Re: Country Related: Christmas

>On Tue, 22 Dec 1998, Nik Taylor wrote:
>
>> Eric Christopherson wrote:
>> > When did the new year fall before Christianity came to Britain?
>>
>> April 1, I think.
>
>I thought it was Mar. 25th, with the end of the festivities on Apr. 1.
>Thus all that "April Fools" business heaped upon them that continued the
>Traditional Way by those touting the new fangled Jan. 1 date.
This April 1st thing is a post-christian event, related to the the English
adoption of the Gregorian calendar reform. Christmas had moved because of
the inaccuracies in the Roman calendar, and the reaction against the reform
was because people were angry at "losing" 3 months of their lives in the
change.

Now the Roman calendar may have been adopted before the Christianization of
Britain, but that's a different question.

  -- David
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