Dating Events In History

[frankq]

Can anyone pinpoint the shift from employing BC and AD and replacing it with BCE and CE? As far as I can discern this shift has been a gradual thing over the course of the last ten to twenty years. We're at the midpoint now, some use the old way, some the new. There seems to be no set rule yet about the matter. While I am more than eager to release history from the bonds of Christian dominance in dating things, I have to admit that BC and AD have more, well ''MGM'' punch. Some authors and historians of course employ the old plus and minus technique, but this seems horribly numerical and too left-brained.

 

Any case, any comments to the above would be welcomed. I'm curious how other members of the forum feel about the technique in dating things.

[Primus Pilus]

I have been rather inconsistent in it myself. I generally like the ring of the BC and AD as its simply the way I 'learned' to study dates, but I've used CE and BCE as a departure in other cases.

 

Either way I'm not torn about. Despite being a non-Christian using Christian annotation does not affect my belief system or offend me in the slightest.

[Onasander]

BC is simple. BCE is longer. Use the shorter of the two, no need to make everyone have to suffer to aim in the quest for political correctness. This BCE stuff is discrimination against the lazy.

[frankq]

I have been rather inconsistent in it myself. I generally like the ring of the BC and AD as its simply the way I 'learned' to study dates, but I've used CE and BCE as a departure in other cases.

 

Either way I'm not torn about. Despite being a non-Christian using Christian annotation does not affect my belief system or offend me in the slightest.

 

I'm in the same boat. And learning it a certain way has much to do with it, too. I'm convinced it hits a subconscious vein. Case in point, I saw Ben Hur when it first came out, I was 9. The ending after the director's credit blazed ''Anno Domini'' into my brain. It started my love for Roman history.

[M. Porcius Cato]

At least we don't insist on dating everything ab urbe condita!

[Ursus]

BC and AD don't really offend me, but at the same time I'm not quite Christian and can't really identify with the birth of Christ as the seminal event of Western history.

 

BCE and CE are silly - but until something better comes along I'll use them.

 

And honestly, I'd prefer if we dated everything from Ab Urbe Condita.

[M. Porcius Cato]

BC and AD don't really offend me, but at the same time I'm not quite Christian and can't really identify with the birth of Christ as the seminal event of Western history.

 

BCE and CE are silly - but until something better comes along I'll use them.

 

And honestly, I'd prefer if we dated everything from Ab Urbe Condita.

 

Me too, but it would take so much practice. I'm not even sure I know what this year is in auc. On whose calendar is dated the traditional founding of the city?

[Tobias]

Being the non-practicing Catholic that i am, i always use BC and AD. Besides that, basically no teacher i've ever had uses BCE and CE, so i'm not sure what they mean and how they differ from BC and AD.

Edited December 20, 2005 by Tobias

[M. Porcius Cato]

Being the non-practicing Catholic that i am, i always use BC and AD. Besides that, basically no teacher i've ever had uses BCE and CE, so i'm not sure what they mean and how they differ from BC and AD.

CE=Common Era; BCE=Before Common Era. They mean exactly the same thing as BC and AD, even down to the error that Jesus was 3 years old in 1 BC.

[Sextus Roscius]

Personaly, I'd like to start dating things off the founding of Rome but I can't remember the year. BC 760 something, I was always faultering on that date.

 

CE=Common Era; BCE=Before Common Era.

 

You are wrong. I beleive (and will bet on) that it stands for Christ's Era and Before Christ's Era and so I refuse to use it.

Edited December 20, 2005 by Sextus Roscius

[Primus Pilus]

I'm not even sure I know what this year is in auc. On whose calendar is dated the traditional founding of the city?

 

Technically since our calendar, the Gregorian, is an evolution of Caesar's Julian, which is an evolution of the earlier Republican system, its really all the same thing. Though there was some 'correction' that took place in conversion from lunar to solar and with the addition of intermittent leap years. Still using our current calendar, wouldn't 2005 simply be 753 BC + 2005 AD or 2758 a.u.c.? (of course assuming 753 BC as the traditional founding)

[FLavius Valerius Constantinus]

I don't really get what's the big fuss with the Anno Domini and Before Christ stuff. I always use those, and everytime in school, I manage to vex some teachers by not using the new acronyms which I find really unnecessary.

[frankq]

I don't really get what's the big fuss with the Anno Domini and Before Christ stuff. I always use those, and everytime in school, I manage to vex some teachers by not using the new acronyms which I find really unnecessary.

 

Interesting comment. Are you saying your teachers are pressing the new CE approach?

[FLavius Valerius Constantinus]

Well, I'm from a Jesuit school, so we can use it if we want. But some teachers

are hardpressed about it because well I don't know, strictly by the book I must say.

[frankq]

Well, I'm from a Jesuit school, so we can use it if we want. But some teachers

are hardpressed about it because well I don't know, strictly by the book I must say.

 

Probably has to do with the general trend of strengthening the separation of church and state in education, which I'm strongly for, but I must agree with several posts above, BC and AD are shorter, register better, and BCE and CE sound silly. And, indeed, while Christianity should not be used as the seminal point in history, it became a reference point with the powers that be.