This was the month during which England shifted from the Roman Julian
Calendar to the Gregorian Calendar. A Julian year was 11 days longer
than a Gregorian year. So the King of England ordered 11 days to be
wiped off the face of that particular month. (A King could order
anything, couldn't he?) So the workers worked for 11 days less that
month, but got paid for the whole month. That's how the concept of
"paid leave" was born. Hail the King!!!
In the Roman Julian Calendar, April used to be the first month of the
year; but the Gregorian Calendar observed January as the first month.
Even after shifting to the Gregorian Calendar, many people refused to
give up old traditions and continued celebrating 1st April as the New
Year's Day. When simple orders didn't work, the King finally issued a
royal dictum; which stated that those who celebrated 1st April as the
new year's day would be labled as fools. From then on, 1st April became
April Fool's Day.
www.patelbassar.blogspot.com
The year used to start on the 25th of march, not the 1st of april, and the Julian year is not longer than the Gregorian year by 11 days. You fool.
ReplyDeleteIt was the year 1582AD, when the Gregorian Calendar was introduced. As the observation of the equinoxes (normally March 20th and September 23rd) had drifted over 10 days in the Julian calendar, October 4th 1582 was followed by October 15th 1582 to compensate. The drift was due to the fact that the Julian year was 11 minutes longer (at 365.25 days) than the tropical year (the time the Earth is in the same position in its orbit, at 365.24217 days). The Gregorian calendar compensates for the 11 minutes drift of the 1 leap-year every 4 years model by limiting the leap-years to those divisible without a remainder by 4, and those divisible without a remainder by 400 if divisible by 100, thus omitting 3 leap-years every 400 years.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, the Julian calendar was also involved in the longest year in history: the introduction of the Julian calendar required Julius Caesar to add 67 days to the year 46BC, to compensate for the transformation to the tropical (sun) year from the lunar (moon) year and align the new year with January 1st 45BC. So the year 46BC was 445 days long.