Why does the new year begin on January 1?
Fountain in Trieste, Italy depicting Janus, the two-faced god. Photo: Flickr user Marvin (PA)
Why do we celebrate the New Year when we do?
New Year’s Day seems so fundamental that it’s almost as though nature ordained it. But it’s a civil event – not fixed for any natural reason and unconnected with a solstice or equinox or any other seasonal marker.
The modern celebration of New Year’s Day stems from an ancient Roman custom, the feast of the Roman god Janus – god of doorways and beginnings. The name for the month of January also comes from Janus, who was depicted as having two faces – one looking back into the past, and the other peering forward to the future. By the Middle Ages, in many places the new year began in March. Around the 16th century, a movement developed to restore January 1 as New Year’s Day. In the New Style or Gregorian calendar, the New Year begins on the first of January.
Still, there is a natural event around that time of year – one that the old calendar-makers didn’t consider. It’s Earth’s perihelion or closest point to the sun. It happens because Earth’s orbit around the sun isn’t a perfect circle – and it always happens in the first few days of January.
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