New Year’s celebrations have been around for centuries, intertwining with humanity’s understanding of time and the changing of seasons. The ways in which people celebrate the New Year throughout the world varies, influenced by culture, religion, and history.
The earliest recorded New Year celebration dates back to ancient Babylon. The first new moon following the vernal equinox, which typically falls in March, was marked as the New Year by the Babylonians. This resulted in an eleven day festival known as Akitu, which consisted of a variety of rituals.
Similarly, the New Year was celebrated during the flooding of the Nile around mid-July, by ancient Egypt. This event was annual, bringing fertility to the land and marking the new agricultural season.
The Roman calendar originally began in March, until Julius Caesar reformed it in 45 B.C to align with the solar year and be known as the Julian calendar. With this reformation, New Year’s Day was set on January 1st, in honor of the Roman god of beginning, gates, transitions, time, duality, and endings. January 1st became widely recognized as New Year’s Day as the Roman Empire expanded, though it wasn’t uniformly celebrated until the Middle Ages, when Christianity introduced new traditions that replaced pagan customs.
During the early medieval period, the New Year was celebrated at different times depending on the local customs and religious calendars, that often differed. For some, New Years was observed on Easter, the Feast of the Annunciation, or Christmas.
In 1583, Pope Gregory XIII brought about the Gregorian calendar, officially and universally establishing January 1st as New Year’s Day.
'Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?” Isaiah 43:18-19