Why Does January First Start the New Year? - New Year's Explained

CORRECTIONS:
1. Julius Caesar was not technically the first emperor of Rome, he declared himself dictator for life but did not establish a hereditary monarchy. His cousin, who succeeded him, Augustus, established the monarchy and was thus the first emperor.

2. I mispronounced Aloysius Lilius. It's like "Allowishus" which is a name I had heard, but never seen spelled!

3. The picture of Rome I used was MUCH LATER than 46 BC

In which Hank goes deep (but not too deep) into the reasons why our calendar begins on January 1st, and why January 1st is when it is. I left a lot out, actually, like why Numa was so down with January and where the names of all the months come from. It's pretty fascinating stuff.

Also, I'd like to say that just because things are arbitrary does not mean they aren't valuable. I think New Year's is a lovely holiday and I am super down with celebrating it, even if the day that we happen to celebrate it on is not special in any way at all (except that it happened to be the date of the new moon 2061 years ago.)

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[DavidParody]

I hope everyone reading this right now has the best 2016 possible! Much love to the community

[besmart]

Happy New Year, Hank! A couple small corrections: When "officially" added to the calendar by Numa-Numa, January and February were the _last_ two months of the year, and the Roman New Year was celebrated in March along with the arrival of spring (see also: Julius' fateful Ides). The last few days of February (and also the year) were dedicated to renewal (Februus was the god of purification), plus February was last because months with even numbers of days were considered unlucky, unless you added the purification part? In fact, the last week of February would be anywhere from 5 to ? days long, in order to correct for the fact that the calendar didn't line up with Earth's travel around the sun. But since it was up to priests and politicians to declare those days, sometimes they "forgot" to add them in order to get certain people out of office sooner than normal and the whole thing remained screwy for quite a while longer.

In 153 B.C., for reasons that remain murky to me (but are likely because of political wrangling) the empire's newly elected consuls wanted to take office in January instead of March (like they normally would, since it was still then the first month of the year), so they just said "January is now the first month of the year and you can all just deal with it".

[Macconator]

"Tough luck" says the universe. - CGP Grey.

[rdreher]

As a lover of Roman history, particularly it's architectural history, I am obligated to tell you that that model of Rome you showed represents a MUCH later version of the city. Like CENTURIES later (the Roman period is long after all). In 46 BC, there was no Flavian Amphitheater (aka the Colosseum), nor Circus Maximus, nor any of those other famous structures that you can see in that picture. In particular, you can see in this image the Baslica Maxentius, built under Emperor Constantine in 312 AD!

In fact, Rome was a pretty unspectacular city in 46 BC, with most construction made of brick and wood, no marble. It wouldn't even start to look even close to that image until the reign of Augustus. Also the iconic arched concrete construction of Rome, although it has it's roots in that earlier period, didn't really take off until a few decades later.

[NikolajLepka]

I for one propose ditching our current calenar in favour of a 13 month calendar. Why 13? Because 13 × 28 = 364
Add one day to be the New Year Day and put it on the winter solstice.
Leap day would then be put 182 days after the new year day, squeezed into the new seventh month.

Calendar as proposed by those wo invented it:
(0 Year Day)
1 January
2 February
3 March
4 April
5 May
6 June
7 Sol The new month
8 July
9 August
10 Sepember
11 October
12 November
13 December

Pros:
Every month is the same length, namely a length of 28 days
Every month starts on the same day
Movable holidays that start on a specific weekend or weekday will be fixed, and no longer move
Even length months makes it easier for businesses to calculate salaries, as they don't need to take varying month lengths into account

Cons:
13 is a prime, it's not easily divided

[ashtuatara]

Happy New Year Everyone!
Also, there wasn't a section for comments on the survey, so I'll put it here:
I'm in favour of the time limit, but could we maybe get rid of it for reunion videos?

[Matt_Rowan]

As I woke up this morning mildly hung over this is honestly what I was wondering about. Handy timing for me!

[icannotchoose]

If I were to create a new calender, I would have it start on the spring equinox to symbolize new life, equal parts light and dark, and the beginning of light overtaking the dark (days getting longer). I would then have it so january and febuary were called undecember and duodecember or something like and put at the end of the year. Each month ould have 30 days and the remaining 5 or 6 days would have a special "month/week" and it would just be a giant celebration (kindof like new years).

That's just me though. What would you guys do?

[MattPalka]

There is no end to a circle. That basically summarizes so much of life. Knowing why we do what we do and the history behind it always fascinates me. Thank you, Hank and Happy 10th Year Anniversary!

[brwneyedgirlx]

LEAP YEAR REFERENCE! "Where do you think chickens come from, the freezer section?"

[krabkit]

i LOVE that you changed the circle to a realistic elips during the annotation because every other time i have seen an example of an orbital ellipse it is vastly over exaggerated to look like an egg on its side .

[mrclueuin]

9:01 PM, at least 43 degrees in Brooklyn, NYC. I'm @ Target using their wi-fi. (Thanks Target! 😃)
This is the 4th Vlogbrothers video watched. 👍 Thank you guys for ten wonderful, thought provoking, entertainment, fun, years! 🙌

[Waltztheplank]

TEN YEARS?!

Proud to have been around for so long, can't wait for another year with you guys.

[caitsayssmile]

Great video, Hank! The Classics enthusiast within me enjoyed it a lot. But personally I think the real reason we celebrate new year on January 1st is that it's my birthday!! 18 today. Happy New Year everyone!

[fromscratchauntybindy]

Wow - what a contrast between speech speed here and the first vlog ever! Lol

[Peripatetic]

This has just saved me a research topic. Having come to the realisation this past year that I find more significance in the physical events that in any notional or religious 'landmarks', this very question raised itself, so thank you for answering it. I am also intrigued by the relation between Yule (the pagan festival), the variants in some Northern European languages (Jule, Juli et al.) and the ancient name of Julius; more research to come :)

[superpcstation]

Thank you for taking some time out of your celebrations to make this video for us <3

[cellogirl]

This kind of thing always fascinates me. Thanks for the video, Hank!

[Megan-xgui]

Me and my friends literally spent at least a half an hour last night discussing why the new year started on January first. Thank you for explaining haha.

[Paholala]

Ten years, six in which I'm with you guys. Thank you so much. Happy new gregorian year