilis is a root for 'the 6th'.

This is odd as they knew it was not in line with the lunar monolith from which Cesar devilishly deviated away from by their own admission and historical record. Why did July go from 5th month to 6th and how did August go from 6th month to 8th? How have many changes been made exactly? ¯_(ツ)_/¯

The concept of the celebration of New Year’s Day in January instead of in April did not go well in the Middle Ages, and even those loyal to the Rome Empire and its Julian calendar did not observe the New Year exactly on January 1. This was because Caesar and Sosigenes did not use a correct calculation for the correct value of a solar year. This created an 11-minute-a-year error which added seven days by the year 1000, and 10 days by the mid-15th century.

The Roman church or the Neo-Roman Empire decided to add to this problem, like always. So, circa the 1570s Pope Gregory XIII, whom at the behest of his Jesuit astronomer Christopher Clavius decreed that now named Roman Catholic Empire were to use a new calendar. This new Empire mind you, which spread by the sword thanks to crusades and inquisitions.

In 1582, the Gregorian calendar was implemented, omitting 10 days for that year and establishing the new rule that only one of every four centennial years should be a leap year. Since then, people around the world have gathered en masse on January 1 to celebrate the precise arrival of the New Year. I love to celebrate things as much as the next guy but why not celebrate the New Year on April first as well.

Well, I guess what I'm trying to say is Happy 2018 Everyone! ...Again. or is it April Fools Day? Jokes on us?

Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2013-07-world-oldest-calendar

http://intarch.ac.uk/journal/issue34/gaffney_index.html

https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/new-years-day

More information: Time and a Place: A luni-solar 'time reckoner' from 8th millennium BC Scotland, Internet Archaeology, July 15 2013. dx.doi.org/10.11141/ia.34.1

https://sites.google.com/site/greenlandtheory/

You can check out my last few rants below, haha!

https://steemit.com/steemit/@jaimebetamax/blockchain-a-global-financial-payment-system-reboot-or-am-i-just-seeing-things-an-observation-of-mine

https://steemit.com/steemit/@jaimebetamax/has-the-sun-begun-to-set-on-unregulated-icos-and-crypto-exchanges-in-the-us

https://steemit.com/steemit/@jaimebetamax/silver-mother-of-all-bullish-cup-and-handle-patterns-redux-with-some-tasty-coffee

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