It's About Time, Part 1

“Do not squander time for that is the stuff life is made of.”

Benjamin Franklin

"I've got too much (clap, clap) time on my hands / and it's ticking away, ticking away from me."

"Too Much Time on My Hands" -- song by Styx, 1981

Given that it is the beginning of another year, I figured it would be appropriate to write my newest blog post about the development of the calendar.  I put this on my list of topics a while ago when all the public furor began regarding our fiery death as predicted by the Mayans.  Since we dodged that bullet, I figured I would take full advantage of being alive and do some research about how we arrived at the calendar the western world follows.  I can’t say that I knew the majority of what I’ve learned, and I found a lot of interesting tidbits about how the months were named, how leap years came to be, and why this is not 2013 in the eyes of some people.

Beyond those historical and technical elements of the calendar, I think time itself is a fascinating topic.  The language of time is commonplace in English.  Some well-known idioms with regards to time include:

• Better late than never
• Once in a blue moon
• Living on borrowed time
• Have the time of your life
• Time is money

But we also say things like, “I don’t have enough time” or “If I had the time, I would” or “I’ve got all the time in the world.”  Quite often, we use the word "time" in sentences with the verb “have.”  Looking at it from that perspective, time is not just something that is, it’s something we own and control.  We see time as a resource to be used, wasted, or spent in a particular way.  Along with that consideration comes many other implications and pick-apart-able ideas.  J  I think Franklin’s quote above gives a pretty good idea of why we think so much about time – it truly is the stuff life is made of, and how we use our time also is a clear commentary on who we are.  The events, activities, and work that fill all those little boxes of the calendar every year make up the substance of our lives.  And while no one wants to say they’ve used their time poorly, so often, we are guilty of doing just that.

What is it that makes wasting time so easy and using it wisely so much more difficult?  When did the concept of "time management" emerge and why?  Why are we so obsessed with the world’s end and how much time we have left?  How have our lives changed for better or worse because of the development of the calendar?  These are all questions to contemplate as I start by giving you some background on how we keep track of how much time we have each year.  (And maybe start thinking of some of your own – I love new questions I’ve never thought of!)

The Basic Set-Up of the Calendar

There are three types of calendars in the world: lunar, solar, and lunisolar.  Lunar years – years based on the cycles of the moon – have 354 days, and solar years – those based on the sun – have 365 days.  The majority of the world uses what is known as the Gregorian calendar and it is a solar calendar.  Despite the fact that we follow a solar calendar, we don’t follow the definition of a solar year to a T.  We actually use something called “tropical years”: 365.24219 days equal one year.  The fact that each year is 365.25 days long is why we do a leap year every four years.  Let me show you what I mean in math language.

[.25 of a day + .25 of a day + .25 of a day + .25 of a day = 1 whole day]

The long process of developing this precise number will be discussed throughout this series of blog posts.  So, we continue on.  J   Islamic cultures use a lunar calendar.  Because the lunar calendar falls short eleven days every year (and twelve days in leap years), lunar calendars eventually end up moving backwards through the seasons.  (I know that sounds weird, but think about it for a moment: over time, eleven days can add up.)  Lunisolar calendars are based on…can you guess?...the sun and the moon.  The major contributor to a lunisolar calendar is the moon and its cycles, but every two or three years, cultures who use the lunisolar calendar add a month, thus giving a nod to the solar calendar.  The Chinese and Hebrew calendars are lunisolar.  (If this seems like a lot of calendars to keep straight, just wait until you read the next sentence.)  In all, there are approximately forty different types of calendars in use today all over the world.

Now, if you’re anything like I am, you may be saying this to yourself: “Besides those mildly entertaining placemats at my favorite Chinese restaurant that tell me it’s the Year of the Dog or the Year of the Dragon or whatever, I didn’t know that different cultures still used different calendars.”  I was really surprised to learn that even though the Gregorian calendar is used world-wide for business and major world holidays, the Muslims, Jews, and Chinese still follow their own yearly calendars.  Some people still follow the precursor of the Gregorian calendar, the Julian calendar.  What this means is that depending on which calendar you’re looking at, January 3 might not be January 3 and 2013 might not be 2013.  Check out this chart I found in one of my books:

Which calendar?	What year?	Based on what?	When is 2005’s New Year’s Day on this calendar?
Gregorian	2005	Birth of Christ	January 1, 2005
Julian	2005	Birth of Christ	January 14, 2005
Islamic	1426	Flight of Muhammad	February 10, 2005
Chinese	4703	Legend	February 9, 2005
Hebrew	5766	Year of creation	October 4, 2005

Maybe now you’re wondering where all these calendars came from and how they were developed.  Well, shucks…I’m so glad you asked.

Early “Calendars”

Before people chose whether they wanted gamboling puppies or Maxim pinups gracing their monthly collection of numbered boxes, they simply ordered their days based on their observations of the sun, moon, and stars.  These celestial bodies all follow clear patterns.  The sun rises in a new place every day over a period of a year; the moon waxes and wanes every thirty days (give or take); and there are certain stars that show up on the horizon pre-sunrise or post-sunset at particular times of the year.  All of these patterns are a direct result of the Earth spinning on its axis.  (Just as a quick review, the Earth spinning once on its axis is the equivalent of a day, and the Earth traveling once around the sun is the equivalent of a year.)  Paying attention to these natural repetitions in the sky – as well as the yearly progression of seasons – helped early people figure out the best times to plant and reap crops.  Once people realized that the same thing happened every year, they tried to create a tangible record of the progression of days.  Archaeologists have found evidence of many types of early calendars:  carved animal bones, stones arranged in a particular pattern, clay tablets full of markings, and records of flood patterns.

How Early Civilizations Dealt with the Calendar Issue

The Sumerians were the first to create a calendar over 5000 years ago.  They divided the year into days and the days into hours and they were able to do this by using the moon and its cycles.  One year was the equivalent of twelve lunar months of thirty days apiece.  (Using your quick math skills, you can see that they only accounted for 360 days.)  The Sumerians knew there was an error somewhere because they recorded that the seasons were happening later and later with each passing year.

According to my research, the Sumerians are considered an older civilization than the Egyptians, but not by much.  In approximately 4000 BC, the Egyptians contributed to the development of the calendar by creating a 365 day year.  However, they based the calendar on the seasons and the flooding of the Nile rather than the moon.  Their calendar had twelve thirty-day months and they spent the last five days of the year feasting and celebrating.

By 2000 BC, the Babylonians had improved on the Sumerian calendar by making each month twenty-nine or thirty days and then throwing in another thirty-day month every three years to compensate for the lost days.  This calendar continued for fifteen centuries!

The peoples of Asia dealt with lost days in a similar manner.  By 1000 BC, the Hindu calendar had twelve months and 360 days with an added leap month every five years.

Finally, on another continent altogether, between the years of 2000 BC and 1500 AD, those pesky Mayans went a direction that no one else did.  Their year had eighteen months with twenty days each.  This still left an extra five days, but the Mayans believed they were full of evil omens.  I’m not exactly sure what that means or how the Mayans dealt with the evil omens.  Obviously, they were a people who assumed the worst about things like extra days and calendars in general.

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As you might have guessed, it was the Romans who really got things rolling in terms of a specific and empire-wide calendar.  When you can find the time, come on back to hear the continued story of the calendar.  There will be more to chew on next week!