Common Era

The Common Era, also known as the Current Era, is the period of measured time beginning with the year 1 on the Gregorian calendar. "Common" or "Current Era" are alternative names for anno Domini, Latin for "in the year of (our) Lord", also translated "of the Christian Era". All of these era names are chronologically equivalent, i.e. the number of any given year is the same no matter which of the names is used. When using the names "Common Era" or "Current Era", early years are described as "before the Common" or "before the Current Era". When using the names "anno Domini" or "Christian Era", early years are described as "before Christ" or "before the Christian Era". Neither of these systems includes a year zero, though however, the astronomical system and ISO 8601 do.

The short forms for "Common Era" and "before the Common Era" are "CE" and "BCE". The short form for "anno Domini" is "AD". The short forms for "Christian Era" are either "AD" or "CE". The short form for "before Christ" is "BC". These short forms are sometimes written with small capital letters, or with full stops (e.g., "C.E.").

The term "Common Era" is preferred by many, and especially by academic writers and publishers, as an alternative to the more overtly religious "AD" and "BC", since "Common Era" does not explicitly make use of religious titles for Jesus, such as "Christ" and "Lord", which are used in the AD/BC notation. Some criticise Common Era notation as a euphemism that does not alter the pivotal year 1 still centering on the life of Jesus. Others criticise the notation as an unnecessary attempt at political correctness.

The term "CE" is preferred by academics in some fields (e.g., by the American Anthropological Association).

During the 1800s, the phrase "common era", in lower case, was frequently used in a generic sense, not necessarily to refer to the Christian Era, but to any system of dates in common use throughout a civilisation. Thus, "the common era of the Jews", "the common era of the Mahometans", "the common era of the foundation of Rome". When it did refer to the Christian Era, it was sometimes qualified: e.g., "the common era of the Nativity of Our Lord". or "the common era of the birth of our Saviour";

Chronology and notation

The calendar practice prompting the coining of the term "Common Era" is the system of numbering years from the supposed beginning of the life of Jesus. This system was devised by the monk Dionysius Exiguus in the year 525, who named it "anno Domini". Two centuries later, the Anglo-Saxon historian Bede used a Latin term – "ante incarnationis dominicae tempus" – that was roughly equivalent to the English term "before Christ" to identify years before the first year of this era.

Both abbreviations are written following the year; thus Aristotle was born in 384 BCE (or 384 BC), and Genghis Khan died in 1227 CE (or AD 1227). As with "anno Domini", the year zero is not used, except for astronomical uses: 1 CE is immediately preceded by 1 BCE.

On (rare) occasions, one may find the abbreviation "e.v." or "EV" instead of "CE"; this stands for "era vulgaris", a Latin translation of "Common Era".

Gregorian versus Julian calendar

The terms '"Common Era", "Anno Domini", "Before the Common Era", and "Before Christ" can be applied to dates that rely either on the Julian calendar or the Gregorian calendar. Modern dates are understood to be in the Gregorian calendar, but writers should specify the calendar for older dates. Dates in the Gregorian calendar have always used the Common Era, but a wide variety of eras have been used with the Julian calendar over the millennia.

Origins

The term "Common Era" has early antecedents. A 1716 book by the English Bishop John Prideaux includes a reference to: "The vulgar era, by which we now compute the years from his incarnation". In 1835, in his book Living Oracles, Alexander Campbell, wrote: "The vulgar Era, or Anno Domini; the fourth year of Jesus Christ, the first of which was but eight days." In its article on "General Chronology", the 1908 Catholic Encyclopedia says: "Foremost among these (dating eras) is that which is now adopted by all civilized peoples and known as the Christian, Vulgar or Common Era, in the twentieth century of which we are now living".

"Vulgar" comes from the Latin word vulgāris (from vulgus, the common people), meaning "of or belonging to the common people, everyday". By the late 1800s, however, "vulgar" had come to mean "crudely indecent", and the Latin word was replaced by its English equivalent, "common".

Some Jewish academics were using using the "BCE" abbreviation by the mid 1800s, such as in 1856, when Rabbi and historian Morris Jacob Raphall used the abbreviation in his book Post-Biblical History of the Jews.

Usage

Academics, especially in relevant fields such as classics, history, history of ideas, anthropology]], etc., have adopted the CE and BCE notation, and it has been in use for Hebrew lessons for "more than a century". Jehovah's Witnesses exclusively use CE and BCE in their publications, generally explaining in footnotes that the terms stand for "Common Era" and "Before the Common Era".

More visible uses of Common Era notation have recently surfaced at major museums in the English-speaking world: The Smithsonian Institution prefers Common Era usage, though individual museums are not required to use it. Furthermore, several style guides now prefer or mandate its usage. Even some style guides for Christian churches prefer its use: for example, the Episcopal Diocese Maryland Church News.

The usage of the BCE/CE notation in textbooks is growing. The 2007 World Almanac was the first edition to switch over to the BCE/CE usage, ending a 138-year usage of the traditional BC/AD dating system. It is used by the U.S. College Board in its history tests, as well as by some National Geographic Society publications, The Norton Anthology of English Literature, and the United States Naval Observatory. The U.S.-based History Channel uses BCE/CE notation in articles on non-Christian religious topics such as Jerusalem and Judaism and uses BC (but neither CE nor AD) in other cases.

In June 2006, the Kentucky State School Board reversed its decision that would have included the designations BCE and CE in referring to dates.

Support of and opposition to the use of CE/BCE over AD/BC

There is a range of arguments for and against the use of CE and BCE over AD and BC.

Support

Supporters of Common Era notation promote it as a religiously-neutral notation suited for cross-cultural use. Arguments given for changing to Common Era notation include:

• The calendar used by the West has become a global standard — one built into every computer's hardware. It should be religiously and culturally neutral out of consideration for those cultures compelled to use it out of necessity.
• It has been largely used by academic and scientific communities, and is not a completely unfamiliar dating system.
• It is simple to change BC/AD to BCE/CE notation, since the years are numbered exactly the same in both (e.g., 33 BC becomes 33 BCE), Documents with years that do not have AD designation do not need to be changed at all (e.g., 1066 remains 1066 in AD and in CE systems).
• The label Anno Domini is almost certainly inaccurate; the birth of Jesus of Nazareth probably occurred no later than 4 BC, the year of Herod the Great's death.
• "Anno Domini" (which means, literally, "in the year of the Lord") works well with specific dates – e.g., 655 AD – but its use with centuries (and other time units such as decades and millennia) presents grammatical difficulties: "the seventh century AD" means, literally: "In the year of the Lord, the seventh century". The CE notation avoids this problem.
• "Forcing a Hindu, for example, to use AD and BC might be seen by some as coercing them to acknowledge the supremacy of the Christian god and of Jesus Christ." The Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance further state: "We use the terms CE and BCE throughout this web site because they are less hurtful to non-Christians."
• Although some claim that AD and BC have lost nearly all their religious significance, much of the opposition, some of it intense, to switching to usage of CE and BCE has been on religious grounds.

Opposition

Efforts to replace AD/BC notation with CE/BCE notation have given rise to opposition. Arguments against the Common Era designation include:

• BC and AD have been used for such a length of time as to have become somewhat removed from their religious connotations.
• The newer BCE/CE system has not been used widely enough to have become commonly recognised.
• The Christocentricity of the AD epoch is not addressed by simply exchanging the labels with BCE/CE, since the epoch remains the same, based on a sixth-century estimate of the birth of Jesus. People concerned with the epoch's Christocentricity would need to switch to a different epoch-system altogether.
• BCE/CE fails to fix one of the problems with the Christian calendar, the lack of a year zero, which makes calculations involving years that span both sides of the central year one year too large, unless one remembers to subtract one.
• The BCE/CE promotion distracts from the adoption of the system already used by astronomers, i.e. 0 for 1 BC, -1 for 2 BC, etc., which does resolve this problem and does not use any of the contentious acronyms.
• As there is no equally forceful trend to remove other terms with origins in non-Christian religions (such as those days of the week which in English are named after Norse gods), many argue that movement to replace BC and AD is specifically anti-Christian. This argument is countered by the argument that "while the Roman and Norse Gods represent virtually extinct religions, Christianity is still massively influential and potentially culturally divisive."

Other calendar eras

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Several systems of calculating the year have existed:

• The Hindu calendar constitutes four eras and the epoch of the present (fourth) era, the Kali Yuga, is January 23 3102 BCE on the proleptic (i.e., back dated) Gregorian calendar, making the current year (2007) 5109.

• The Hebrew calendar dates from the traditional Jewish date of Creation (according to which the year beginning in the northern autumn of 2000 was 5761 AM);

• Most Chinese do not assign numbers to the years of the Chinese calendar, but the few who do (expatriate Chinese and Westerners) date from the Yellow Emperor (three different systems are in use, which caused the Chinese years 4637, 4697, or 4698 to begin in early 2000).

• The Taiwanese calendar dates from the founding of the Republic of China in 1912.

• The Buddhist calendar dates from the passing away of the Buddha (making 2000, 2543 under this calendar, currently used in Thailand).

• The Indian national calendar (also the Saka calendar) is the official civil calendar in use in India. Years are counted in the Saka Era, which starts its year 0 in 78. 2007 is therefore 1929 in India.

• The Islamic calendar dates from the Hijra in 622 using a lunar year of about 354 days (so the Western year 2000 contains parts of 1420 AH and 1421 AH);

• The Jalaali calendar, a form of the Zoroastrian calendar, which is used in Iran, uses Zoroastrian months, but also starts from the Hijra in 622--thus the year 1386 begins in March 2007. The spring equinox marks the beginning of the year for this calendar.

• The Bahá'í calendar dates from the year of the declaration of the Báb. Years are counted in the Bahá'í Era (BE), which starts its year 1 from March 21, 1844.

• The Japanese calendar dates from the succession of the current Emperor of Japan. The current emperor took the throne in 1989, which became Heisei 1, but which was until then Shōwa 64.

• The French Revolutionary Calendar was used in Revolutionary France from October 24, 1793 (on the Gregorian calendar) to January 1, 1806. Years were counted using the Republican era from September 22 1792 starting with year 1.

• The Roman Calendar, which is virtually extinct, dated years from the mythological founding of Rome, 21 April 753 BC. The first year was thus 1 AUC (ab urbe condita or anno urbis conditae; "from the city being founded", or "in the year of the foundation of the city"). Reckoning days by this calendar is complex and no longer in use, but the calendar continues today as 2760 AUC in 2007.

• The Discordian calendar follows the CE numbering plus 1166, presumably because of the Curse of Greyface that occurred in 1166 BCE. As a reference, 2024 is Template:Dis-year YOLD (Year of Our Lady of Discord) in the Discordian calendar.

• The Julian day number can be considered a very simple calendar, where its calendar date is just an integer. This is useful for reference, computations, and conversions. The Julian day system was introduced by astronomers to provide a single system of dates that could be used when working with different calendars and to unify different historical chronologies. Apart from the choice of the zero point and name, this Julian day and Julian date are not related to the Julian calendar. The Julian day or Julian day number (JDN) is the (integer) number of days that have elapsed since noon Greenwich Mean Time (UT or TT) Monday, January 1, 4713 BCE in the proleptic Julian calendar. This equals November 24, 4714 BCE in the proleptic Gregorian calendar. That noon-to-noon day is counted as Julian day zero. Thus the multiples of 7 are Mondays. Negative values can also be used. It does not count years, so, strictly speaking, it has no era, but it does have an epoch. Today (noon-to-noon UTC) the value is .

See also

• Calendar reform
• Within the context of archeology, one also encounters the term Before present (also known as before physics) with the abbreviation BP to indicate dates in years before 1950.

External links

• The use of "CE" and "BCE" to identify dates (Religious Tolerance.org)
• Whatever happened to B.C. and A.D., and why? (United Church of Christ)
• NASA: Year dating conventions
• Associated Press: P.C. scholars take Christ out of B.C.
• The Columbia Guide to Standard American English (1993): A.D., B.C., (A.)C.E., B.C.E.