Have you ever wondered why the transition from December 31 to January 1 at midnight, became our New Year? And why January? Is there a celestial reason? The winter solstice was a little over a week ago, and the spring equinox is months away. And our New Year isn’t associated with a new moon, an old moon, a full moon, or any other phase of the moon. 

And why at midnight? Why not sunset or sunrise like every other culture on the planet? Some ancient cultures celebrated their New Year at the new moon nearest the spring equinox and their day started at sunset. The Chinese celebrate their New Year on the new moon a month before spring and they stay up all night to celebrate it at the rising of the sun, not the middle of the night. Some ancient cultures celebrate the New Year at the new moon nearest the fall equinox, for example the Jews, and, again, the celebration occurs at sunset. The Egyptians celebrated their New Year in July at the first visibility of Sirius just before sunrise, which occurred around July 18 thousands of years ago. All of these have some astronomical rationale; some justification from the positions of the stars, moon, and sun. However, January 1, midnight, doesn’t have any of that. So, why is it our New Year?

It all goes back to the Romans.

Numa Pompilius

From “Plutarch’s Lives“, we have the account that Numa Pompilius, the second king of Rome, attempted to improve the Roman calendar. During the reign of Romulus, the founder of Rome on April 21 of 753 BC (which is considered to be year 1 for the Romans), the calendar was a bit of a mess. Plutarch says,

During the reign of Romulus, they had let their months run on without any certain or equal term; some of them contained twenty days, others thirty-five, others more; they had no sort of knowledge of the inequality of the motions of the sun and moon; they only kept to the one rule that the whole course of the year contained three hundred and sixty days. (Plutarch, 97)

However, after the Romans and their allies, the Sabines, chose Numa Pompilius (a Sabine) to be Romulus’ successor, one of his reforms was to correct Rome’s calendar. He wanted to bring some sense of harmony back to it.

Of primary concern to our topic, is that Numa Pompilius added January and February to Romulus’ ten month year. At the time of Numa (around 700 BC), December was the tenth month, which makes sense since latin “decem-” means ten. Also, Latin “novem-” means nine, “oct-” means eight, and “sept-” means seven. December is now the twelfth month, but none of these months match their original names because Numa Pompilius 

…altered the order of the months; for March, which was reckoned the first, he put into the third place; and January, which was the eleventh, he made the first; and February, which was the twelfth and last, the second” (Plutarch).

Special note: Plutarch implies in this quote that Rome used a twelve month calendar under Romulus, that January and February were the eleventh and twelfth months, and that Numa only re-numbered them. However, Plutarch later says that, “Many will have it, that it was Numa, also, who added the two months of January and February; for in the beginning they had had a year of ten months” (Plutarch, 97).

Whichever version is true, Numa’s changes established January to be the first month of the Roman year. However, when doing an internet search, most sites give Julius Caesar the credit for the New Year being on January 1. It is true that he cemented that choice when he made his own calendar reforms, but the practice had been around for centuries. Therefore, it is Numa Pompilius who should be given credit for why we celebrate New Years on January 1, and here is why Numa chose to make January the first month. Plutarch explains:

January was also called from Janus, and precedence given to it by Numa before March, which was dedicated to the god Mars; because, as I conceive, he wished to take every opportunity of intimating that the arts and studies of peace are to be preferred before those of war. For this Janus, whether in remote antiquity he were a demigod or a king, was certainly a great lover of civil and social unity, and one who reclaimed men from brutal and savage living; for which reason they figure him with two faces, to represent the two states and conditions out of the one of which he brought mankind, to lead them into the other. His temple at Rome has two gates, which they call the gates of war, because they stand open in the time of war, and shut in the times of peace; (Plutarch. The Lives of the Noble Grecians and Romans, Volume I (p. 98). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.)

A Peaceful Reign

Numa was a religious and a peaceful king, and he wanted Rome to transform into a peaceful nation from its warlike beginnings under Romulus. The people apparently wanted that, too, because they clamored for him to be king. He reluctantly accepted being chosen, and the first thing he did was to fire his personal guard. 

The first thing he did at his entrance into government was to dismiss the band of three hundred men which had been Romulus’s life-guard, called by him Celeres, saying that he would not distrust those who put confidence in him; nor rule over a people that distrusted him (Plutarch, 87).

Can we imagine such a leader? Of his many reforms, making January the first month is one of his most lasting, and the choice was spiritually significant because he wanted to transform the character of Rome. The god Janus is not a twin, but rather a single god with two faces, one facing chaos, the other facing unity; one facing war, the other peace. One faces the future–chaos or unity–and one faces the past. During Numa’s reign, Rome transformed from war to peace; from chaos to order. That peace lasted the entirety of his forty-three year reign. Oh, to live in such times.

Julius Caesar

But that isn’t to say Julius Caesar doesn’t have something to do with establishing January 1 as our New Year. Numa had kept the lunar/solar calendar intact, which needed to be frequently adjusted.  However, Caesar decided to go completely solar, thereby simplifying the calendar. To do so, he sought assistance from Sosigenes, an Egyptian philosopher.

For this purpose [to improve the calendar] he introduced an additional day every fourth year, making February to consist of twenty-nine days instead of twenty-eight, and, of course, the whole year to consist of three hundred and sixty-six days. The fourth year was denominated Bissextile, or leap year, because the sixth day before the calends, or first of March, was reckoned twice. The Julian year was introduced throughout the Roman empire, and continued in general use till the year 1582 (Plutarch, note 68).

(Just so you know, 2024 is a leap year so there will be a Feb. 29th, and we currently use the Gregorian Calendar, which corrected some flaws in the Julian calendar. However, the general structure was maintained.)

Some have also suggested that Caesar made his changes as a way to exert Rome’s supremacy over other cultures. Julius Caesar (and his adopted son Augustus) saw Rome’s calendar as a way to unify the world. They allowed conquered cultures to keep their own lunar/solar based calendars, but Rome’s calendar was to unite all the other cultures under the banner of one overarching, supreme calendar.

Caesar’s reforms established Numa’s decision as a worldwide influence. January 1 would now  be celebrated by everyone. The advantage was that the cycles of the moon no longer mattered as far as calculating a year goes, and the religious festivals would be able to shift all they wanted within the solar calendar. So, instead of shifting the calendar to fit the religious festivals, the religious festivals would shift within the template of the Roman calendar. This is why Easter is on a different date every year (see my post “Why does the date of Easter change every year“).

But Why Midnight?

Why January was chosen is now understandable, but why midnight? Why not at sunrise or sunset as all the other cultures did? A website that helped guide my thinking on this is here, and the website bases its information on the book Daily Life in Ancient Rome by Jerome Carcopino.

Essentially, the problem humanity faced was establishing a consistent reference for which hour of the day it was. If one said the first hour was when the sunrises, well, that changes a little bit everyday. Also, how much daylight there is changes from season to season (in the summer there are more daylight hours, and in the winter there are fewer). If one were to start counting hours at sunrise, that would be more and more every day going toward the summer, and fewer and fewer every day going toward the winter. It’s very natural, but it is no way for an efficient, worldwide bureaucracy to function.

The Romans solved this problem by creating what they called a “civil day” which broke the day into two, twelve-hour periods. AM is latin for ante meridiem, which means “before midday,” and PM is latin for post meridiem, which means “after midday.” Twelve in the afternoon is when the sun is at its highest point–at its meridian–and so the civil clock became the standard way to keep track of time because its regularity was linked to the meridian of the sun, not the rising and setting of the sun which was irregular. That is why midnight is when one day changes to the next. 

In Summary

Numa Pompilius, the second king of Rome (ca. 700 BC), chose January 1 to be the New Year because the god Janus is like a gate which represents two states and conditions of chaos and order out of the one.  Julius Caesar, in 46 BC, made reforms that established the Roman solar calendar as the calendar for the known world, and so in that way, Numa’s New Year became universally celebrated. Midnight is when the Roman civil clock transitions from one day to the next, and that tradition continues to this day.

500 Year Journey