1. To the most ancient of ancient Romans, the year began in March: this is why in so many languages the ninth to 12th months, September to December, are even now named for the Latin words for “seventh” to “tenth”.
2. The man Romans credited with changing that was Numa Pompilius, who followed Romulus to become the second king of Rome. He is credited with creating most of the city’s political and religious institutions – not just the calendar, but also the office of Pontifex Maximus (the high priest); the cults of Mars, Jupiter and his predecessor; the Vestal Virgins and so on.
3. There are, however, two slight problems with this theory. One: there is evidence that January 1 didn’t begin the New Year until around 153BC, more than half a millennium after Numa Pompilius is believed to have died. Two: he almost certainly never existed at all. Whoever invented it, the Roman calendar – the Julian version, introduced by the (actually existing) Julius Caesar in 46BC – spread, because that’s the sort of thing you can do if you’ve got a big empire.
4. After Rome fell, though, much of Christendom changed the date of New Year’s Day. One popular choice was December 25, for reasons I’m not going to spell out; another was March 25, the Feast of the Annunciation, which commemorates the moment Mary was visited by the Angel Gabriel and learned she was up the duff. Both options speak more of fresh starts from a specifically Christian point of view.
5. The English went with March, and kept to it for a surprisingly long time: as late as the 18th century, the new year began in the spring, which means that March 24, 1750 was, officially if confusingly, followed by March 25, 1751.
6. By then, though, England was behind the times. In 1582, Pope Gregory XIII had introduced the Gregorian calendar, to deal with the fact that the Julian version had years that were, on average, approximately 11 minutes too long. That may not sound like much – but over a millennium after the fall of the western empire, it was enough for everything to be nearly a fortnight out of sync.
7. Gregory’s fix, which involved adjusting the frequency of leap years, had been accepted by much of Europe as soon as it was proposed. Scotland didn’t adopt all the reforms, but did introduce January 1 as New Year’s Day in 1600.
8. The rest of Britain, though, held out until passing the Calendar (New Style) Act 1750 before it joined the trend, ensuring that, for the first time, December 31, 1751 would be followed by January 1, 1752 in the process. Anyway, that’s why this is new year: because we copied a Pope who copied the Romans.
9. There is an argument, of course, that this is a stupid place to put new year. It means people will be trying to cut sugar or alcohol at a point when the skies are grey, the fun bit of the winter is behind us, and there are still months and months of it to run. Is a week when you’re depressed, and your kitchen still has leftover booze, cheese and chocolate in it, really the most realistic moment for a fresh start?
10. Not everywhere has caved to the post-Roman hegemony, incidentally. Four countries still use their own calendar, with their own new years to match: Ethiopia (September 11 or 12), Nepal (April 13 or 14), Iran (whose Solar Hijri – that is, Islamic – calendar puts it on the spring equinox, around March 20) and Afghanistan (whose lunar hijri calendar only has 354-5 days, so good luck settling on a date for New Year’s Day).
11. In addition, although China aligned its calendar with the rest of the world in 1911 and Thailand in 1941, both still celebrate their own traditional new years, too, in late January or February (it depends on the moon) and mid-April respectively.
12. The roots of Scottish enthusiasm for Hogmanay, incidentally, seem to lie in the period of the mid-17th century when a Christmas break was banned by those ever fun-loving Presbyterians.
13. Lastly, Britain’s 1752 calendar reforms also meant skipping over September 3 to 13 inclusive, to counteract the past few centuries of drift and put the equinoxes back in the right place. This, if you’ve ever wondered, is also why the financial year begins on April 6: our accounting system is still following the old calendar, with a slight adjustment to account for those missing days. This will be very comforting this year as you do your taxes, I’m sure.
Suggested Reading
Nerd’s Eye View: 13 things you need to know about the Gift-Bringers
282
Number of days in the year 1751 in Britain
1582
Gregorian calendar was adopted in Italy, France, Spain, and much of the rest of Europe
1600
First time Scotland celebrated the new year on January 1
1752
First time England and Wales joined the party
2024
First time Saudi Arabia – the most recent convert to this way of keeping time – began a new year on January 1
