Happy New Year, Pope Gregory XIII

Q: Who decided that Jan. 1 was to be the annual start date of our planet’s repetitive trek around the sun? Why not one of the solstices or equinoxes? That would seem to make more sense and be more orderly.

A: You certainly wouldn’t have gotten an argument from the Sumerians 4,000 years ago. Or the Egyptians, Persians or ancient Greeks for that matter. Or even England (and its American colonies) as late as 1750.

Through most of recorded history, the majority of cultures did use more significant dates to begin their new year, particularly solstices and equinoxes because they were so central to their lives. But thanks to the Romans, one very messed-up calendar and a 16th-century pope who set it all straight, we started to salute the otherwise inconsequential Jan. 1 as the start of ours just about 400 years ago.

When it came to the how and why of celebrating New Year’s, the Sumerians around ancient Babylon put us to shame way back in 2000 B.C. As you suggest, they chose the time around the spring equinox to herald in the new year with Akitu, the festival of the sowing of barley. On their calendar, it would have been about the first of the month of Nisannu, which corresponds to our March/April.

The goal was to honor their supreme god, Marduk, and his crown prince, Nabu, so they would would bless them with a bountiful harvest in the coming months. To open the festivities, a high priest, rising two hours before dawn, would bathe in the Euphrates before offering a hymn to Marduk. Then, the rump of a beheaded ram was rubbed against the temple walls to absorb any contagion that might be infecting the holy structure.

What followed was a wingding that lasted a week or more with plenty of food and bubbly. Among the activities were a masked mummers’ play along with a lavish parade filled with music, dance and costumes that made its way from the temple to a building known as the House of the New Year on the northern outskirts of Babylon.

They weren’t the only people to associate the beginning of a new year with a change of season. Perhaps to mark the end of the harvest, the Egyptians, Phoenicians and Persians all began their new year with the fall equinox. The ancient Greeks reportedly celebrated it on the winter solstice, which finally marked the beginning of longer days again.

Even the early Romans roughly observed the spring equinox as New Year’s Day with their 10-month calendar. (Remember that septem is Latin for “seven,” octo is “eight,” novem is “nine” and decem is “ten.”)

But when January and February were added to the Roman calendar in about 700 B.C., things started to get crazy. In 153 B.C., the new year was celebrated on Jan. 1 for the first time. For the grand rulers, the change made perfect sense. First, it marked the day that the highest officials in the Roman republic began their one-year terms. Moreover, January was named for Janus, the Romans’ two-headed god, who could look back at the old year and ahead to the new at the same time.

The new date was further solidified in 46 B.C. when Julius Caesar introduced his new calendar. The old calendar had been based on the moon, so it became wildly out of sync with natural events in just a short time. Caesar figured his sun-based calendar would correct these shortcomings, and he kept Jan. 1 as the beginning of the year.

He was wrong on two counts. For starters, when Europe began converting to Christianity, leaders of the Catholic church were horrified by all of the revelry going on to celebrate what was essentially a Jan. 1 holiday left over from a pagan religion. Instead, the church instituted the Feast of Christ’s Circumcision and New Year’s festivals began to vanish. (Remember that the English word “holiday” comes from “holy day.”) In fact, after about the year 1000, the influence of the church had people celebrating the new year on Christmas, March 1, March 25, the Feast of the Annunciation or even Easter, depending where you lived.

Making matters worse, Caesar’s calendar also turned out to be less than perfect at keeping sync with the actual solar year. By the 1500s, there was already a 10-day difference between the two. So in 1582, Pope Gregory XIII did two things that we continue to observe today. First, he instituted another new calendar in which he added an extra day every four years (except centurial years not evenly divisible by 400). And he brought back Jan. 1 as the official start of each new year.

Many Protestant and Eastern Orthodox nations did not get in step with the pope’s marching orders until years later. For example, England, Ireland and the new American colonies continued to celebrate New Year’s on March 25 until Jan. 1, 1752. Russia followed suit only after its 1917 revolution. Even today, the Eastern Orthodox Church sets its liturgical year by either the traditional or revised Julian calendar.

But in three weeks, most of us will be singing “Auld Lang Syne” again as we near midnight on Dec. 31. And if you still need to add a little significance to the date, remember that the Earth will come closest to the sun in 2016 at 4:49 p.m. CST on Jan. 2. So get ready to put that lampshade on your head — Ol’ Sol will be a mere 91,403,808 miles away.

Today’s trivia

Name the only U.S. battleship that saw action in World War I, Pearl Harbor and D-Day.

Answer to Wednesday’s trivia: To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the first airing of “A Charlie Brown Christmas,” I asked Wednesday about cartoonist Charles Schulz, who reportedly said, “A good education is the next best thing to a pushy mother.” Other Schulz gems include: “I have a new philosophy. I'm only going to dread one day at a time.” “Life is like a ten-speed bike. Most of us have gears we never use.” “All you need is love. But a little chocolate now and then doesn't hurt.”

This story was originally published December 10, 2015 at 10:10 AM with the headline "Happy New Year, Pope Gregory XIII."