Talk:Old Style and New Style dates

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—Yamara ✉ 22:41, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] 1751/1752

What would anyone think of the idea of having "1751/1752" as an article name to cover the most unusual 12-month period in the history of the calendar in the whole of the English-speaking world? Or maybe just to cover the period up to 24 March/3 April? Robin Patterson 21:33, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

On the William Shakespeare page it says: died April 23, 1616 (Gregorian calendar), May 3, 1616 (Julian calendar). On this OS/NS calendar page it says: New Style or N.S. means that the date is in the Gregorian calendar Old Style or O.S. after a date means that the date is in the Julian calendar. William Shakespeare died on 23 April 1616 (Old Style).

If Gregorian is new style, then both passages are screwed up. It gives his old style and Gregorian (new style) death dates as the same.

Indeed, much is screwed up (William Shakespeare has, for example, been given a birthdate when his birthdate is unknown). O.S. = Julian. N.S. = Gregorian. I've fixed the errors you pointed out in William Shakespeare. - Nunh-huh 06:41, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Swedish Dating system

I think some mention should be made towards the bottom of the dating system used by Sweden for a time in the 18th Century. if for no other reason than context. but clearly they are similar topics and would help someone to learn more about the subject. Swedish calendar

[edit] "O.S."

I thought that Old Style was a form of birth and not any sort of dating style or technique. WB2 00:48, 13 July 2005 (UTC)


[edit] for editors

Template:OldStyleDate can be used to write OS to NS dates. For example, it will produce {{OldStyleDate|11 November|1907|29 October}} to 11 November [O.S. 29 October] 1907 --Fallout boy 07:57, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Is there some way to link to this template in the article, say, a short italic blurb preceding the article? What is the standard way of refering to Wikipedia namespace articles/templates? --Adamrush 18:33, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "Give us back our eleven days"

The well-known incident of mob outcry relating to the calendar changes should perhaps be relayed in this article. See for instance http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2279/is_n149/ai_17782422.

Thanks for the link! However, I fear that you have misunderstood the link's article, whose author, Robert Poole, conclusively proves that the "calendar riots" never occurred. In his words: "It can be asserted with confidence that the calendar riots are a myth." (top of web page 3: [1]). Your misunderstanding is fostered by the Find Articles version of the article, because it did not indent paragraphs that were quotations. They occur immediately after a paragraph terminated by a colon (:) and end with an endnote number (nn). Nevertheless, it might be useful to mention that the riots did not occur, referring to this article. — Joe Kress 06:34, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Edison calender?

In the section "countries with lunisolar calenders," it says that Japan, China, and Korea converted to the "Edison calender" on some various respective years. But this "Edison calender" was never mentioned before and I have no idea how it relates to the Julian and Gregorian calenders previously mentioned in the article. And in fact that secion about Japan, China, and Korea never mentions the Julian and Gregorian calenders but only this mysterious "Edison calender." Could somebody who knows what it's talking about clear this up? --Edward Tremel 16:52, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

An anonymous editor (66.212.78.246) maliciously changed "Gregorian" to "Edison" on 24 July 2006. I am reverting it. — Joe Kress 23:38, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Confusing

This article really needs some clarification as it is confusing and seems incosistent. E.g.:

Usually in modern histories, to avoid confusion and to keep dates consistent, the OS dates are mapped onto NS dates with an adjustment for the start of the year to 1 January. For example modern histories all state that Charles I of England was executed on 30 January 1649. But Parliamentary documents investigating the regicide during the Restoration eleven years later all state that the event happened on 30 January 1648.[2]

Surely these are not "NS" dates, but in fact are OS dates with the calendar year adjusted? As far as I understand it, a 17th-century OS date is equivalent to a NS date 10 (?) days later, so 30 January 1648/1649 (OS) would be 9 February 1649 (NS)

To add to the confusion, the Battle of Boyne which took place only a few months later in Ireland on 1 July "Old Style" is not mapped to 1 July "New Style" but is remembered as taking place on 12 July. The keeping of the recorded date (not a mapped date) for the anniversary of this battle has more to do with Protestants not at first recognising Gregorian dates, so they continued to celebrate the anniversary on their Protestant 1 July and now traditionally do so.

Why would it be mapped to 1 July (NS)? Surely 1 July (OS) is 12 July (NS)? The next sentence goes on to say that the anniversary IS celebrated on 1 July, but according to the Battle of Boyne page, it is actually commemorated on 12 July. There are lots of contradictions here... 143.252.80.100 13:30, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

The term NS in English usually refers to the habit of keeping Julian calendar dates but adjusting the start of the year. For example Charles I was executed on 30 January 1649 (NS) or January 30 1648 (OS). Usually the only need to comment on the date is if it falls between the new start of the year and the old start of the year (as with the execution of Charly) or because the date is being compared to that of another country which was using a calendar different from that used in England. If it were only a question of defining New Style dates as Gregorian dates then there would be no need for the term, one could write the Battle of the Boyne took place in 1690 on 1 July (JC)/12 July (GC). (The only reason for commenting on the date of the battle of the Boyne is because unlike nearly all other dates of the that period where they year is the same old and new styles, there needs to be some explanation of why there is a date conflict in the commemoration of the battle.) As is shown in the paragraph on Russia, after England adopted the Gregorian colander, the term is still used in English language histories but it is then used as a synonym for the Gregorian calendar and dates are fully converted. During the middle ages date involving England in English language histories are usually written New Style (Julian dates with January 1st as the start of the year) --Philip Baird Shearer 11:08, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] ugly bias

I came to this article from a resolved conflict about Russian dates and found it is presented as a British thing. Until the 6th paragraph, the sole mention of other countries is "many countries" in the first line... If I come to this article expecting to find info about Russian transition from OS to NS, I don't want to read things about dates in letters sent to England, dates of execution of English kings, or dates in U.S. tombstones, written as if they were what the thing is about.

Is it me? --euyyn 12:06, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Two different interpretations

Here are a two of sources which state that NS means beginning of the year adjustment only not full Julian/Gregorian conversion:

  • http://www.genfair.com/dates.htm
    "increasingly parish registers, in addition to a new year heading after 24th March showing, for example "1733", had another heading at the end of the following December indicating "1733/4". This showed where the New Style 1734 started even though the Old Style 1733 continued until 24th March." ... "We as historians have no excuse for creating ambiguity and must keep to the notation described above in one of its forms. It is no good writing simply 20th January 1745, for a reader is left wondering whether we have used the Old or the New Style reckoning. The date should either be written 20th January 1745 OS (if indeed it was Old Style) or as 20th January 1745/6. The hyphen (1745-6) is best avoided as it can be interpreted as indicating a period of time."
  • http://www.merlyn.demon.co.uk/miscdate.htm
    "The terms "Old Style" and "New Style" are now commonly used for both the "Start of Year" and "Leap Year" changes (England & Wales: both in 1752; Scotland: 1600, 1752).
    I believe that, properly and historically, the "Styles" really refer only to the "Start of Year" change (from March 25th to January 1st); and that the "Leap Year" change should be described as the change from Julian to Gregorian.

This seems to be the problem some people think that "New Style/Old Style" means Julian Gregorian calendar while others think "New Style/Old Style" the change of the start of year for the Julian Calendar". I think we need to talk this though because it is causing misunderstanding. --Philip Baird Shearer 19:56, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

The two changes were made at the same time in Britain. At any rate, the year beginning March 25 is a convention that we never use in wikipedia - we always act as though years begin on January 1. john k 18:25, 30 July 2007 (UTC)
Which is to say, I've always understood "New Style" to refer to Gregorian dates, and "Old Style" to Julian. It may also refer to the other issue, but that's secondary. john k 18:27, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

That is were we differ and why I think there can be confusion. I tend to understand Old Style and New Style to mean the start of year. Hence Charles I was executed 30 January 1648 (OS) and 30 January 1649 (NS). --Philip Baird Shearer 20:34, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

But one certainly sees "old style" and "new style" used for, for instance, Russian dates, where it's obviously not about year change. And when does one ever see Charles I being listed anymore as having been executed on 30 January 1648? john k 21:27, 30 July 2007 (UTC)
I would add that I've never seen "January 30, 1649" as the date of Charles I's execution referred to as "New Style." Certainly your contention, that the term never refers to Julian vs. Gregorian dating, seems wrong to me. john k 21:29, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

John I have not said "never refers to Julian vs. Gregorian" quite the contrary I said "some people think that "New Style/Old Style" means Julian Gregorian calendar while others think "New Style/Old Style" the change of the start of year for the Julian Calendar". One of my interests is the English Civil War where the first quarter of the year matters and where using historic sources, some people get confused over the year, so to me New Style Old Style has to do with that mess, (and it matters long before the invention of the Gregorian calendar). The only saving grace is that the campaign season was usually after the March new year so it does not usually rear its ugly head during the campaigning season!

Here is a source for old style new style Charley execution: Death warrant of Charles I web page of the UK National Archives.

Until I found the Britannica article for this article, I did not appreciate that style was also used for Julian/Gregorian dates. I suspect that this confusion has to do with historical period specialisation and because any historian worth his salt would specify what he meant by "Old Style/New Style" in a footnote.

It is a problem that I think needs highlighting in this article but also I think we need to come up with a guideline on how Wikipeida articles should deal with the issue.

For a guideline we could use the convention 1648/49[*] for start of year problems.

  • All dates in this article use the start of year as January 1 see [Old Style and New Style dates] for an explanation of why this is necessary.

And for Julian/Gregorian dates where it is an issue (and none more so than the Glorious Revolution) put in an explanation that N.S. means Gregorian and the start of year on old style dates is assumed to be January 1. --Philip Baird Shearer 09:46, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree that it is useful to clarify which type of "new style" date is meant. Beyond that, are you suggesting use of hyphenated years for events from January-March? (Saying, for instance, that Charles I reigned from 1625 to 1648/9? I would strongly oppose that. I think we should simply always use the "new style"/year beginning January 1, format, which is used by nearly all historians that I'm aware of. Use of the hyphenated year, so far as I can tell, is largely done by genealogists. john k 16:29, 31 July 2007 (UTC)
Highlighting this, I have always heard that a year beginning January 1 was called the "historical year" because that is the type used by modern historians. — Joe Kress 22:15, 31 July 2007 (UTC)
John I really am not at all sure what to do, but it is a problem that I think we need to address, because there is room for confusion. It is relatively easy to highlight the dichotomy, as I have tried to do in this article today, but there probably needs to be a paragraph in Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)‎ on what we do in Wikipedia articles. --Philip Baird Shearer 23:07, 31 July 2007 (UTC)
Wow, I just happened to bring this very issue up on Manual of Style (dates and numbers) last week. I was laughed at a little there for raising this issue, too. I've always assumed that unless otherwise stated the calendar year begins on 1 January in a Wikipedia article -- which I think is the simplest solution. If there is any reasonable chance of confusion (such as the execution of King George mentioned above), then the problem should be explained in the article, either in the text or a footnote. As for the problem of various countries using the Julian calendar long after the rest of the "civilized world" (yes, I'm being humorous here -- no flames, please!) adopted the Georgian, I suggest that the date in the primary source should be offered after the corrected/modernized date with an explanation. One would need to explain, again regardless of whichever standard that is adopted, why the October Revolution actually took place in November. -- llywrch 05:08, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
Llywrch, you seem to have George on the brain - you say "King George" when you mean "King Charles," and "Georgian," when you mean "Gregorian." john k 19:36, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
Ugh, you're right John. At the moment I typed that, it was late, my wife was yelling at me to get off the computer, & I didn't take the time to proof-read what I wrote, so I confused King Charles with King George. I'm just glad that despite all of those glitches someone understood what I meant. -- llywrch 20:35, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
It was easy enough to understand. I just found it amusing that both of the errors involved putting the name "George" where it didn't belong. john k 01:31, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia mainly relies on secondary sources, and for an example of how confusing this can be please see the article Glorious Revolution. Usually at that time events that take place in Britain are recorded under the Julian calendar and those that take place on the West European continent are recorded in the Gregorian calandar, and secondary sources keep to that convention,(adjusting the Julian year to start on 1 January). We need to have a way of indicating that the dates on the continent were not the same ones as in Britain, or the dates in Britain were not the same as the dates on the continent (Take you pick), and because of the dual interpretation of the NS/OS these may not be the best way to do it. For example in the section William made King of the GR article a date crops up that is wrong "On February 13, 1689 (Old Style), February 23 (New Style)" the date Old Style was "February 13, 1688" (note the eighty-eight) and "New Style" it was either "February 13, 1689" (start of year adjustment) or "February 23 1689" (Gregorian calendar) --Philip Baird Shearer 08:54, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't think you can say definitively that the "Old Style" date was "February 13, 1688." Both are "old style" in the sense of being Julian calendar dates. It's not incorrect, it's simply ambiguous, because of the year start issue. john k 19:36, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
John this is where I disagree with you, the year adjustment makes "February 13, 1689" also News Style date.[2] --Philip Baird Shearer 07:38, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

We have similar problems today with time zones, but occasionally dates matter as well. For example the attack on Pearl Harbor happened on 7 December 1941, and the attack on Malaya took place on 8 December 1941. So why were the British taken by surprise? Because thanks to the international date line the attack on Malaya started 90 minutes before the attack on Pearl Harbor. Just as we can live with the international date line, so the people in the transition period seemed to have found it no more difficult or odd than we do adjusting our watches to different time zones. --Philip Baird Shearer 08:54, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

I think we should follow the same system that (as far as I can tell) all modern sources use ie: ignore March 25 and backdate the start of the year to Jan 1. I have checked all my sources including books on the English civil war, War of the Spanish Succession etc, and they are all consistent with each other: dates for British events use the Julian calendar and are termed Old Style, that is 10 days behind the continent before 1700, 11 days after 1700 AND use Jan 1 as the start of the year. This is usually explained at the beginning of the text.
I have rarely seen Charles execution dated as 1648 and I feel this should be avoided on wikipedia. Therefore Charles died on 30 January 1649 OS. As Philip said a note in the ‘notes’ should explain what dating system is used.
Example from Sussex university: The Newton Project [3]
Note on dates: During Newton's lifetime, two calendars were in use in Europe: the 'Julian' or 'Old Style' in Britain and parts of Eastern Europe, and the more accurate 'Gregorian' or 'New Style' elsewhere. The difference between them lay in their attitude to leap years. At Newton's birth, Gregorian dates were ten days ahead of Julian dates: thus Newton was born on Christmas Day 1642 by the Julian calendar but on 4 January 1643 by the Gregorian. On either 19 February/1 March 1700 or 29 February/11 March 1700 (depending on which calendar is used to measure the gap), this discrepancy rose to eleven days, because there was no 29 February 1700 in the Gregorian calendar. Since some reference sources use one calendar, some the other, and some a mixture of both, this can cause considerable confusion. In the interests of clarifying apparent discrepancies with other sources, both options are given here wherever a particular date is specified.
Matters are further complicated by the contemporary English habit of regarding the year as beginning on 25 March. It is here regarded as beginning on 1 January, but notes are added where this may lead to confusion (for instance, the Complete Works of Joseph Mede are dated 1664 but were in fact published in the early months of what we now call 1665).
I think you are misunderstanding the point I am making. Old Style uses the new year as 25 March. New Style can mean just an adjustment to use 1 January (Here is a source that uses "New Style" to mean start of year adjusted). The problem is other sources - like Sussex university quoted above - use the term "New Style" when they mean Gregorian calendar so it is not possible to tell from this statement "Charles I was executed on 30 January 1649 (NS)" whether it means new style beginning of year adjusted, or Gregorian year adjusted --Philip Baird Shearer 13:41, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

The National Archives site goes on in the very next paragraph to use "New Style" in the sense of "Gregorian Calendar." There's clearly a lot of confusion here. But I think it would be best to just use New Style/Old Style as synonymous with Gregorian/Julian, and simply ignore the year adjustment. john k 19:33, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

I'd noticed that :-) and yes it does show that there is confusion. For that reason I think the alteration I made to this article makes sense, because the article is not a wikipedia guideline and it explains this issue to a person who has come across the National Archive page and wants to find out more about it.
But I also think that we need to decide how Wikipedia should cover this area and at the very least I think that this issue needs a footnote on articles that use this terminology to explain what Wikipedia means my OS/NS. It also needs to be in a guideline, (probably Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)) --Philip Baird Shearer 22:39, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

You're right that we ought to be clearer on the guidelines, and you're right, I think, that this ought to be discussed at a manual of style talk page, rather than here. john k 07:12, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mergefrom dual dating

I see no need for another article about the the same subject so I think that new article Dual dating should become a redirect to this page. If there is any information on that page which is not on this page then it can be incorporated into this page. What do others think? --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 14:25, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps. But for someone looking for info on double dating, the new article is clear. Clearer, I think. So such a change should not be done lightly nor too quickly. (Exception: the last 2 sentences of Dual dating give advice = OR or POV, whichever.) --Hordaland (talk) 17:22, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
Thanks to Philip for the welcome message, and all the help from everyone. Wikipedia is awesome. I originally started this subject because I was looking for advice on dates on an historical document, so merging might work, however, theoretically OS/NS are not the same as the G/J distinction. Also, I think a short blurb to give people a quick and dirty explanation is helpful. Hordaland: I absolutely agree, the last two sentences are opinion, and I tried to indicate that, edited a couple times, and then gave up. Do you suggest I just say something like: "One contemporary researcher suggests . . ." What is the proper form here? Also, do I needt the NEHGS's permission for that reference? Thanks again folks. Mak--S. McIntire Allen (talk) 03:01, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
One could argue that the Europe & colonies NS/OS is just one case of dual dating. This article already has references tacked on related to calendar changes in Asia. A separate dual dating article could give the overview then this article could concentrate on NS/OS as "we" know it. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 13:55, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
Hmm, as "we" know it? Not sure what that means. I haven't thought a lot about this topic lately, but have earlier written a couple of articles about it in connection with genealogy (not WP). It's always been my opinion that using OS/NS to refer to Julian/Gregorian is flat out wrong, but that one does see that confusion a lot. IMO, OS/NS should only refer to dates 01 Jan. to the local first day of the year.
To McIntire: whatever weasel words you choose when adding your opinion or advice, you're likely to be called on it. Best to find a "recognized" authority to quote. --Hordaland (talk) 18:53, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. I will go find one. FYI, the Dual dating article was nominated for the Did You Know page, so I think that is some evidence of the inherent worth in having a separate article for it.--S. McIntire Allen (talk) 05:29, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
"We" in western europe and its then colonies. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 17:54, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

"FYI, the Dual dating article was nominated for the Did You Know page" the nominator probably did not know of this page. I still do not see the point of having two pages that replicate each other. It would be easy to add a redirect to "dual dating" to a specific section in this page. Hordaland I think you will find the discussion in the section above (#Two different interpretations) interesting as whether you think it right or wrong OS/NS are used for both 25-3/1-1 and J/G. All we can do on Wikipedia pages is report the differences. But to address this issue when writing Wikipedia articles see WP:MOS#Chronological items which refers to Wikipedia:MOSNUM#Calendars --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 18:29, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

The fact that the nominator did not know of this page could be taken as an endorsement that there should be a separate listing for Dual dating. The separate OS/NS page and Dual dating page do not replicate each other. Dual dating encompasses the leap year change and the start of the year change. The OS/NS page should encompass only the start of the year change if you respect the 'pure,' traditional use of the OS/NS definition. In the interest of being precise, I think WP ought to adhere to the more strict definition.--S. McIntire Allen (talk) 02:49, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
FYI:
The talkpage at Dual dating is now active. --Hordaland (talk) 01:32, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

Close? Shall I remove the merge suggestion from the Dual Dating page? Please reply on the Dual Dating Talk page. Thanks.--Mak Allen (talk) 10:19, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Please leave it I am not convinced that the merge should not take place and to date there have been few editors involved in the discussion. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 10:29, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

It seems to me that Dual Dating has transformed itself from a duplicate fork into a useful generic world-view article on calendar migration, and points to this article as the authoritive specific article for OS/NS transition in Europe. So I'd support deletion of the tag now. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 18:00, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Against the merge, all for removing tag. The dual dating page has to skim over this subject, but dual dating is not the same thing as OS/NS. It is not needed. Dual dating is its own individual subject.

Lukewarm and proud, LOOKIE MILK! (talk) 11:38, 22 February 2008 (UTC)