What the hell with that old style calendar ???

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Denis Beauregard

What the hell with that old style calendar ???

Legg inn av Denis Beauregard » 23 nov 2007 05:18:57

I would like to understand how an event may happen on a date
that doesn't exist.

Before the reform of the English calendar in 1752, the year
was beginning on the March 1st. So, an event occuring in
February should be dated the previous year in a document
made at this time.

Then, how can something occur on the February 29th 1704 old
style or March 11th new style. The old style date should be
in 1703 which is not a leap year, so it must be the 28th,
not the 29th.

I have seem an image of an original document of 1707, so long
before the change of calendar, and it is clearly written
"last of February 1703/4". See
http://www.1704.deerfield.history.museu ... istoric.do

I have seen some medieval time line in the 1300s years where the
year was obviously beginning in March (in a Dauphine or French
document), so in the medieval time, the year begun in March.

In 1752, it switched to January in England but was already
that month in the Catholic countries for nearly 2 centuries
(when they changed to the Gregorian calendar).

But in February 1703/1704, shouldn't the year in New England
be 1703, so not a leap year, so I would like to know why many web
sites say the Deerfield attack happened in the night of the
February 29th, 1704 old style while it should be February 28th,
1703 ?


Denis

--
0 Denis Beauregard -
/\/ Les Français d'Amérique du Nord - http://www.francogene.com/genealogie--quebec/
|\ French in North America before 1722 - http://www.francogene.com/quebec--genealogy/
/ | Maintenant sur cédérom, début à 1770 (Version 2008)
oo oo Now on CD-ROM, beginnings to 1770 (2008 Release)

Gjest

Re: What the hell with that old style calendar ???

Legg inn av Gjest » 23 nov 2007 07:49:02

On Nov 22, 8:18 pm, Denis Beauregard <denis.b-at-
francogene....@fr.invalid> wrote:
I would like to understand how an event may happen on a date
that doesn't exist.

Before the reform of the English calendar in 1752, the year
was beginning on the March 1st. So, an event occuring in
February should be dated the previous year in a document
made at this time.

Then, how can something occur on the February 29th 1704 old
style or March 11th new style. The old style date should be
in 1703 which is not a leap year, so it must be the 28th,
not the 29th.

First let's be clear. There were two different calendar reforms. The
first regarded when the year started, although the old style first of
the year was not the 1 of March, but the 25th, Annunciation Day. (note
that this would not affect the year at all in your case, with Feb 28/9
and Mar 11 falling within the same year whether the year begins on Jan
1 or Mar 25)

The other change was going from Julian to Gregorian, which resulted in
the subtraction of 11 days (at the time the change was made) - this is
(generally) not done retroactively.

The problem is that both old systems are sometimes called "Old Style",
and it looks like the people who did this correction from old to new
adjusted the Julian/Gregorian shift (which is not generally
corrected), but not the change from Annunciation day (which generally
is).

I have seem an image of an original document of 1707, so long
before the change of calendar, and it is clearly written
"last of February 1703/4". Seehttp://www.1704.deerfield.history.mu ... istoric.do

Many congregations anticipated the formal Annunciation Day-to-Jan 1
shift by several decades, representing the dates between Jan 1 and Mar
25 thus. What I don't know is how they dealt with Leap Year Day. Did
they celebrate it in 1703/4, or 1704/5. My guess would be the latter,
but I think you would have to check the actual records of Deerfield to
be certain. (I checked a couple of my people who got the old "welcome
to America" from their reluctant hosts that day, but I don't have the
precise day recorded in my handy reference sheets.)

taf

Renia

Re: What the hell with that old style calendar ???

Legg inn av Renia » 23 nov 2007 10:58:36

taf@clearwire.net wrote:

On Nov 22, 8:18 pm, Denis Beauregard <denis.b-at-
francogene....@fr.invalid> wrote:

I would like to understand how an event may happen on a date
that doesn't exist.

Before the reform of the English calendar in 1752, the year
was beginning on the March 1st. So, an event occuring in
February should be dated the previous year in a document
made at this time.

Then, how can something occur on the February 29th 1704 old
style or March 11th new style. The old style date should be
in 1703 which is not a leap year, so it must be the 28th,
not the 29th.


First let's be clear. There were two different calendar reforms. The
first regarded when the year started, although the old style first of
the year was not the 1 of March, but the 25th, Annunciation Day. (note
that this would not affect the year at all in your case, with Feb 28/9
and Mar 11 falling within the same year whether the year begins on Jan
1 or Mar 25)

The other change was going from Julian to Gregorian, which resulted in
the subtraction of 11 days (at the time the change was made) - this is
(generally) not done retroactively.

The problem is that both old systems are sometimes called "Old Style",
and it looks like the people who did this correction from old to new
adjusted the Julian/Gregorian shift (which is not generally
corrected), but not the change from Annunciation day (which generally
is).


I have seem an image of an original document of 1707, so long
before the change of calendar, and it is clearly written
"last of February 1703/4". Seehttp://www.1704.deerfield.history.mu ... istoric.do


Many congregations anticipated the formal Annunciation Day-to-Jan 1
shift by several decades, representing the dates between Jan 1 and Mar
25 thus. What I don't know is how they dealt with Leap Year Day. Did
they celebrate it in 1703/4, or 1704/5. My guess would be the latter,
but I think you would have to check the actual records of Deerfield to
be certain. (I checked a couple of my people who got the old "welcome
to America" from their reluctant hosts that day, but I don't have the
precise day recorded in my handy reference sheets.)

Leap year didn't exist prior to 1752. The reason for having leap years,
is that having an extra day (Feb 29th) every four years, helps to adjust
the timing of clocks, which are or were out by a few seconds, making the
main calendar as reasonably accurate every four-year cycle. (Not sure
I've explained that properly!) So, prior to the adoption of the new
calendar, the last day of February would have been the 28th Feb, not the
29th.

John Watson

Re: What the hell with that old style calendar ???

Legg inn av John Watson » 23 nov 2007 11:05:03

On Nov 23, 2:47 pm, t...@clearwire.net wrote:
On Nov 22, 8:18 pm, Denis Beauregard <denis.b-at-

francogene....@fr.invalid> wrote:
I would like to understand how an event may happen on a date
that doesn't exist.

Before the reform of the English calendar in 1752, the year
was beginning on the March 1st. So, an event occuring in
February should be dated the previous year in a document
made at this time.

Then, how can something occur on the February 29th 1704 old
style or March 11th new style. The old style date should be
in 1703 which is not a leap year, so it must be the 28th,
not the 29th.

First let's be clear. There were two different calendar reforms. The
first regarded when the year started, although the old style first of
the year was not the 1 of March, but the 25th, Annunciation Day. (note
that this would not affect the year at all in your case, with Feb 28/9
and Mar 11 falling within the same year whether the year begins on Jan
1 or Mar 25)

The other change was going from Julian to Gregorian, which resulted in
the subtraction of 11 days (at the time the change was made) - this is
(generally) not done retroactively.

The problem is that both old systems are sometimes called "Old Style",
and it looks like the people who did this correction from old to new
adjusted the Julian/Gregorian shift (which is not generally
corrected), but not the change from Annunciation day (which generally
is).

I have seem an image of an original document of 1707, so long
before the change of calendar, and it is clearly written
"last of February 1703/4". Seehttp://www.1704.deerfield.history.mu ... istoric.do

Many congregations anticipated the formal Annunciation Day-to-Jan 1
shift by several decades, representing the dates between Jan 1 and Mar
25 thus. What I don't know is how they dealt with Leap Year Day. Did
they celebrate it in 1703/4, or 1704/5. My guess would be the latter,
but I think you would have to check the actual records of Deerfield to
be certain. (I checked a couple of my people who got the old "welcome
to America" from their reluctant hosts that day, but I don't have the
precise day recorded in my handy reference sheets.)

taf

This raises an interesting though largely academic point. In both the
Julian and Gregorian calendar systems an extra day is added to the end
of February every fourth year - in the years when the date is
divisible by four. The main difference between the two systems, is
that the extra day is not added in the century years in the Gregorian
calendar unless the year number is divisible by 400 (i.e. 1700, 1800
and 1900 had no February 29, but 2000 did in the Gregorian system).

In the English (Julian) calendar system (also used in the colonies)
before 1754, the year started on 25 March (Lady Day), so 29 February
1704 would occur in both calendar systems, but the extra day would be
one year later in England, compared with the Gregorian calendar.

Since France had adopted the Gregorian calendar in 1582, presumably
the Quebecois were using this calendar. In 1704 there was a 10-day
difference between the calendars used in the British Empire and the
calendars used in most of the rest of Europe. So, 29 February 1704 for
the Quebecois would be 19 February 1703 for the British colonists.
Conversely, 29 February 1704 for the British would be 10 March 1705
for the Quebecois. Exactly which date the incident occurred, by our
reckoning, is entirely going to depend on which side did the
reporting.

Hope that wasn't too confusing.

Regards,

John

Denis Beauregard

Re: What the hell with that old style calendar ???

Legg inn av Denis Beauregard » 23 nov 2007 16:55:42

On Thu, 22 Nov 2007 22:47:50 -0800 (PST), taf@clearwire.net wrote in
soc.genealogy.medieval:

First let's be clear. There were two different calendar reforms. The
first regarded when the year started, although the old style first of
the year was not the 1 of March, but the 25th, Annunciation Day. (note
that this would not affect the year at all in your case, with Feb 28/9
and Mar 11 falling within the same year whether the year begins on Jan
1 or Mar 25)

After further reading, I found something about that in
books.google.com.

1) Some paper saying that the legal date was using new year as the
March 25th, but people were already using the January 1st to change
year, this long before 1752. I don't know if the popular use is
short after 1582 (when the Catholics adopted the Gregorian/new style
calendar) or after 1700, or long before 1582. But that paper said
in 1752 both the calendar and legal date for new year were changed.

2) Lead years in the Julian calendar are similar to the same in the
Gregorian calendar, i.e. multiple of 4. However, if the year legally
begun the March 25th, then circa 1704, the Gregorian leap day occured
the Feb. 29, 1704, but the Julian **legal** one occured the Julian
March 11, 1705 (which would be written as 1704/5) while the Julian
***civil** (or popular) leap day occured one year before, the March
11, 1704, close to the same in the Gregorian calendar.

There must be some date in the Medieval time where the beginning
of the year was the same for civil and legal use, i.e. March 25th,
and corresponding in the Gregorian calendar to the previous year.
Or is it possible the legal use was only to record laws and nobody
actually was using it ? I remember that in the Regeste de Dauphine
(or something like that), which is some kind of roll of events in
the medieval times, circa the 1300s and 1400s, was using a new year
in March but I didn't check for any date on the Feb. 29.

Many congregations anticipated the formal Annunciation Day-to-Jan 1
shift by several decades, representing the dates between Jan 1 and Mar
25 thus. What I don't know is how they dealt with Leap Year Day. Did
they celebrate it in 1703/4, or 1704/5. My guess would be the latter,
but I think you would have to check the actual records of Deerfield to
be certain. (I checked a couple of my people who got the old "welcome
to America" from their reluctant hosts that day, but I don't have the
precise day recorded in my handy reference sheets.)

There is at least one letter dated 1706 saying the "last day" of
February. The other record I have seen is the history told by a
witness but it seems all the copies in google books are from the
7th or more printing.


Denis

--
0 Denis Beauregard -
/\/ Les Français d'Amérique du Nord - http://www.francogene.com/genealogie--quebec/
|\ French in North America before 1722 - http://www.francogene.com/quebec--genealogy/
/ | Maintenant sur cédérom, début à 1770 (Version 2008)
oo oo Now on CD-ROM, beginnings to 1770 (2008 Release)

Ian Goddard

Re: What the hell with that old style calendar ???

Legg inn av Ian Goddard » 23 nov 2007 17:50:27

Denis Beauregard wrote:
I would like to understand how an event may happen on a date
that doesn't exist.

Before the reform of the English calendar in 1752, the year
was beginning on the March 1st. So, an event occuring in
February should be dated the previous year in a document
made at this time.

Then, how can something occur on the February 29th 1704 old
style or March 11th new style. The old style date should be
in 1703 which is not a leap year, so it must be the 28th,
not the 29th.

I have seem an image of an original document of 1707, so long
before the change of calendar, and it is clearly written
"last of February 1703/4". See
http://www.1704.deerfield.history.museu ... istoric.do

I have seen some medieval time line in the 1300s years where the
year was obviously beginning in March (in a Dauphine or French
document), so in the medieval time, the year begun in March.

In 1752, it switched to January in England but was already
that month in the Catholic countries for nearly 2 centuries
(when they changed to the Gregorian calendar).

But in February 1703/1704, shouldn't the year in New England
be 1703, so not a leap year, so I would like to know why many web
sites say the Deerfield attack happened in the night of the
February 29th, 1704 old style while it should be February 28th,
1703 ?


Denis


This is a useful reference for calendars in general
http://www.tondering.dk/claus/cal/calendar28.html

--
Ian

Hotmail is for spammers. Real mail address is igoddard
at nildram co uk

Denis Beauregard

Re: What the hell with that old style calendar ???

Legg inn av Denis Beauregard » 23 nov 2007 18:12:52

On Fri, 23 Nov 2007 16:50:27 +0000, Ian Goddard
<goddai01@hotmail.co.uk> wrote in soc.genealogy.medieval:

This is a useful reference for calendars in general
http://www.tondering.dk/claus/cal/calendar28.html

Would you believe a site with:

The leap years were:
45 BC, 42 BC, 39 BC, 36 BC, 33 BC, 30 BC, 27 BC, 24 BC, 21 BC, 18 BC, 15 BC, 12 BC, 9 BC, AD 8, AD 12, and every 4th year from then on.

Those dates were computed in the 700s. Why would the Roman use a "BC"
date ? Non-sense. And no reason to change the leap year in year 1.

If based on actual data, they should give the original (Roman)
years and then the Julian/Christian dates...

Interesting, but not sure if reliable...

Anyway, there is nothing about the problem of the date of new year.


Denis

--
0 Denis Beauregard -
/\/ Les Français d'Amérique du Nord - http://www.francogene.com/genealogie--quebec/
|\ French in North America before 1722 - http://www.francogene.com/quebec--genealogy/
/ | Maintenant sur cédérom, début à 1770 (Version 2008)
oo oo Now on CD-ROM, beginnings to 1770 (2008 Release)

Denis Beauregard

Re: What the hell with that old style calendar ???

Legg inn av Denis Beauregard » 23 nov 2007 21:57:02

This message gives the solution.


http://groups.google.fr/group/soc.genea ... fac6de222f

Despite England was using the March 25th as the beginning of the
legal year (for tax purposes for instances), they were using the
January 1st as a reference to compute the leap day, likely because
in many places, it was always the Jan. 1st (perhaps from the Roman
era).


Denis

--
0 Denis Beauregard -
/\/ Les Français d'Amérique du Nord - http://www.francogene.com/genealogie--quebec/
|\ French in North America before 1722 - http://www.francogene.com/quebec--genealogy/
/ | Maintenant sur cédérom, début à 1770 (Version 2008)
oo oo Now on CD-ROM, beginnings to 1770 (2008 Release)

Chris Pitt Lewis

Re: What the hell with that old style calendar ???

Legg inn av Chris Pitt Lewis » 24 nov 2007 15:51:42

In message <n42ek35i2vsu7p8ou2lqcr4oqgps4qt26u@4ax.com>, Denis
Beauregard <denis.b-at-francogene.com@fr.invalid> writes
On Fri, 23 Nov 2007 16:50:27 +0000, Ian Goddard
goddai01@hotmail.co.uk> wrote in soc.genealogy.medieval:

This is a useful reference for calendars in general
http://www.tondering.dk/claus/cal/calendar28.html

Would you believe a site with:

The leap years were:
45 BC, 42 BC, 39 BC, 36 BC, 33 BC, 30 BC, 27 BC, 24 BC, 21 BC, 18 BC,
15 BC, 12 BC, 9 BC, AD 8, AD 12, and every 4th year from then on.

Those dates were computed in the 700s. Why would the Roman use a "BC"
date ? Non-sense. And no reason to change the leap year in year 1.

If based on actual data, they should give the original (Roman)
years and then the Julian/Christian dates...

Interesting, but not sure if reliable...

Anyway, there is nothing about the problem of the date of new year.


Denis


These dates are correct (except in one respect - see below). As the site
explains, the Romans initially calculated the leap years wrongly. Almost
incredibly, they confused themselves with their inclusive method of
counting (counting the starting point as 1 rather than 0, so that, for
instance, the day before the Kalends of December counts as II Kal Dec,
not I Kal Dec). So, understanding the principle to be that there should
be a leap year every fourth year, instead of counting as they should:
1234
xxxx1234
they counted:
1234
xxx1234
and put the leap year in what we would call every third year.

After 36 years, the resulting drift in the calendar made the mistake
obvious. The solution was to catch up by omitting the next three leap
year days, and starting the correct four year cycle in the year we now
call 8 AD. It is pure chance that the gap straddles the BC/AD boundary,
where there is the further complication that, of course, there is no
year 0 in our system. Presumably when Dionysius invented the AD era in
the 6th century he deliberately fixed it so that the leap years fell
conveniently in years divisible by 4, but I do not know.

The source for the error and its correction is the early 5th century
writer Macrobius (Saturnalia I, 14). He does not name the years
involved, but says that in the 36 years after the introduction of the
new calendar there were 12 leap years when there should have been nine.
Augustus ordered it put right by ordering 12 years without a leap day,
so as to claw back the extra three. Since then, says Macrobius, the
scheme Caesar intended has been regularly followed.

So from this information, the knowledge that the Julian calendar started
in 45 BC, and our knowledge of how the regular cycle has ended up, it is
possible to calculate which years were involved. It would be possible to
name the years in the way a contemporary would, using the names of the
consuls, but is obviously more intelligible to use the modern system.

But one detail is unclear (at least to me). The website points out that
scholarly opinions differ as to whether 45 BC - the starting year - was
a leap year. 45 BC plus 36 years is 9 BC, so it is not quite clear
whether Macrobius means to say that 9 BC was a leap year, or the first
of the 3 omitted leap years. Since there were 12 leap years before the
correction, it would appear that if 9 BC was a leap year, then 45 BC was
not. Conversely, if 45 BC was a leap year, then presumably 9 BC was not.

Macrobius' Latin text can be found here (scroll down to chapter XIV):

http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/R ... urnalia/1*
..html
--
Chris Pitt Lewis

Ian Goddard

Re: What the hell with that old style calendar ???

Legg inn av Ian Goddard » 24 nov 2007 16:33:53

Denis Beauregard wrot
The leap years were:
45 BC, 42 BC, 39 BC, 36 BC, 33 BC, 30 BC, 27 BC, 24 BC, 21 BC, 18 BC, 15 BC, 12 BC, 9 BC, AD 8, AD 12, and every 4th year from then on.

Those dates were computed in the 700s. Why would the Roman use a "BC"
date ? Non-sense. And no reason to change the leap year in year 1.

If based on actual data, they should give the original (Roman)
years and then the Julian/Christian dates...

I would guess he thought that BC/AD dates would have been more
meaningful to his readers than AUC.

--
Ian

Hotmail is for spammers. Real mail address is igoddard
at nildram co uk

Denis Beauregard

Re: What the hell with that old style calendar ???

Legg inn av Denis Beauregard » 24 nov 2007 18:19:49

On Sat, 24 Nov 2007 15:33:53 +0000, Ian Goddard
<goddai01@hotmail.co.uk> wrote in soc.genealogy.medieval:

Denis Beauregard wrot
The leap years were:
45 BC, 42 BC, 39 BC, 36 BC, 33 BC, 30 BC, 27 BC, 24 BC, 21 BC, 18 BC, 15 BC, 12 BC, 9 BC, AD 8, AD 12, and every 4th year from then on.

Those dates were computed in the 700s. Why would the Roman use a "BC"
date ? Non-sense. And no reason to change the leap year in year 1.

If based on actual data, they should give the original (Roman)
years and then the Julian/Christian dates...

I would guess he thought that BC/AD dates would have been more
meaningful to his readers than AUC.

In that case, what about a double table ?

Line 1 - AUC/Roman date
Line 2 - AD/BC/Julian date


Denis

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