> ...now we need some other date for the doomsayers among us to get all worked up about. DID YOU KNOW:
>
> The year which most of us are currently calling 2000 is, in fact:
>
> 1997 dating from Christ's birth if the 4 BC theory is true;

Er... wouldn't that mean that the current year (2000) is actually 2004? And if Christ was born during Caesar Augustus' census in 5-6 BC, then the current year ought to be 2005 or 2006?


> 2753 according to the old Roman calendar;
> 2749 according to the ancient Babylonian calendar;
> 6236 according to the first Egyptian calendar;
> 5760 according to the Jewish calendar;
> 1420 according to the Moslem calendar;
> 1378 according to the Persian calendar;
> 1716 according to the Coptic calendar;
> 2544 according to the Buddhist calendar;
> 5119 in the current Great Cycle of the ancient Mayas;
> 208 according to the calendar of the French Revolution;
> The year of the Dragon according to the traditional Chinese calendar;

Traditional legend has it that the Emperor Huangdi invented the Chinese calendar in 2637 BC. The name of the current year is geng-chen, the 17th year in the 78th cycle (each cycle is 60 years long). The 'chen' part in the geng-chen name stands for "Dragon" in Mandarin. Since the Chinese calendar is a combined lunar/solar calendar, the calculations for determining months and seasonal events get quite involved astronomically. For example, my father counts his birthday according to this calendar, and the actual date jumps wildly within a 2 month period...