Research Results For 'Equinox'

ARIES

Aries is a sign of the zodiac. Represented by the ram. It is a northern constellation of 156 stars, of which fifty are visible. It is the first of the twelve signs in the zodiac, which the sun enters at the vernal equinox, about the 21st of March. The first point in Aries is that where the equator cuts the ecliptic in the ascending node, and from which the right ascensions of heavenly bodies are reckoned on the equator, and their longitudes upon the ecliptic. Owing to the precession of the equinoxes the sign Aries no longer corresponds with the constellation Aries, which it did 2000 years ago.
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AUTUMN

Autumn is the season between summer and winter, in the northern hemisphere traditionally regarded as embracing August, September, and October, or three months about that time. The beginning of the astronomical autumn is September the 22nd, the autumnal equinox; and the end is December the 21st, the shortest day. The autumn of the southern hemisphere takes place at the time of the northern spring.
Research Autumn

BAHA'ISM

Baha'ism is a religion founded in Iran by Baha'ullah with about five million adherents throughout the world. Following the suppression of the millenarian Babi movement Babism in Iran and the execution of its leader, the Bab, in 1850, Baha'ullah declared himself in 1863 to be the new prophet heralded by the Bab. Baha'ullah acknowledged the revelations of earlier prophets such as Jesus and Muhammad, but held that the single identity of God must be re-taught by new prophecy to each generation.

Baha'is believe in the spiritual progression of the world to unity and their ideal is an international community with one language. Baha'i temples are open to the faithful of all creeds. A Universal House of Justice administers the religion, with its centres in Haifa and Akko (Acre) in Israel. There is no clergy or ritual; spiritual practice includes daily private prayer and an annual period of fasting, which ends with the festival of Now Ruz, the Persian New Year at the spring equinox. Baha'is stress the equality of women and the importance of monogamous family life.

Although Baha'is regard the Koran and Muhammad with reverence, to Muslims the Baha'is are heretics who have displaced the Koran from its position as the final and most important revelation; this has led to persecution in Iran since the religion's inception, with renewed force since the Islamic revolution of 1979. Furthermore, the location of the Baha'is world centre in Israel has led to an association of Baha'is with that country and made the Baha'is a target of anti-Semitic sentiment.
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CALENDAR

A calendar (named from the Latin calendarium, from calendce, the first day of the month), is a record or marking out of time as systematically divided into years, months, weeks, and days.

The periodical occurrence of certain natural phenomena gave rise to the first division of time, the division into weeks being the only purely arbitrary partition. The year of the ancient Egyptians was based on the changes of the seasons alone, without reference to the lunar month, and contained 365 days divided into twelve months of thirty days each, with five supplementary days at the end of the year.

The Jewish year consisted of lunar months of which they reckoned twelve in the year, intercalating a thirteenth when necessary to maintain the correspondence of the particular months with the regular recurrence of the seasons.

The Greeks in the earliest period also reckoned by lunar and intercalary months, but after one or two changes adopted the plan of Meton and Euctemon, who took account of the fact that in a period of nineteen years, the new moons return upon the same days of the year as before. This period of nineteen years was found, however, to be about six hours too long, and subsequent calculators still failed to make the beginning of the seasons return on the same fixed day of the year. Each month was divided into three decads.

The Romans at first divided the year into ten months, but they early adopted the Greek method of lunar and intercalary months, making the lunar year consist of 354, and afterwards of 355 days, leaving ten or eleven days and a fraction to be supplied by the intercalary division. This arrangement continued until the time of Julius Caesar. The first day of the month was called the calends. In March, May, July, and October the 15th, in other months the 13th, was called the ides. The ninth day before the ides (reckoning inclusive) was called the nones, being therefore either the 7th or the 5th of the month. From the inaccuracy of the Roman method of reckoning the calendar came to represent the vernal equinox nearly two months after the event, and at the request of Julius Caesar, the Greek astronomer Sosigenes with the assistance of Marcus Fabius, contrived the so-called Julian calendar. The chief improvement consisted in restoring the equinox to its proper place by inserting two months between November and December, so that the year 707 (46 BC), called the year of confusion, contained fourteen months.

In the number of days the Greek computation was adopted, which made it 365.25. To dispose of the quarter of a day it was determined to intercalate a day every fourth year between the 23rd and 24th of February. This calendar continued in use among the Romans until the fall of the empire, and throughout Christendom until 1582.

By this time, owing to the cumulative error of eleven minutes, the vernal equinox really took place ten days earlier than its date in the calendar, and accordingly Pope Gregory XIII issued a brief abolishing the Julian calendar in all Catholic countries, and introducing in its stead the one now in use, the Gregorian or reformed calendar. In this way began the new style, as opposed to the other or old style. Ten days were to be dropped; every hundredth year, which by the old style was to have been a leap year, was now to be a common year, the fourth excepted; and the length of the solar year was taken to be 365 days, five hours, forty-nine minutes, and twelve seconds, the difference between which and subsequent observations is immaterial. The new calendar was adopted in Spain, Portugal, and France in 1582; in Catholic Switzerland, Germany and the Netherlands in 1583; in Poland in 1586; in Hungary in 1587; in Protestant Germany, Holland, and Denmark in 1700; in Switzerland in 1701; in England in 1752; and in Sweden, 1753.

In the English calendar of 1752, also, the 1st of January was now adopted as the beginning of the legal year, and it was customary for some time to give two dates for the period intervening between 1st January and 25th March, that of the old and that of the new year, as January 1752/3. Russia alone retained the old style, which by 1906 differed twelve days from the new.

In France, during the revolution, a new calendar was introduced by a decree of the rational Convention, on November the 24th, 1793. The time from which the new reckoning was to commence was the autumnal equinox of 1792, which fell upon the 22nd of September, when the first decree of the new republic had been promulgated. The year was made to consist of twelve months of three decades each, and, to complete the full number, five fete days, or sansculotides (in leap years six) were added to the end of the year. The seasons and months were as follows: Autumn; 22nd September to 22nd December Vendimiaire, vintage month; Brumaire, foggy month; Frimaire, sleet month. Winter; 22nd December to 22nd March: Nivose, snowy month; Plumose, rainy month; Ventose, windy month. Spring; 22nd March to 22nd June: Germinal, bud month; Floreal, flower month; Prairial, meadow month. Summer; 22nd June to 22nd Sept.: Messidor, harvest month; Thermidor, hot month; Fructidor, fruit month. The common Christian or Gregorian calendar was re-established in France on the 1st of January, 1806, by Napoleon.
Research Calendar

EASTER

Easter is an ancient religious festival occurring at or around the vernal equinox. It originally marked the end of the old year and the dawn of a new year and was celebrated by the Anglo-Saxons in honour of their goddess of the east who was called Easter. In Rome the sacred fire in the temple of Vesta was rekindled on the first of March each year marking the start of the Roman year.

The practice of giving easter eggs at spring time is widely spread through ancient traditions from the Persians, Jews, Egyptians and Hindus and universally symbolises creation or the hatching of a new year. The Christian faith adopted the tradition as a symbol of resurrection, which of course spring is after the 'death' that is winter, and originally coloured their easter eggs red in allusion to the blood of their saviour.
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SPRING

Spring is the first season of the year. In the northern hemisphere it is reckoned astronomically from the vernal equinox (about March the 21st) until the summer solstice (about June the 21st). In the southern hemisphere spring corresponds in date with the northern autumn.

SUMMER

Summer is the warmest season of the year. It begins astronomically in northern latitudes when the sun enters the zodiacal sign of Cancer, about June 22nd, and terminates at the autumn equinox, about September 21st. In Britain, summer is officially the months of May, June and July with Midsummer Day the middle of the British summer, but astronomically the start of summer. In the USA, summer is officially the months of June, July and August. Short spells of warm weather in the middle of October and the beginning of November used to be known as St Luke's and St Martin's summer from the occurrence of these saints' days on October 18th and November 11th.
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VEADAR

Veadar is a month of the Jewish calendar intercalated at leap year. The ordinary year consists of 12 lunar months, making 354 days. To ensure that Passover, the 16th day of Nisan, shall occur at the full moon of the spring equinox, an adjustment is made by introducing a leap year of 384 days. This leap year comes seven times in each period of 19 years. In the leap year, an additional day is added to the month Adar and the remaining 29 days form the month Veadar (double Adar), which is intercalated between Adar and Nisan, thus becoming the 7th month of the civil and the 1st of the ecclesiastic year.
Research Veadar

WINTER

Winter is the coldest of the seasons. It is defined astronomically as beginning in the northern hemisphere with the sun's entry into the sign of Capricorn, around December 21st and ending with the vernal equinox.

ZODIAC

The zodiac was the name given by the ancient Greeks to the heavens. It was an imaginary belt in the celestial sphere, extending about 80 degrees on either side of the ecliptic, the apparent path of the Sun among the stars. The width of the zodiac was determined originally so as to include the orbits of the Sun and Moon and of the five planets (Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn) that were known to the people of ancient times.

The zodiac is divided into 12 sections of 300 degrees each, which are called the signs of the zodiac. Starting with the vernal equinox and then proceeding eastward along the ecliptic, each of the divisions is named for the constellation situated within its limits in the second century BC. The names of the zodiacal signs are Aries, the Ram; Taurus, the Bull; Gemini, the Twins; Cancer, the Crab; Leo, the Lion; Virgo, the Virgin; Libra, the Balance; Scorpio, the Scorpion; Sagittarius, the Archer; Capricorn, the Goat; Aquarius, the Water Bearer; and Pisces, the Fish. Because of the precession of the equinoxes about the ecliptic, a 26,000-year cycle, the first point of Aries retrogrades about 10 degrees in 70 years, so that the sign Aries today lies in the constellation Pisces. In about 24,000 years, when the retrogression will have completed the entire circuit of 3600, the zodiacal signs and constellations will again coincide.

It is believed that the zodiacal signs originated in Mesopotamia as early as 2000 BC . The Greeks adopted the symbols from the Babylonians and passed them on to the other ancient civilisations. The Egyptians assigned other names and symbols to the zodiacal divisions. The Chinese also adopted the 12-fold division, but called the signs rat, ox, tiger, hare, dragon, serpent, horse, sheep, monkey, hen, dog, and pig. Independently, the Aztec Indians devised a similar system.
Research Zodiac

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