Byzantine calendar
The first appearance of the term is in the treatise of a monk and priest, Georgios (AD 638–639), who mentions all the main variants of the "World Era" in his work.
Complex calculations of the 19-year lunar and 28-year solar cycles within this world era allowed scholars to attribute cosmic significance to certain historical dates, such as the birth or the crucifixion of Jesus.
[5][note 6] By the late 10th century (around AD 988), when the era appears in use on official government records, a unified system was widely recognized across the Eastern Roman world.
The era was ultimately calculated as starting on September 1, and Jesus was thought to have been born in the year 5509 since the creation of the world.
[7][note 7] Historical time was thus calculated from the creation, and not from Christ's birth as it was in the west after the Anno Domini system adopted between the 6th and 9th centuries.
The eastern Church avoided the use of the Anno Domini system of Dionysius Exiguus, since the date of Christ's birth was debated in Constantinople as late as the 14th century.
After the collapse of the Byzantine Empire in 1453, the era continued to be used by Russia, which witnessed millennialist movements in Moscow in AD 1492 (7000 AM).
[16] Both of these early Christian writers, following the Septuagint version of the Old Testament, determined the age of the world to have been about 5,530 years at the birth of Christ.
[17] Ben Zion Wacholder points out that the writings of the Church Fathers on this subject are of vital significance (even though he disagrees with their chronological system based on the authenticity of the Septuagint, as compared to that of the Masoretic Text), in that through the Christian chronographers a window to the earlier Hellenistic biblical chronographers[note 13] is preserved: An immense intellectual effort was expended during the Hellenistic period by both Jews and pagans to date creation, the flood, exodus, building of the Temple...
After the initial attempts by Hippolytus, Clement of Alexandria and others,[note 15] the Alexandrian computation of the date of creation was worked out to be 25 March 5493 BC.
This system presents in a masterly sort of way the mystical coincidence of the three main dates of the world's history: the beginning of Creation, the incarnation, and the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Considering that Christ was conceived at that date turned March 25 into the Feast of the Annunciation which had to be followed, nine months later, by the celebration of the birth of Christ, Christmas, on December 25.The Alexandrian Era of March 25, 5493 BC was adopted by church fathers such as Maximus the Confessor and Theophanes the Confessor, as well as chroniclers such as George Syncellus.
However this masterpiece of Christian symbolism had two serious weak points: historical inaccuracy surrounding the date of the resurrection of Jesus as determined by its Easter computus,[note 17] and its contradiction to the chronology of the Gospel of St John regarding the date of the crucifixion of Jesus on Friday after the Passover.
For its influence on Greek Christian chronology, and also because of its wide scope, the Chronicon Paschale takes its place beside Eusebius, and the chronicle of the monk Georgius Syncellus[22] which was so important in the Middle Ages; but in respect of form it is inferior to these works.
John Chrysostom says in his Homily "On the Cross and the Thief", that Christ "opened for us today Paradise, which had remained closed for some 5000 years.
In the year AD 691, we find the Creation Era in the Acts of the Quinisext Council: ... as of the fifteenth day of the month of January last past, in the last fourth Indiction, in the year six thousand one hundred and ninety"[28]We find the era also in the dating of the so-called Letter of three Patriarchs to the emperor Theophilos (April, indiction 14, 6344 = AD 836).
[5] John Skylitzes' (c. 1081–1118) major work is the Synopsis of Histories, which covers the reigns of the Byzantine emperors from the death of Nicephorus I in 811 to the deposition of Michael IV in 1057; it continues the chronicle of Theophanes the Confessor.
Quoting from him as an example of the common Byzantine dating method, he refers to emperor Basil, writing that: In the year 6508 [1000], in the thirteenth indiction, the emperor sent a great force against the Bulgarian fortified positions (kastra) on the far side of the Balkan (Haimos) mountains,..."[7]Niketas Choniates (c. 1155–1215), sometimes called Acominatus, was a Byzantine Greek historian.
Again, an example of the dating method can be seen as he refers to the fall of Constantinople to the fourth crusade as follows: The queen of cities fell to the Latins on the twelfth day of the month of April of the seventh indiction in the year 6712 [1204].
Although unrefined in style, the history of Doukas is both judicious and trustworthy, and it is the most valuable source for the closing years of the Byzantine empire.
And Abraham with his offspring dwelt in the land of Canaan 433 years, and having multiplied they numbered twelve tribes; a multitude of 600,000 were reckoned from the twelve sons of Jacob whose names are as follows: Ruben, Symeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Dan, Joseph, and Benjamin.
[30]Even the most mystical Fathers such as St. Isaac the Syrian accepted without question the common understanding of the Church that the world was created "more or less" in 5,500 BC.
Seraphim Rose points out: For early Christians, the creation of the world was neither a matter of dogma nor a cosmological problem.
This cycle begins on the first Sunday after Easter ("Thomas-Sunday") and contains the texts whose content represents the meaning of the days of the week.
[47] To this day, traditional Orthodox Christians will use the Byzantine calculation of the World Era in conjunction with the Anno Domini (AD) year.
Eusebius (vii.32) recounts that Anatolius of Laodicea was the first to arrange the 19-years cycle (when the new moon returns to the same Julian date) for ecclesiastical purposes.
Anatolius says that he places the new moon of the first year of his cycle on the Alexandrian equivalent of 22 March, the day of the vernal equinox.
In the Julian calendar, the equinox recedes at the rate of 1 day in 128 years; by the time of the First Council of Nicaea in AD 325 it was falling on 21 March.
In the sixth century, after it accepted that it no longer mattered if the birthday of Rome (23 April) fell within Lent, the Roman church abandoned its own calculation (the Supputatio Romana) for the Alexandrian one.
