The New Year begins on January 1 across the globe today, however, this wasn’t always the case.
For centuries, other dates marked the start of the calendar, including March 25 and December 25.
Let's dig English history to find out how January 1 came to became New Year’s Day.
According to Britannica, Roman king Numa Pompilius has to be partly thanked for making January 1 as the New Year Day.
According to archives, during the reign of Numa Pompilius (c. 715–673 BCE), the King revised the Roman republican calendar so that January replaced March as the first month.
At the time, it was a fitting choice, since January was named after Janus, the Roman god of all beginnings; March celebrated Mars, the god of war. And, there has been evidence that January 1 was not made the official start of the Roman year until 153 BCE.
Britannica adds that in 46 BCE, Roman dictator Julius Caesar introduced more changes in his Julian calendar. But the Julian calendar retained January 1 as the year’s opening date.
The use of the Julian calendar spread overtime with the expansion of the Roman Empire.
However, with Rome's decline in the 5th century CE, many Christian countries altered the calendar to make it more reflective of their religion, and March 25 (the Feast of the Annunciation) and December 25 (Christmas) became common New Year’s Days.
Later realizing a miscalculation concerning leap years, people at that time made additional changes to the Julian calendar.
The effect of miscalculation of leap years over the course of several centuries caused various events to take place in the wrong season and also created problems when determining the date of Easter.
To address the issue of leap years, Pope Gregory XIII introduced a revised calendar in 1582 and restored January 1 as the start of the New Year. The calender thus introduced came to be known as Gregorian calendar.
Italy, France, and Spain, among other countries, immediately accepted the new calendar. However, as per Britannica, some protestant and orthodox nations resisted its use.
Great Britain and its American colonies did not begin following the Gregorian calendar until 1752.
Before then they celebrated New Year’s Day on March 25.
Over time non-Christian countries also began to use the Gregorian calendar.
China (1912) is a notable example, though it continued to celebrate the Chinese New Year according to a lunar calendar.
In fact, many countries that follow the Gregorian calendar also have other traditional or religious calendars.
Some nations never adopted the Gregorian calendar and thus start the year on dates other than January 1. Ethiopia, for example, celebrates its New Year (known as Enkutatash) in September.
Likewise, Nepalis and the Indians follow the Vikram Samvat calendar, which is generally 57 years ahead of Gregorian calendar. The start of New Year takes place on Baisakh 1 as per Vikram Samvat calendar.
