New Year
New Year (also New Year's Day ) is the first day of the calendar year . Because of the sometimes different in different cultures and religions eras and thus calendar is the beginning of the year at different times. In almost all cultures it is associated with a New Year festival with associated customs, and it is often a public holiday . The choice of which day the 1st day of the calendar system falls on is called the calendar style .
Basics
On an astronomical basis, New Year's dates for solar calendar systems ( solar and lunisolar calendars ) refer to long-term fixed times such as winter / summer solstices (solstices) or passage through the winter / autumn point (equinox, equinoxes), i.e. the geometry of the ecliptic to relate, more unusual about the perihelion passage (maximum proximity to the sun), i.e. the geometry of the orbit of the earth. Pure lunar calendars ( lunar calendars ) relate their system to events of the [sun] earth-moon system (such as new moon / full moon ). The two models “wander” towards each other with respect to the beginning of the year . In addition, because of the length of the solar year of roughly 365¼ days, there is also intercalation (leap days and similar bridging units), which can be solved in different ways. The choice of the New Year's date is purely arbitrary and culturally determined, and is therefore called the calendar style .
The Gregorian calendar , which is used internationally today, is based on the sun low in the northern hemisphere (December 21, so the spring date fluctuates), and is shifted by 10 days from the solar year in this sense (the tropical year on which the year is based, however, is by definition related to the spring point today which is easier to measure).
In the following text, the dates mentioned are either that of the calendar system that is dealt with or that of the Gregorian calendar to which other calendar systems and styles are related.
New Year's date in the western cultural area
In 153 BC According to their calendar , the Romans moved the beginning of the year of office from March 1st to January 1st , the day the consuls took office . However, the calendar year kept the March style with March 1st as the beginning of the year. It was not until Caesar's calendar reform ( Julian calendar ) that the originally appended months of January and February were set at the beginning of the year, so that the calendar year and the year of office began on January 1st. The counting months (September, as much as 'seventh'; October, 'the eighth'; November, 'the ninth'; December, 'the tenth') lost the positions corresponding to their names. Instead of counting the year, the Romans named the years after the consuls' periods of office .
Until the New Year's Day was established in 1691 by Pope Innocent XII. On January 1st, January 6th ( high New Year ) was the beginning of the year in large parts of Europe .
In the western cultural area, January 1st as the date for the beginning of the year has been widespread since the Middle Ages . Regardless of this, there were and are different dates in different regions and times, and in addition, different New Year's dates were sometimes used simultaneously in the same geographic areas.
The following variants, which are mainly used in the church sector (see church year ), are worth mentioning :
- the circumcision style (from Latin circumcisio = circumcision of Jesus on the 8th day of his life) lets the year begin on January 1st
- the Annunciation style from conceptione Virginis (from the Latin. annuntiatio = proclamation of the Conception of Mary ) on 25 March (near the spring day and night are equally long / the beginning of spring )
- the Christmas style on December 25th (near the longest night / the beginning of winter)
- the Paschal style (from Latin pascha = Easter) between March 22nd and 23rd and April 25th
New Years Dates
Fixed dates
-
January 1st ( circumcision style )
- Roman Empire from 153 BC BC (official inauguration of the consuls )
- Roman Empire from 45 BC Chr. (→ Julian calendar )
- Rome and the Medieval Papal States
- Germany: City of Frankfurt am Main, Kurmainz from the 13th century, Meißen and Thuringia, Hochstift Münster from the 14th century, Augsburg from the 15th century, generally in Germany in the course of the 16th century
- France: from 1564 (→ Edict of Roussillon )
- Japan: from 1873 (→ Japanese New Year )
- Thailand : from 1941 (→ Suriyakati calendar )
-
6th January
- The Swabian-Alemannic New Year
-
January 14th
- Old New Years Eve
- civil Orthodox New Year, corresponds to January 1st on the Julian calendar; see below, September 14th
-
March 1st ( March style )
- Ancient Roman calendar to 153 BC. Chr.
- with the Franks
- Russia 988 to between 1475 and 1500
- Venice until 1797 ( More Veneto )
- Ottoman Empire and Turkey from 1840 to 1926 ( Rumi calendar )
-
March 21 (beginning of spring)
- In the Bahá'í - calendar year begins on March 21 in common years and 20 March in leap years , the Naw Ruz or Nowruz is called. This celebration is in Iran, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, in the Parsee celebrated community in India, Kosovo, Pakistan and by the Kurds and allegedly goes on Zarathustra back.
- The first day of the year in the Iranian calendar is determined by the astronomical beginning of spring, the spring equinox (see Nouruz ). In the Gregorian calendar this is between March 19th and March 21st. If the time of the spring equinox is before 12:00 noon Tehran local time, that day will be the first day of the new year, otherwise the next day.
-
March 25th ( Annunciation ); introduced by Dionysius Exiguus in 525
- widespread in Germany until the 13th century
- Florence and Pisa from the Renaissance to 1749
- Scotland until 1600
- England until 1752
- April 1st
- New Year of the Assyrians.
- Akitu
- Thailand : 1888 to 1941 (→ Suriyakati calendar )
- First Wednesday after April 14th:
- New Year (Serê Sal) of the Yazidis
- April 13th to 15th
- Thailand (see the article Songkran )
-
September 1st (day of the creation of the world)
- Byzantine Empire
- Russia from the mid-13th century to 1701 ( Peter the Great )
- Georgian calendar
-
September 14th
- ecclesiastical Orthodox New Year, corresponds to September 1st according to the Julian calendar; see above January 14th
-
September 22
- France, between 1793 and 1805, see the article French Revolutionary Calendar
-
October 31
- celtic new year celebration
-
November 1st
- Celtic New Year in neo-paganism , see also Samhain
-
December 25th (Christmas)
- widespread in England, Germany and Switzerland until the 16th century
- Spain 14th to 16th centuries
Moving appointments
The date is flexible relative to both the Gregorian calendar and the solar year:
- Chinese New Year (see there)
- Easter in the church year (between March 22nd / 23rd and April 25th); the paschal style, from Latin pascha (e.g. in the Georgian calendar )
- Jewish New Year (see there)
- Muslim New Year (see Muharram ). Since the Muslim year is about 11 days shorter and leap months are never inserted, the New Year's date moves compared to the Gregorian calendar, so that two Muslim New Years fall into a calendar year about every 33 years.
- Balinese New Year (day after the first spring new moon)
- Matariki , the New Year celebrations of the New Zealand Māori and other Polynesian peoples in the South Pacific: the rise of Rigel or the neighboring Pleiades , in early June.
- 1st Advent : Beginning of the church year in the western church
See also
literature
- Oswald Adolf Erich , Richard Beitl : Dictionary of German Folklore. (= Kröner's pocket edition. Volume 127). 3rd Edition. Kröner, Stuttgart 1974, ISBN 3-520-12703-2 , pp. 594-598.
- Karl-Heinz Göttert : All of our celebrations. Their origin and meaning. Reclam, Stuttgart 2007, ISBN 978-3-15-010645-7 , pp. 45-51.
- Paul Sartori : New Years. In: Eduard Hoffmann-Krayer , Hanns Bächtold-Stäubli : Concise dictionary of German superstition . Volume 6: Wall plow bread. Unchanged photomechanical reprint of the de Gruyter edition, Berlin / Leipzig 1935. De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 1987, ISBN 3-11-011194-2 , Sp. 1020-1045 ( digitized in the Internet Archive ).
- Roman Tischberger (Ed.): Happy New Year! The turn of the year and happiness. (= Series of publications by the museums of the Swabian district. Volume 53). Swabian Folklore Museum Oberschönenfeld, Oberschönenfeld 2015, DNB 1081338458 .
Web links
- New year . In: Kalender-Uhrzeit.de
- New year . In: Theology.de
- New year . In: Brauchtumsseiten.de
- Literature for New Years in the catalog of the German National Library
Individual evidence
- ↑ Tacitus , Annals 13.10; Censorinus , De die natali 21.7. See Little Pauly . Munich 1979, Volume 2, Column 1311.
- ↑ See Eszter Spät: The Yezidis. Saqi Books, London, 2005. pp. 64-66.
- ↑ Cf. Hieronymus Engberding : The New Year of the Byzantine liturgy on September 1st. In: The Christian Orient in the past and present. Volume 1, No. 3, 1936, pp. 12-17.