Anno Domini

God created the world in 4004 B.C., and it was reorganized by J. P. Morgan in 1901.

The New Testament is not a collection of maxims, reflections, and meditations dissociated from historical concreteness. On the contrary, its documents focus on a historical figure, Jesus of Nazareth, and address the problems faced by his followers in a variety of specific contexts in the Roman Empire. This concern with historical events, persons, and situations does not mean, however, that the New Testament submits itself to purely historical and chronological interests.

The Greeks dated events by Olympiads, or periods of four years intervening between successive celebrations of the Olympic games, and this mode of computation, having been largely adopted at Rome, continued to be frequently used in the first centuries of Christianity. The Olympiads started from 776 B.C., and consequently A.D. 1 was the fourth year of the 194th Olympiad.

The Romans frequently reckoned from the traditional foundation of their city (ab urbe conditâ--A.U.C.), which date, as has been said, coincided with 753 B.C. They likewise often designated years by the names of the consuls then in office (e.g. console Planco). Sometimes the Romans dated by post-consular years (i.e. so long after the consulate of a well-known man). Naturally the regnal years of Roman emperors presently supplanted those of consuls, whose power in later times was merely nominal, and from the emperors this method of describing dates was imitated by popes, kings, and other rulers, with or without the addition of the year A.D. It became in fact universal in the Middle Ages, and it subsists in documents, both ecclesiastical and civil, down to our own day.

The Christian Era has this disadvantage for chronological purposes, that dates have to be reckoned backwards or forwards according as they are B.C. or A.D., whereas in an ideally perfect system all events would be reckoned in one sequence. The difficulty was to find a starting point whence to reckon, for the beginnings of history in which this should naturally be placed are those of which chronologically we know least. At one period it was attempted to date from the Creation (A.M. or Anno Mundi), that event being placed by Christian chronologists, such as Archbishop Usher, in 4004 B.C., and by the Jews in 3761 B.C. But any attempt thus to determine the age of the world has been long since abandoned.

In the year 1583, however--that following the Gregorian reform--Joseph Justus Scaliger introduced a basis of calculation which to a large extent served the purpose required, and, according to Sir John Herschel, first introduced light and order into chronology. This was the Julian Period--one of 7980 Julian years, i.e. years of which every fourth one contains 366 days. The same number of Gregorian years would contain 60 days less. For historians these commence with the midnight preceding 1 January, 4713 B.C., for astronomers with the following noon. The period 7980 was obtained by multiplying together 28, 19, and 15, being respectively the number of years in the Solar Cycles the Lunar Cycle, and the Roman Indiction, and the year 4713 B.C. was that for which the number of each of these subordinate cycles equals 1. The astronomical day is reckoned from noon to noon instead of from midnight to midnight. Scaliger calculated his period for the meridian of Alexandria to which Ptolemy had referred his calculation.

The introduction of the Gregorian Calendar entailed various discrepancies between the dates which different people assigned to the same events. The Julian system of time-measurements, introduced by Cæsar, was not sufficiently accurate, as it made the year slightly too long, with the result that by the sixteenth century it had fallen ten days in arrear, so that, for instance, the day of the vernal equinox, which should have been called 21 March, was called 11 March. To remedy this, besides substituting an improved system which should prevent the error from operating in future, it was necessary to omit ten full days in order to bring things back to the proper point.

Pope Gregory XIII, who introduced the reformed system, or "New Style", ordained that ten days in October, 1582, should not be counted, the fourth of that month being immediately followed by the fifteenth. He moreover determined that the year should begin with 1 January, and in order to prevent the Julian error from causing retardation in the future as in the past, he ruled that three leap years should be omitted in every four centuries, viz. those of the centennial years the first two figures of which are not exact multiples of four, as 1700, 1800, 1900, 2100, etc. The New Style (N.S.) was speedily adopted by Catholic States, but for a long time the Protestant States retained the Old (O.S.), from which there followed important differences in marking dates according as one or other style was followed. In the first place there was the original difference of ten days between them, increased to eleven by the O.S. 29 February in A.D. 1700, to twelve days in 1800, and to thirteen in 1900. Moreover, the period from 1 January to 24 March inclusive, which was the commencement of the year according to N.S., according to O.S. was the conclusion of the year previous. From want of attention to this, important events have sometimes been misquoted by a year.

In illustration may be considered the death of Queen Elizabeth. This occurred in what was then styled in England 24 March 1602, being the last day of that year. In France and wherever the N.S. prevailed, this day was described as 3 April, 1603. To avoid all possible ambiguity such dates are frequently expressed in fractional form as 24 March/3 April, 1602/3. In our modern histories years are always given according to N.S., but dates are otherwise left as they were originally recorded. Thus Queen Elizabeth is said to have died 24 March, 1603. Not till 1700 was the Gregorian reform accepted by the Protestant States of Germany and the Low Countries, and not till 1752 by Great Britain, there being by that time a difference of eleven days between O.S. and N.S. Sweden, after some strange vacillation, followed suit in 1753. O.S. was still followed by Russia and other Eastern Orthodox countries well into the twentieth century, and their dates consequently were thirteen days behind those of the rest of Christendom.

It is thus for history what latitude and longitude are for geography. The first requisite in any system of historical chronology is an era, that is to say a fixed point of time, the distance from which shall indicate the position of all others. The term era, the derivation of which is not certainly known, appears first to have been employed in France and Spain to signify a number or rule. Since the need of a definite system of chronology was first recognized by mankind, many and various eras have been employed at different periods and by different nations.

Foremost among these is that which is now adopted by all civilized peoples and known as the Christian, Vulgar, or Common Era, in the twentieth century of which we are now living. This was introduced about the year 527 by Dionysius Exiguus, a Scythian monk resident at Rome, who fixed its starting point in the year 753 from the foundation of Rome, in which year, according to his calculation, the birth of Christ occurred. Making this the year 1 of his era, he counted the years which followed in regular course from it, calling them years "of the Lord", and we now designate such a date A.D. (i.e. Anno Domini). The year preceding A.D. 1 is called Ante Christum (A.C.) or Before Christ (B.C.).

England would appear to have been among the earliest regions to have made use of it, under the influence of the Roman missioners, as it is found in Saxon charters of the seventh century. In Gaul it made its appearance only in the eighth, and its use did not become general in Europe until after A.D. 1000; accordingly in French the term millésime was frequently used to signify a date A.D. In Spain, although not unknown as early as the seventh century, the use of the Christian Era, did not become general until after the middle of the fourteenth century.

With the collapse of the Roman Empire in the fifth century A.D. came the beginning of a long period now known as the Middle Ages. Over the next seven centuries, until the beginning of the Renaissance, the European continent was intended to function as one Christian state, with the Catholic Church playing the central role in governing the lives of its people. In 1231, Pope Gregory IX officially formalized the mission of the Holy Office, or Inquisition, to deal with heretics against the church, as well as moral crimes. Though it eased up in Europe after the 14th century, the Inquisition was kept alive for a period in Spain, where it targeted Jews and Muslims who had converted to Catholicism after a royal mandate in 1492. Some of the interrogation devices traced to the inquisitors include the heretic's fork, the Judas cradle and the headcrusher. For many, the dawn of the Renaissance around the 13th to 15th centuries showed the failure of the church to provide a satisfactory framework for all of Europe's diverse citizens, and monarchies, nation-states and national languages were gaining ground. The term Middle Ages was coined by Renaissance scholars, who saw themselves as rediscovering and reviving the humanist values of ancient Greece and Rome and leaving behind the culturally dark ages of the years in between.

Life during the Middle Ages was dominated by the feudal system. There was little central authority (aside from the church) and individual noblemen or lords owned and governed all land. They parceled their land out to dependents, or vassals, in the form of "fiefs," which the vassals would then work in order to make a living and keep the agricultural economy going. Vassals would also pay homage to the lord, even fighting for him if required to do so. The feudal system rigidly separated the different members of society into royals, knights, noblemen and peasants, with hardly any mobility between the classes. Religion played an enormous role in medieval life, and days of worship, feasts and holidays provided the most consistent schedule--aside from the various cycles of the farm calendar--for peasant and lord alike.

The death of Queen Elizabeth I, the last of the Tudors, in 1603 ushered in a century of domestic conflict in England. The new Stuart monarchy clashed with Parliament, Puritans clashed with the Church of England and Catholics continued to be persecuted. Civil war broke out in 1642, spearheaded by the military leadership of Oliver Cromwell, and King Charles I was executed in 1849. Cromwell declared a Commonwealth and protectorate and divided the country into military districts governed by his own generals, which ended up turning the people against him. Royalist sentiment, fueled by resentment of Puritans and the military, grew ever stronger, and after Cromwell's death, the dead king's son returned from exile and was crowned Charles II in 1660. The new regime, and especially the policies of Parliament during this time, moved away from the strict moral codes of Puritanism and an increased repression of non-Anglican Protestants and Catholics. After Charles' Catholic brother, James, was crowned king in 1685, the country headed straight toward revolution, as James' opponents enlisted the king's own son-in-law, the Dutch prince William of Orange, to invade England and take the throne in 1688. As the century ended, William and his wife Mary ruled England jointly, as William sought to assert himself militarily over the territorial ambitions of France's Louis XIV. With order (if not harmony) restored, England began to reclaim its position as one of the strongest military and economic powers in the world.

Despite the bitter struggles between Anglicans, Puritans and Catholics, life for many Englishmen was improving during the 17th century. New methods of agriculture had been introduced, the population was growing steadily and the development of colonies in North America and the West Indies meant that England was increasing its reputation as a trading power. A strong banking industry also developed over the century, culminating in the founding of the Bank of England in 1694. Even as these changes greatly improved life for nobles, merchants and the yeoman farmers who owned their own land, a great mass of the population--particularly the tenant farmers and laborers--continued to struggle to make a living. England's towns and cities were growing rapidly, and despite efforts to improve plumbing and transportation, they were dirty and unsanitary. Plagues broke out in London in 1603, 1636 and 1665, killing large numbers of people, mostly in the city's poorer sections.

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