How does the Julian calendar differ from the Gregorian calendar?

Humanity has been using chronology since ancient times. Take, for example, the famous Mayan circle, which made a lot of noise in 2012. Measuring day by day, the pages of the calendar take weeks, months and years away. Almost all countries of the world today live according to the generally accepted Gregorian calendar, however, for many years it was state Julian. What is the difference between them, and why is the latter now used only by the Orthodox Church?

Julian calendar

The ancient Romans counted the days by lunar phases. This simple calendar had 10 months named after the gods. The Egyptians had the usual modern chronology: 365 days, 12 months of 30 days. In 46 BC. Emperor of Ancient Rome Gaius Julius Caesar ordered leading astronomers to create a new calendar. The solar year with its 365 days and 6 hours was taken as a model, and the starting date was January 1. The new method of calculating days was then, in fact, called a calendar, from the Roman word “calends” - this was the name given to the first days of each month when interest on debts was paid. In honor of the ancient Roman commander and politician, in order to immortalize his name in the history of a grandiose invention, one of the months was called July.

After the assassination of the emperor, the Roman priests became a little confused and declared every third year to be a leap year in order to equalize the six-hour shift. The calendar was finally aligned under Emperor Octavian Augustus. And his contribution was recorded with a new name for the month - August.

From Julian to Gregorian

For centuries Julian calendar states lived. It was also used by Christians during the First Ecumenical Council, when the date for the celebration of Easter was approved. Interestingly, this day is celebrated differently each year depending on the first full moon after the spring equinox and the Jewish Passover. This rule could only be changed under pain of anathema, but in 1582 the head of the Catholic Church, Pope Gregory XIII, took a risk. The reform was successful: the new calendar, called the Gregorian, was more accurate and returned the equinox to March 21. The hierarchs of the Orthodox Church condemned the innovation: it turned out that the Jewish Easter happened later than the Christian Easter. This was not allowed by the canons of the Eastern tradition, and another point appeared in the discrepancies between Catholics and Orthodox.

Calculation of chronology in Rus'

In 1492, the New Year in Rus' began to be celebrated according to church tradition on September 1, although previously the New Year began simultaneously with spring and was considered “from the creation of the world.” Emperor Peter I established that received from Byzantium Julian calendar on the territory of the Russian Empire is valid, but the New Year is now celebrated without fail on January 1. The Bolsheviks transferred the country to Gregorian calendar, according to which all of Europe has long lived. It is interesting that in this way the then February became the shortest month in the history of chronology: February 1, 1918 turned into February 14.

WITH Julian to Gregorian calendar Greece officially passed in 1924, followed by Turkey, and in 1928 Egypt. In our time, according to the Julian calendar, only a few Orthodox churches live - Russian, Georgian, Serbian, Polish, Jerusalem, as well as eastern ones - Coptic, Ethiopian and Greek Catholic. Therefore, there are discrepancies in the celebration of Christmas: Catholics celebrate the birthday of Christ on December 25, and in the Orthodox tradition this holiday falls on January 7. The same is with secular holidays - which confuses foreigners, is celebrated on January 14 as a tribute to the previous calendar. However, it doesn’t matter who lives by which calendar: the main thing is not to waste precious days.

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On the threshold new years When one year follows another, we don’t even think about what style we live by. Surely many of us remember from history lessons that once there was a different calendar, later people switched to a new one and began to live according to a new one style.

Let's talk about how these two calendars differ: Julian and Gregorian .

The history of the creation of the Julian and Gregorian calendars

To make time calculations, people came up with a chronology system, which was based on the periodicity of the movements of celestial bodies, and this is how the calendar.

Word "calendar" comes from the Latin word calendarium, which means "debt book". This is due to the fact that debtors paid their debt on the day Kalends, the first days of each month were called, they coincided with new moon.

Yes, y ancient romans every month had 30 days, or rather, 29 days, 12 hours and 44 minutes. At first this calendar contained ten months, hence, by the way, the name of our last month of the year - December(from Latin decem– tenth). All months were named after Roman gods.

But, starting from the 3rd century BC, a different calendar was used in the ancient world, based on a four-year lunisolar cycle, it gave an error in the solar year of one day. Used in Egypt solar calendar, compiled on the basis of observations of the Sun and Sirius. The year according to it was three hundred sixty-five days. It consisted of twelve months of thirty days every.

It was this calendar that became the basis Julian calendar. It is named after the emperor Guy Julius Caesar and was introduced into 45 BC. The beginning of the year according to this calendar began 1st of January.

Gaius Julius Caesar (100 BC - 44 BC)

Lasted Julian calendar more than sixteen centuries, until 1582 G. Pope Gregory XIII did not propose a new chronology system. The reason for the adoption of the new calendar was the gradual shift in relation to the Julian calendar of the day of the vernal equinox, by which the date of Easter was determined, as well as the discrepancy between the Easter full moons and the astronomical ones. The head of the Catholic Church believed that it was necessary to determine the exact calculation of the celebration of Easter so that it would fall on a Sunday, and also return the vernal equinox to the date of March 21.

Pope Gregory XIII (1502-1585)

However, most European countries followed the call of Pope Gregory XIII and switched to a new style chronology.

The transition to the Gregorian calendar entailed the following changes :

1. to correct accumulated errors, the new calendar immediately shifted the current date by 10 days at the time of adoption;

2. a new, more precise rule about leap years came into force - a leap year, that is, contains 366 days, if:

The year number is a multiple of 400 (1600, 2000, 2400);

The year number is a multiple of 4 and not a multiple of 100 (... 1892, 1896, 1904, 1908...);

3. The rules for calculating Christian (namely Catholic) Easter have changed.

The difference between the dates of the Julian and Gregorian calendars increases by three days every 400 years.

History of chronology in Russia

In Rus', before Epiphany, the new year began in March, but since the 10th century, the New Year began to be celebrated in September, according to the Byzantine church calendar. However, people, accustomed to the centuries-old tradition, continued to celebrate the New Year with the awakening of nature - in the spring. While the king Ivan III V 1492 year did not issue a decree stating that the New Year was officially postponed to beginning of autumn. But this did not help, and the Russian people celebrated two new years: in spring and autumn.

Tsar Peter the First, striving for everything European, December 19, 1699 year issued a decree that the Russian people, together with Europeans, celebrate the New Year 1st of January.

February 14, 1918, after the coup, all of Russia switched to a new style, now the secular state began to live according to Gregorian calendar. Later, in 1923 year, the new authorities tried to transfer the church to a new calendar, however To His Holiness Patriarch Tikhon managed to preserve traditions.

Today Julian and Gregorian calendars continue to exist together. Julian calendar enjoy Georgian, Jerusalem, Serbian and Russian churches, whereas Catholics and Protestants are guided by Gregorian.

People have been thinking about the need for chronology for a very long time. It is worth remembering the same Mayan calendar, which a few years ago made a lot of noise all over the world. But almost all world states now live according to a calendar called the Gregorian. However, in many films or books you can see or hear references to the Julian calendar. What is the difference between these two calendars?

This calendar got its name thanks to the most famous Roman emperor Gaius Julius Caesar. Of course, it was not the emperor himself who was involved in the development of the calendar, but this was done by his decree by a whole group of astronomers. The birthday of this method of chronology is January 1, 45 BC. The word calendar was also born in Ancient Rome. Translated from Latin, it means debt book. The fact is that then interest on debts was paid on kalends (that’s what the first days of each month were called).

In addition to the name of the entire calendar, Julius Caesar also gave the name to one of the months - July, although this month was originally called Quintilis. Other Roman emperors also gave their months their names. But besides July, nowadays only August is used - a month that was renamed in honor of Octavian Augustus.

The Julian calendar completely ceased to be the official calendar in 1928, when Egypt switched to the Gregorian calendar. This country was the last to switch to the Gregorian calendar. Italy, Spain and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth were the first to cross in 1528. Russia made the transition in 1918.

Nowadays, the Julian calendar is used only in some Orthodox churches. In such as: Jerusalem, Georgian, Serbian and Russian, Polish and Ukrainian. Also, according to the Julian calendar, holidays are celebrated by the Russian and Ukrainian Greek Catholic churches and the ancient Eastern churches in Egypt and Ethiopia.

This calendar was introduced by the Pope Gregory XIII. The calendar got its name in honor of him. The need to replace the Julian calendar was primarily due to confusion over the celebration of Easter. According to the Julian calendar, the celebration of this day fell on different days of the week, but Christianity insisted that Easter should always be celebrated on Sunday. However, although the Gregorian calendar streamlined the celebration of Easter, with its advent the rest of the church holidays went astray. Therefore, some Orthodox churches still live according to the Julian calendar. A clear example is that Catholics celebrate Christmas on December 25, and Orthodox Christians on January 7.

Not all people took the transition to the new calendar calmly. Riots broke out in many countries. But in the Russian Orthodox Church, the new calendar was valid for only 24 days. Sweden, for example, completely lived according to its own calendar due to all these transitions.

Common features in both calendars

1. Division. In both the Julian and Gregorian calendars, the year is divided into 12 months and 365 days, and 7 days per week.
2. Months. In the Gregorian calendar, all 12 months are called the same as in the Julian calendar. They have the same sequence and the same number of days. There is an easy way to remember what month and how many days. You need to clench your own hands into fists. The knuckle on the little finger of the left hand will be considered January, and the following depression will be considered February. Thus, all the dominoes will symbolize months with 31 days, and all the hollows will symbolize months with 30 days. Of course, the exception is February, which has 28 or 29 days (depending on whether it is a leap year or not). The hollow after the ring finger of the right hand and the knuckle of the right little finger are not taken into account, since there are only 12 months. This method is suitable for determining the number of days in both the Julian and Gregorian calendars.
3. Church holidays. All holidays that are celebrated according to the Julian calendar are also celebrated according to the Gregorian calendar. However, the celebration takes place on other days and dates. For example, Christmas.
4. Place of invention. Like the Julian calendar, the Gregorian calendar was invented in Rome, but in 1582 Rome was part of Italy, and in 45 BC it was the center of the Roman Empire.

Differences between the Gregorian calendar and the Julian calendar

1. Age. Since some Churches live according to the Julian calendar, we can confidently say that it exists. This means that it is approximately 1626 years older than the Gregorian.
2. Usage. The Gregorian calendar is considered the official calendar in almost all countries of the world. The Julian calendar can be called a church calendar.
3. Leap year. In the Julian calendar, every fourth year is a leap year. In the Gregorian calendar, a leap year is one whose number is a multiple of 400 and 4, but one that is not a multiple of 100. That is, 2016 according to the Gregorian calendar is a leap year, but 1900 is not.
4. Date difference. Initially, the Gregorian calendar, one might say, was 10 days faster than the Julian calendar. That is, according to the Julian calendar, October 5, 1582 was considered October 15, 1582 according to the Gregorian calendar. However, now the difference between the calendars is already 13 days. In connection with this difference, in the countries of the former Russian Empire the expression “old style” appeared. For example, the holiday called Old New Year is simply New Year, but according to the Julian calendar.

God created the world outside of time, the change of day and night, seasons allows people to put their time in order. For this purpose, humanity invented the calendar, a system for calculating the days of the year. The main reason for switching to another calendar was disagreement about the celebration of the most important day for Christians - Easter.

Julian calendar

Once upon a time, back during the reign of Julius Caesar, in 45 BC. The Julian calendar appeared. The calendar itself was named after the ruler. It was the astronomers of Julius Caesar who created a chronology system based on the time of successive passage of the equinox by the Sun , therefore the Julian calendar was a “solar” calendar.

This system was the most accurate for those times; each year, not counting leap years, contained 365 days. In addition, the Julian calendar did not contradict the astronomical discoveries of those years. For fifteen hundred years, no one could offer this system a worthy analogy.

Gregorian calendar

However, at the end of the 16th century, Pope Gregory XIII proposed a different chronology system. What was the difference between the Julian and Gregorian calendars, if there was no difference in the number of days between them? Every fourth year was no longer considered a leap year by default, as in the Julian calendar. According to the Gregorian calendar, if a year ended in 00 but was not divisible by 4, it was not a leap year. So 2000 was a leap year, but 2100 will no longer be a leap year.

Pope Gregory XIII was based on the fact that Easter should be celebrated only on Sunday, and according to the Julian calendar, Easter fell on a different day of the week each time. 24 February 1582 the world learned about the Gregorian calendar.

Popes Sixtus IV and Clement VII also advocated reform. The work on the calendar, among others, was carried out by the Jesuit order.

Julian and Gregorian calendars – which is more popular?

The Julian and Gregorian calendars continued to exist together, but in most countries of the world it is the Gregorian calendar that is used, and the Julian remains for calculating Christian holidays.

Russia was among the last to adopt the reform. In 1917, immediately after the October Revolution, the “obscurantist” calendar was replaced with a “progressive” one. In 1923, they tried to transfer the Russian Orthodox Church to the “new style,” but even with pressure on His Holiness Patriarch Tikhon, a categorical refusal followed from the Church. Orthodox Christians, guided by the instructions of the apostles, calculate holidays according to the Julian calendar. Catholics and Protestants count holidays according to the Gregorian calendar.

The issue of calendars is also a theological issue. Despite the fact that Pope Gregory XIII considered the main issue to be astronomical and not religious, later discussions appeared about the correctness of a particular calendar in relation to the Bible. In Orthodoxy, it is believed that the Gregorian calendar violates the sequence of events in the Bible and leads to canonical violations: Apostolic rules do not allow the celebration of Holy Easter before the Jewish Passover. The transition to a new calendar would mean the destruction of Easter. Scientist-astronomer Professor E.A. Predtechensky in his work “Church Time: Reckoning and Critical Review of Existing Rules for Determining Easter” noted: “This collective work (Editor's note - Easter), in all likelihood by many unknown authors, was carried out in such a way that it still remains unsurpassed. The later Roman Easter, now accepted by the Western Church, is, in comparison with the Alexandrian one, so ponderous and clumsy that it resembles a popular print next to an artistic depiction of the same object. Despite all this, this terribly complex and clumsy machine does not even achieve its intended goal.”. In addition, the descent of the Holy Fire at the Holy Sepulcher takes place on Holy Saturday according to the Julian calendar.

Since by this time the difference between the old and new styles was 13 days, the decree ordered that after January 31, 1918, not February 1, but February 14. The same decree prescribed, until July 1, 1918, after the date of each day according to the new style, to write in brackets the number according to the old style: February 14 (1), February 15 (2), etc.

From the history of chronology in Russia.

The ancient Slavs, like many other peoples, initially based their calendar on the period of changing lunar phases. But already by the time of the adoption of Christianity, i.e. by the end of the 10th century. n. e., Ancient Rus' used a lunisolar calendar.

Calendar of the ancient Slavs. It was not possible to definitively establish what the calendar of the ancient Slavs was. It is only known that initially time was counted by seasons. Probably, the 12-month lunar calendar was also used at the same time. In later times, the Slavs switched to a lunisolar calendar, in which an additional 13th month was inserted seven times every 19 years.

The most ancient monuments of Russian writing show that the months had purely Slavic names, the origin of which was closely related to natural phenomena. Moreover, the same months, depending on the climate of the places in which different tribes lived, received different names. So, January was called where the section (the time of deforestation), where the prosinets (after the winter clouds the blue sky appeared), where the jelly (since it became icy, cold), etc.; February—cut, snowy or severe (severe frosts); March - birch zol (there are several interpretations here: the birch tree begins to bloom; they took sap from birch trees; they burned the birch for coal), dry (the poorest in precipitation in ancient Kievan Rus, in some places the earth was already dry, sap (a reminder of birch sap); April) - pollen (blooming of gardens), birch (beginning of birch flowering), duben, kviten, etc.; May - grass (grass turns green), summer, pollen; June - cherry blossoms (cherries turn red), isok (grasshoppers chirp - “izoks”). "), milk; July - lipets (linden blossom), cherven (in the north, where phenological phenomena are delayed), serpen (from the word “sickle”, indicating the time of harvest); August - serpen, stubble, roar (from the verb “to roar”). " - the roar of deer, or from the word "glow" - cold dawns, and possibly from "pazores" - auroras); September - veresen (flowering of heather); October - leaf fall, “pazdernik” or “kastrychnik” (pazdernik - hemp buds, the name for the south of Russia); November - gruden (from the word “heap” - frozen rut on the road), leaf fall (in the south of Russia); December - jelly, chest, prosinets.

The year began on March 1, and around this time agricultural work began.

Many ancient names of months later passed into a number of Slavic languages ​​and were largely retained in some modern languages, in particular in Ukrainian, Belarusian and Polish.

At the end of the 10th century. Ancient Rus' adopted Christianity. At the same time, the chronology used by the Romans came to us - the Julian calendar (based on the solar year), with Roman names for the months and a seven-day week. It counted years from the “creation of the world,” which allegedly occurred 5508 years before our chronology. This date - one of the many variants of eras from the “creation of the world” - was adopted in the 7th century. in Greece and has been used by the Orthodox Church for a long time.

For many centuries, the beginning of the year was considered March 1, but in 1492, in accordance with church tradition, the beginning of the year was officially moved to September 1 and was celebrated this way for more than two hundred years. However, a few months after Muscovites celebrated their next New Year on September 1, 7208, they had to repeat the celebration. This happened because on December 19, 7208, a personal decree of Peter I was signed and promulgated on the reform of the calendar in Russia, according to which a new beginning of the year was introduced - from January 1 and a new era - the Christian chronology (from the “Nativity of Christ”).

Peter's decree was called: "On the writing henceforth of Genvar from the 1st day of 1700 in all papers of the year from the Nativity of Christ, and not from the creation of the world." Therefore, the decree prescribed that the day after December 31, 7208 from the “creation of the world” should be considered January 1, 1700 from the “Nativity of Christ.” In order for the reform to be adopted without complications, the decree ended with a prudent clause: “And if anyone wants to write both those years, from the creation of the world and from the Nativity of Christ, freely in a row.”

Celebrating the first civil New Year in Moscow. The day after the announcement of Peter I’s decree on calendar reform on Red Square in Moscow, i.e. December 20, 7208, a new decree of the tsar was announced - “On the celebration of the New Year.” Considering that January 1, 1700 is not only the beginning of a new year, but also the beginning of a new century (Here a significant mistake was made in the decree: 1700 is the last year of the 17th century, and not the first year of the 18th century. The new century began on January 1 1701. An error that is sometimes repeated today.), the decree ordered that this event be celebrated with especially solemnity. It gave detailed instructions on how to organize a holiday in Moscow. On New Year's Eve, Peter I himself lit the first rocket on Red Square, giving the signal for the opening of the holiday. The streets were illuminated. The ringing of bells and cannon fire began, and the sounds of trumpets and timpani were heard. The Tsar congratulated the population of the capital on the New Year, and the festivities continued all night. Multi-colored rockets took off from the courtyards into the dark winter sky, and “along the large streets, where there is space,” lights burned—bonfires and tar barrels attached to poles.

The houses of the residents of the wooden capital were decorated with needles “from trees and branches of pine, spruce and juniper.” For a whole week the houses were decorated, and as night fell the lights were lit. Shooting “from small cannons and from muskets or other small weapons,” as well as launching “missiles,” were entrusted to people “who do not count gold.” And “poor people” were asked to “put at least a tree or branch on each of their gates or over their temple.” Since that time, our country has established the custom of celebrating New Year's Day on January 1 every year.

After 1918, there were still calendar reforms in the USSR. In the period from 1929 to 1940, calendar reforms were carried out in our country three times, caused by production needs. Thus, on August 26, 1929, the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR adopted a resolution “On the transition to continuous production in enterprises and institutions of the USSR,” in which it was recognized as necessary, starting from the 1929-1930 business year, to begin a systematic and consistent transfer of enterprises and institutions to continuous production. In the fall of 1929, a gradual transition to “continuity” began, which ended in the spring of 1930 after the publication of a resolution of a special government commission under the Council of Labor and Defense. This decree introduced a unified production timesheet and calendar. The calendar year had 360 days, i.e. 72 five-day periods. It was decided to consider the remaining 5 days as holidays. Unlike the ancient Egyptian calendar, they were not located all together at the end of the year, but were timed to coincide with Soviet memorial days and revolutionary holidays: January 22, May 1 and 2, and November 7 and 8.

The workers of each enterprise and institution were divided into 5 groups, and each group was given a day of rest on every five-day week for the whole year. This meant that after four working days there was a day of rest. After the introduction of the “uninterrupted” period, there was no longer a need for a seven-day week, since weekends could fall not only on different days of the month, but also on different days of the week.

However, this calendar did not last long. Already on November 21, 1931, the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR adopted a resolution “On the intermittent production week in institutions,” which allowed the People's Commissariats and other institutions to switch to a six-day intermittent production week. For them, permanent days off were established on the following dates of the month: 6, 12, 18, 24 and 30. At the end of February, the day off fell on the last day of the month or was postponed to March 1. In those months that contained 31 days, the last day of the month was considered the same month and was paid specially. The decree on the transition to an intermittent six-day week came into force on December 1, 1931.

Both the five-day and six-day periods completely disrupted the traditional seven-day week with a general day off on Sunday. The six-day week was used for about nine years. Only on June 26, 1940, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR issued a decree “On the transition to an eight-hour working day, to a seven-day working week and on the prohibition of the unauthorized departure of workers and employees from enterprises and institutions.” In development of this decree, on June 27, 1940, the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR adopted a resolution in which it was established that “in addition to Sundays, non-working days also include:

January 22, May 1 and 2, November 7 and 8, December 5. The same decree abolished the six special days of rest and non-working days that existed in rural areas on March 12 (Day of the Overthrow of the Autocracy) and March 18 (Paris Commune Day).

On March 7, 1967, the Central Committee of the CPSU, the Council of Ministers of the USSR and the All-Russian Central Council of Trade Unions adopted a resolution “On the transfer of workers and employees of enterprises, institutions and organizations to a five-day work week with two days off,” but this reform did not in any way affect the structure of the modern calendar."

But the most interesting thing is that passions do not subside. The next revolution is happening in our new time. Sergei Baburin, Victor Alksnis, Irina Savelyeva and Alexander Fomenko introduced a bill to the State Duma in 2007 on the transition of Russia to the Julian calendar from January 1, 2008. In the explanatory note, the deputies noted that “there is no world calendar” and proposed establishing a transition period from December 31, 2007, when, for 13 days, chronology would be carried out simultaneously according to two calendars at once. Only four deputies took part in the voting. Three are against, one is for. There were no abstentions. The rest of the elected representatives ignored the vote.