What's the story with B.C. and A.D.? Did they start A.D. with 1?

Question

I bet in the beginning of 2 people were still writing 1 on their checks. Also, people believe christ was supposed to have died around 4 A. D., so A.D. can't mean "after death" and B.C. would not mean "before christ". I think the Greeks or the Romans started this though. What would these letters stand for?

Answer 1

A.D. means ad deminium

Answer 2

Like all measurement systems it's arbitrary.  I think that previous to the Christian era years were designated by naming it for the king of whatever land you lived in (11th year of King Sargon, for example), or with the Romans counting from the birth of the Republic.

After Christianity spread throughout Europe, the idea of counting from Christ's death was used.  I believe that they used the format "Year of our Lord 957" rather than 957 AD.

Nowadays most scholars use CE (Common Era) and BCE (Before Common Era) in order to sidestep the religious baggage of BC and AD.

Answer 3

In the BC years, people weren't actually counting down to anything. Romans counted the years from the start of the Republic. Most other kingdoms counted time by measuring the years from the start of the king's reign.

The idea of numbering the years based on Christ's death didn't actually come about until several hundred years later when the Pope of the time estimated the time since He had been born.

Answer 4

AD means Anno Domini.  Year Of Our Lord in Latin.  Christ did not die in AD 4.  BC does mean Before Christ.  Clearly these are designations for time applied at a later date.

Answer 5

A.D. Anno Domini (The Year of Our Lord)

Though the Anno Domini dating system was devised in 525, it was not until the 8th century that the system began to be adopted in Western Europe. According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, even popes continued to date documents according to regnal years, and usage of AD only gradually became more common in Europe from the 11th to the 14th centuries.[4] In 1422, Portugal became the last Western European country to adopt the Anno Domini system.

B.C. (Before Christs) is used in the English language to denote years before the start of AD (now CE) numbering.

Many culture before than and up until most recently usually counted year, by how long their sovereign was in rule. This is why we have Regnal Years (dynasties/eras/kingdoms etc.)

It is Now proper to use B.C.E. (Before Common Era), and C.E. (Common Era).

Answer 6

BC does widely mean Before Christ. The reason the dates dont work is because on the copying of some texts, the monk got it wrong (there were no printing presses or anything in those days). We only recently found out the real date of Christ's death. AD means Anno Domini.