Why The Anno Domini Calendar Is Outdated And Why 2650bc (*the year of the first marriage ceremonies) Should Be Year 0

In 525AD… or, “after death,” referring to the life of Jesus Christ (the messiah of Christian faith)… a monk named Dionysius Exiguus calculated that what we now know to be year 0 in Western culture was in fact the birth year of Jesus Christ and should thus be considered the universal standard of Western time keeping. Nevertheless, today, how many people even question this concept? And is this system of time keeping –now referred to as the, “Anno Domini calendar,” becoming outdated?

Whereby, in my opinion, this calendar is outdated and also gives a certain, “twist,” to some of histories greatest stories with an over (and under) emphasis on the greatness of cultural icons such as; Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Augustus Caesar and Christ himself.

But to elaborate… what we now know as 356BC or 356 years before the birth of Christ, in my opinion feels pre-historic in nature when titled, “356BC,” (*356BC is Alexander the Great’s birth year). Whereas, the earliest known civilizations of Egypt date back to sometime around 5000-6000BC and encompass a more, “truly pre-historic root,” in my opinion. Whereby, when we think of Alexander today, as a key figure in Western culture and a controversial icon in the Middle East, we think of his conquests in terms of pre-history or BC… yet, the first Egyptian Pharaoh’s and the pyramids of Giza were built roughly 2,200 years before Alexander’s time. Thus, Alexander’s lifetime was actually closer to the year 2,200… if the year 0 were to be, in fact, at the dawn of civilization based upon Egyptian history and the first farming civilizations.

Or to outline this concept more frankly… when Alexander was born in 356bc the year would’ve actually been more like 4,200 if the year 0 were in fact, dated back to the earliest hunter gatherers of the Nile River Valley… which then gives us a more MODERN TWIST pertaining to the wars fought from what we now know to be the years 600BC-0AD.

Or to put it more bluntly… labeling the early BC calendar into a context of, “pre-history,” around the time of Greek and Roman culture feels wrong to me, particularly when those periods are more akin to modern history… as opposed to what the modern Anno Domini calendar might suggest. Whereas, in Alexander’s time specifically… the year would’ve been more like 4,200 since the days of the first farmers around 4500BC, when time keeping first began as part of seasonal farming. Whereby, if one was to date the first calendar at say 4,500BC as year 0, when the first Egyptian city states began large scale farming societies on the Nile River Valley… then Alexander would’ve actually been born around 4,250. However, to pinpoint history with the year 0 at the turn of those specific civilizations, from hunter gatherer societies to the earliest farming city states, is still difficult today and was entirely too arbitrary or inaccurate 1000 years ago. Whereby, in some ways the first marriage (Rahotep and Nufret) and the ancient world from which they came… is still a modern, “never never land,” today. (*Which was how Egyptologist John Romer described it in his book on Egypt.) Nevertheless, due to modern archeology (*not present when Anno Domini crafted his Christian calendar in what we now know as 525AD) we can today, however, properly assess that the first hunter gatherer’s evolved into farming civilizations sometime around the year 6,000-4,500BC… and that Rahotep and Nufret constituted the first prominent royal marriage around 2650bc, whereas 100-1000 years ago those dates were lesser known and MORE arbitrary than they are today.

But this changes the entire concept of Western history in itself, in my opinion, mostly because in that context, from the dawn of time so to speak… when the first hunter gatherers took to farming in 5,000BC and with that change bringing the advent of calendars themselves… we now do have a rough estimate of the beginning of, “modern times,” today. Nevertheless, despite time keeping dating back to around 5,000BC, I also find that this date is also somewhat arbitrary in that… although archeological discoveries now show the earliest city states springing up all over the world around this time, give or take 1,000-2,000 years, hunter gatherers at this time had existed in some form for 50-100k years prior to that with no biological changes to modern human DNA, according to modern genetic research. Meaning, that the human species did not change genetically since around the year 100,000BC according to genetic research, however, the evolution of farming itself occurred sometime around 10,000-6,000BC with no real historical accuracy surrounding this exact evolution of human behavior or the transition to modern farming. Or more simply put; crop sharing, clothing, advanced weapons and grain storage can only be roughly approximated to around 5,000-12,000BC without any hard evidence to support any exact date. Nevertheless, it’s assumed by most historians today that this is the time when most of the Mediterranean and Nile River Valley took to creating the first Egyptian city-states of human civilization. Nevertheless, and without getting too arbitrary with my own time keeping, that step of early farming and the first calendars were thus created between 10,000 and 5,000BC according to MOST historians today and then the first chieftains who would later become Egyptian Pharaoh’s then arose around the year 3,500BC which is not arbitrary at all to modern scholars and with them the first large scale city states and farming civilizations, thereafter, with few others taking root in rural outposts in Asia and other parts of Africa, during the dawn of Western culture.

Yet, with regard to concrete facts… and without rambling on too much, in the year 525AD when the Anno Domini calendar was first accepted… this argument surrounding, “the dawn of time,” was of great philosophical importance that is rarely discussed in today’s culture. And this is because before 525AD and the institution of the modern calendar… the year 0 was changed several times and was often stated as the birth year of the newest Roman Emperor (*who at that time was given divine status). Whereas, during this time (roughly 1000bc-1000ad)… entire years were often extended and shortened based on the Roman Senate’s decrees. Or in other words because of early historians lack of knowledge about Astronomy and things like the leap year, weeks were often added and subtracted from the earliest calendars (*before the Anno Domini calendar) and in some instances entire years were absent from prehistoric record keeping. Whereby, at this time (*roughly 1000BC-1000AD) there were likely several occurrences of entire years being lost to histories early tyrants. And furthermore, it can now be deciphered with some certainty that the earliest calendars were restarted several times over… both during and before the reigns of Emperors; Caesar, Augustus and Nero, whom often proclaimed a new year 0… in accordance with their own birth year, often muddying some of these dates several times over and essentially using the pre-historic calendar as an early tool of economic control, much like interest rates today.

Nevertheless; where my issue is… is in the perspective of the time itself. Where at the time of the Anno Domini calendar, 525AD, when Anno Domini pinpointed the birth of Christ to 0AD and created some consensus on these debates, “over the true dawn of time,” he essentially labeled everything before Christ as, “pre-history,” with the reign of the Roman Emperor Augustus at year 0, during a time when Rome first became truly civilized by most accounts. Yet, without getting into too much detail or rambling on about this very controversial topic, in essence Anno Domini then labeled Alexander The Great’s conquests at around 330BC or the third century before Christ, which then gives Alexander an aura of, “pre-history,” stacked alongside the Greeks and Trojans, the destruction of Carthage (*one of the oldest city states at that time) and the conquest’s of Julius Caesar… all of which are now essentially labeled as, “pre-history,” or before the times of Christ and Emperor Augustus, where there was essentially more anarchy and less civilized society (BC). However, today, with modern archeology tracing human history and the Pharaoh’s and much of Egyptian culture (*which makes up a bulk of the Old Testament in the Bible), we know that advanced civilizations can be more properly dated to around 4,500BC and in my opinion the year 2,650BC holds an even more important significance as that was the year in which the first WEDDING CEREMONIES became commonplace, in Egyptian culture (*although the institution of marriage seems to have taken root sometime closer to 5,000-6,000BC). And the marriage that I’m specifically referring to is between the Egyptian’s Rahotep and Nufret, sometime during the reign of Pharoah’s Sneferu or Khufu in the 27th century BC. Nevertheless, while a lot of these dates still remain arbitrary to even the best historians (*although Artificial Intelligence could one day bring even more clarity to these discussions) I believe that a more proper YEAR 0, in essence should be casted at the year 2,650BC when the first wedding ceremonies began to take root in Egypt, which is still almost 1,000 years after the first, “royal chieftains,” and subsequent Pharaoh’s.

Whereby, in conclusion I’d like to see 2,650BC, the year of the first wedding ceremonies recorded in Egyptian history, to become the new YEAR 0… in a more modern form of time keeping which would then make the first wedding ceremonies the dawn of Western culture and with less of an emphasis on the figure that we now know to be Jesus Christ (*or to historians… Christus). But furthermore, I’d also like this change to occur predominately because I find that Christ is over-emphasized for a variety of reasons in Western culture today and because Alexander, the Greeks, Julius Caesar and even Augustus Caesar really did their, “best work,” in the years 2,300-2,700 POST MARRIAGE or P.M. in this case… if the year 0 was in fact 2,650BC… or reset at the time of the first wedding ceremonies, giving a more modern twist to their conquests in particular. Whereby, under this form of time keeping… Alexander the Great (356-323BC) would then have conquered Persia around the year 2,300PM or POST MARRIAGE, a more modern twist to Western history and a more accurate portrayal of those events in some ways. Whereby, at this time it would’ve been more like 2,300PM or POST MARRIAGE when Alexander did his best work and 2,600 P.M. when Julius Caesar united most of Europe under Rome, essentially giving Alexander and Caesar’s conquests MORE LUSTER in terms of conquering more advanced civilizations than we now give them credit for by simply calling it 350BC or 50BC (*the times of Caesar and Alexander), which in essence downplays Caesar and Alexander’s military records, in many ways.

Case in point… I find that 2,650BC should be labeled as the new year 0… due to modern archeological findings and specifically the excavation of the Egyptian’s Rahotep and Nufret, as the first truly divine couple… because this date marks the conception of the first marriage ceremonies in Egyptian culture and because this change to the calendar would then place a lot of key Western figures at more TELLING DATES OF TIME. Whereby… by the way… that would then also place this current year at 4,677PM and not 2,022AD.

-William Larsen, CiviliansNews.com