eli5: did people living in the past, eg. the 1500s, know they were living in the 1500s like we know we’re living in 2023 and the 2000s?
In: 1
In Europe – yes. In other countries – it depends, but mostly no.
Most Catholic countries at the time used Julian calendar with an assumed birth of Jesus Christ as a starting year. It is *almost* the same calendar we use today (we use the same starting year, but our current calendar differs by 13 days). So they knew they live in 1500s.
Orthodox countries, however, used Byzantine calendar. It was also a Julian calendar (the same days and months), but its year 1 was set at a “creation of the World by God”. People who lived in those countries thought they live in 7000s.
Asian and African countries used completely different calendars. Some of them use a different calendar even today.
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