|
If you have family documents from before the beginning of the 19th century, there may be some confusion about some of the dates.
By the 16th century the slight miscalculations of the old Julian calendar had reached a point where the calendar months no longer corresponded with the solar year.
For that reason Pope Gregory XII proclaimed a new, improved calendar in Feb 1582; at that time the introduction involved jumping forward 10 days. The longer any area left it before adopting the new calendar, the more days it had to jump forward
But the Gregorian calendar ran into resistance, especially in the Reformed areas. In Switzerland it was introduced only slowly, over the course of 200 years. Sometimes even in different parts of the same canton disagreed about which calendar to follow.
By the beginning of the 18th century it had been widely adopted. But there were still places where this had not happened. Here are the dates on which the remaining areas finally started using it:
1.1.1701 (new style: 12.1.1701): Reformed cantons of Zurich, Bern, Basel, Schaffhausen and the Catholic parts of Glarus, Neuchatel, Geneva
1724: City of St Gallen
4.7.1798: Reformed Glarus
Christmas 1798: Appenzell Outer Rhodes
The situation in Graubünden was particularly complicated.
In the mixed (Catholic/Reformed) communes the Catholics used the new calendar from the middle of the 17th century, but the Reformed members of the communes adopted it only from the middle of 18th century.
Wholly Reformed communes adopted the new calendar at various times between 1783 and 1812
The last to conform were Schiers and Grüsch, in 1812.
Between 1793 and 1805 the French revolutionary calendar was in force in those areas of Geneva and the Bishopric of Basel which France had annexed.
Even as late as the 20th century some almanachs listed both dates. By this time “corrected” January 1st was equivalent to “old” December 19th.
In America (at that time still a British colony), the Gregorian calendar was introduced on 14th September 1752, as it was in Britain.
|
Genealogy
Community
