Year 9~XIX Month 7

80 Weeks past, 180 to go theAbysmal Calendar’s launch: 21~12~2012

Bloomsday!

In Honour of June 16th 1904 ~ a day in the life of Leopold Bloom

In case this has escaped your notice, today is the day on which the events in James Joyce’s Ulysses take place.

I read this noteworthy tale on and about Bloomsday 2004, and have to say it bears rereading. Fortunately, the work is in the public domain, so for you, here it is:

Ulysses wikimedia version

Ulysses project gutenberg versions

Year 9~XIX Month 6

76 Weeks past, 184 to go theAbysmal Calendar’s launch: 21~12~2012

Two days of note here:

Friday Day 13 (equivalent to June 21st) – this day is the last Friday of Quarter 1 (the second Quarter of the Year) – and also the day on which the Sun would appear to pass into the Constellation of Gemini (by astronomical reckoning, not astrological). This is also the Summer solstice (in the Northern Hemisphere). As such, we may want to rename the Northern Tropic the Tropic of Gemini, since the Sun is no longer in Cancer when at the Solstice.

In Canada, the Summer Solstice is celebrated as National Aboriginal Day.

Saturday Day 14 (equivalent to June 22nd) – this is the First Saturday of Quarter 2 (the third Quarter of the Year) – and also the New Moon. It also denotes the first Day of the second half of the year.

Month 6 is the central month of theAbysmal Calendar – there are 6 months prior and 6 months after. Enjoy your sunny days (except lately – it’s been cold, rainy & humid however that’s possible…)

Year 9~XIX Month 5

72 Weeks past, 188 to go theAbysmal Calendar’s launch: 21~12~2012

Multiple New Years

Thailand and South Asia celebrate April 13th to 15th

Today’s New Year, coincident in 2009 with the Gregorian Easter Monday, was determined to coincide with the transit of the Sun into the Constellation (not to be confused with the astrological sign) of Aries. In 1930, the International Astronomical Union set the date at which the transit occurs at April 19th, however, due to the Precession of the Equinoxes, this date has likely drifted to April 20th by now (typically it falls a day later every 71 or 72 Years).

theAbysmal Calendar reforms the transit date to April 20th, which this Year bears the glyph 13~XX, the last nymber~glyph in the cycle of 260. This means that April 21st 2009 bears the first of the cycle, 1~I. This bodes well for new beginnings.

Compare the two illustrations that contrast Days of the astrological and astronomical Zodiac. The darkness of the circles represents the relative amount of Daylight at 50 N Latitude.

ASTROLOGICAL BOUNDARIES

ASTRONOMICAL BOUNDARIES

April 13th coincides with Easter and several New Years, as well as theAbysmal Month 4
April 20th coincides with the Sun’s transit into Aries
April 21st bears 1~I

Year 9~XIX Month 4

68 Weeks past, 192 to go theAbysmal Calendar’s launch: 21~12~2012

Ye Oldde New Year

Why New Year’s celebrations on January 1st make no sense.

Back when the Romans first established their calendar (Rome was founded 753 BC), there were 10 lunar months, beginning with Mars (modern March), followed by Aprilis, Maia, Iuno, Quintilis, Sextilis, September, October, November, and December.

The Winter Days were not counted – not particularly surprising for such an agricultural civilization.

New Year was celebrated with the New Moon, equivalent to Aprilis 1st. This would have fallen on March 26th 2009 (the New Moon) if we still observed the calendar in this manner.

So with the Spring New Year, many of the festivals took on Vernal overtones – flowers & fertility, the first stages of planting and the harvest, and of course the underlying overtones of human sexuality – seeds and fertility. This is our most fertile time, and so a New Year rife with carousing makes a great degree of sense. Anyone conceived at this time would be born close to the Winter Solstice, which would allow the mother to work through the Harvest, and have the more immobile days of the pregnancy after the fields had gone dormant for the year.

After the addition of the months of January and February, Aprilis 1st continue to be the new year, until much later, when finally, January took over and has remained as such through the Julian & Gregorian Calendar reforms.

When we celebrate New Year’s on January 1st, it seems to have retained a good deal of its Vernal characteristics, without any reflection in the climate around us. It explains why New Year’s seems so much at odds with the Winter festivals that precede it. December holidays must be a particularly odd series of juxtaposition, so close to the Summer solstice in the Southern Hemisphere.

Another important aspect to public vernal celebration lies in our biological clocks – close to the Equinox, particularly around twilight, our body calibrates itself to the season, which compelled us, at least in part, to gather outdoors en masse at this time of year.

The Assyrian New Year falls on April 1st, at least reminding us that oldde habits die hard. Happy New Year

Year 9~XIX Quarter 1

The beginning of a new Quarter of 13 Weeks (91 Days) from Equinox to Solstice.

So we begin Weeks 13 through 25 to bring us to the Summer Solstice (in the Northern Hemisphere). The Quarter runs from March 23rd to June 20th, with the midway day falling on May 7th.

Quarter 0’s last day falls on the Friday (that’s theAbysmal Weekday, not the Gregorian) of the first Week of Month 3.

Quarter 1’s first day falls on the Saturday of the second Week of Month 3.

The Sun has only just entered the Astrological Aries, and is travelling through the Astronomical Pisces.

just so we know where we’re at thus far.

Happy New Year on the Equinox

New Years for Iran, Central Asia, Zoroastrians & Baha’i.

Lest we forget that among the great empires throughout history, Persia has certainly made its influence felt. The New Year coincident with the observed Equinox (Vernal in the North) is observed in Iran, through Central Asia & the Middle East, and by Zoroastrians & Baha’i.

The Baha’i Calendar consists of 19 periods of 19 days plus 4 epigonal days (19×19 = 361 + 4 Days). The New Year is on March 21st.

The Persian Calendar is an observational calendar (as opposed to a rules-based calendar like the Gregorian), and it observes 12 months of varying numbers of days meant to track the variation in velocity of the Earth’s orbit around the Sun. This begins Year 1388.

The Persian months have 31, 31, 31, 31, 31, 31, 30, 30, 30, 30, 30, 29/30 Days, which at least makes more sense than the Gregorians fluctuating days/month, particularly considering that it’s a rules-based calendar.

Here’s an informative blog entry on the history of Narouz

Year 9~XIX Month 3

64 Weeks past, 196 to go theAbysmal Calendar’s launch: 21~12~2012