The results are in. The majority of Cortez-area residents who responded to our poll believe that the new century and millennium do not actually begin until the year 2001. What’s the deal with the dates, anyway and why is this such a hot-button issue?

View one: The New Millennium Begins in 2001

Millennium is a Latin word (the plural is millennia), and loosely translated, means a period of 1,000 years. A millennium does not end until 1,000 years have been completed. The first millennium (by the Christian calendar as we now know it), began in A.D. 1 (not A.D. Zero!) The second (and current) millennium therefore began in A.D. 1001. If you add 1,000 to 1,001, you come up with 2,001...not 2,000! 2001 is therefore the date at which the third (Christian) millennium will begin. Technically, the 21st century also does not begin until 2001.

Phil Konstantin has explained it very succinctly: "Our calendar started with the year 1. There was no year 0. The first year has not been completed until the end of year one.

Asking whether or not the new millennium begins in 2000 is a lot like asking if you were a year old the day you were born, and the answer is no."

It is people’s fondness for even numbers more than anything else that has led us to celebrating the "millennium" in A.D. 2000. Too, many have confused a computer programming glitch (the Y2K bug) with our dating system and the new millennium (the event).

View two: The New Millennium Begins in 2000

As explained by Peter Meyer, a millennium means "a period of 1,000 years," but no part of the definition says that a millennium must begin or end with a particular year number. Our present dating system, "Anno Domini" was not instituted until the 6th century. The period AD 1 to AD 1000 was a period of 1,000 years. The second millennium of the Christian era began with the year 1001, and the third millennium then, begins in 2001.

However, secular and scientific fields find this system inadequate. The astronomical system numbers years by the doubly infinite series of positive and negative numbers. In this system, the years from 1 onwards have the same numbers as year AD, but the year 0 in the astronomical system is the year 1 B.C..

The date of the new millennium depends on which system of year-numbering one uses. For those who prefer to use the A.D. system, it begins in 2001. However, if one uses the astronomical system, he or she is free to begin millennia from the years 1, 1001, 2001, and so on, or from the years 0, 1000, 2000 and so on. While not invalidating those who choose to reckon years via the Christian calendar, it is also true that anyone who wishes to celebrate the start of the new millennium on Jan. 1, 2000 has perfectly logical grounds for doing so.

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KNOW THY CALENDAR-MAKERS

Calendrical confusion and disagreement is by no means a new phenomenon. Listed below are the key individuals who contributed to the Western A.D. calendar as we know it.

Aristarchus, Julius Caesar and Sosigenes : Julius Caesar found the traditional Roman calendar, which reckoned years since the founding of the city of Rome, to be inadequate. In 48 B.C., he consulted with Sosigenes, an astronomer in the Egyptian city of Alexandria. The calendar which he adopted was the same as the calendar developed by Aristarchus, in 239 B.C. It was comprised of a solar year of twelve months, 365 days, with an extra day every fourth year. (Aristarchus probably got his information from Babylonian astronomers).

Sosigenes decided that the year 46 B.C. should have two intercalcations. The first was that of 23 days following Feb. 23, and the second involved the insertion of two additional months between the end of November and the beginning of December. This resulted in 67 extra days, making a year of 445 days, and causing the beginning of March, 45 B.C. to fall on what is still called Jan. 1 of the Julian Calendar. (Encyclopedia Britannica). Adding to the confusion was that Roman date keepers originally misunderstood Caesar’s instructions, and counted every third year, rather than every fourth, as a leap year.

Further, February, which originally had 29 days and in leap years 30 days, lost a day because the fifth and sixth months in the old Roman calendar were renamed "Julius" and "Augustus", in honor of the two great caesars. The extra day was given to the new month "Augustus" so that it would have as many days as the month "Julius," and that Caesar Augustus would not be thought of as a lesser man than Julius Caesar.

Dionysus Exiguus: Dionysus (Dennis the Short, Dennis the Little) was 6th century abbot, who, attempting as did many others, to determine a precise date for Easter, desired that his Easter table did not "perpetuate the memory of an impious persecutor of the Church, but to count and denote the years from the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ."

His system of counting years from the birth of Jesus replaced the imperial regnal years, which were then based upon the previous reign of Diocletian, a notorious persecutor of Christians. Dionysus gave us the designation "A.D.", which is short for the Latin "anno Domini nostri Jesu Christi," or the year of our Lord Jesus Christ. (In general writing, this has been replaced with the more religiously neutral "C.E", which stands for "Common Era," and "B.C.E.", short for "Before Common Era").

Dionysus did not know that Jesus was born during the same year as a census decree issued by Caesar Augustus in 6 B.C., and missed the date by at least four years. (Some argue that perhaps Christ was born in 4 B.C., when Herod died; however, some Scripture references state that Jesus was a "young child" at this time, not a newborn baby).

Christopher Clavius, Luigi Lilio and Pope Paul III: The problem with the Julian Calendar is that it falls out of sync with the equinoxes and solstices after about 130 years. Thus, it became increasingly inaccurate with respect to the seasons, which, in turn, tampered with the date Dennis had worked so hard to arrive at: Easter. Pope Paul consulted several astronomers, especially Christopher Clavius, a Jesuit. They worked with the calendrical reform ideas arrived at by the astronomer and physician, Luigi Lilio.

Gregory III: Upon his election as pope, Gregory XIII decided in favor of the proposal of Clavius. In 1582, he issued the papal bull Inter Gravissimas. The resulting reform included:

• The omission of 10 days from the calendar

• The changing of the rule for leap years. In the Julian Calendar, a year was a leap year if it was divisible by four. In the Gregorian Calendar, a year is a leap year if it is divisible by four but not by 100, or if it is divisible by 400.

• New rules for the determination of the date for Easter were adopted

• The first day of the year was set at Jan. 1

• The extra day in a leap year was moved to the day following Feb. 28

Although the Gregorian Calendar was officially adopted immediately following the decree in most of Europe, the Julian Calendar continued to be used by the general population. Dates recorded in the Julian Calendar were marked O.S. for "old style" and those in Gregorian Calendar were indicated by N.S. for "New Style." The date for the new year was celebrated differently in various countries as well; and sometimes, people in the same country would celebrate New Year’s Day on different days.