 | ||||||
Bibliography of Resources
Listed here are the resources consulted for the historical information contained on the Real Millennium Group Web Site. We have tried to list as much information as possible about the source to make it easier to find should you wish to use it.
Before we list the sources, there are a couple of things we want to mention about some of the information contained on the site, in particular, involving which years AD 1 and 1 BC are in the Roman Era.
Through the course of our research, we have come across several differing accounts of which year was dubbed AD 1 and which year was dubbed 1 BC. On the Millennium History page we have said that Dionysius estimated Christ's birth year to be 753 A.U.C. (From the founding of Rome). Some of the sources we have used have said that this year is 1 BC, while others say it is AD 1. We have also come across a source that says Dionysius estimated Christ's birthday as occurring in March of 754 A.U.C.
It is now generally accepted that Christ was born in March, and not on December 25th (see tidbits page). It is also agreed that Dionysius got the year wrong. Most historians now look to the year 750 A.U.C. as Christ's birth year. Of course this is irrelevant to our current chronology as the years have been reckoned from Dionysius' miscalculation.
Also irrelevant is the discrepancy in which year became AD 1. Whatever year is was, that is the year that started our current chronology, and the year preceding that one became 1 BC. We have chosen to believe that 753 is 1 BC and 754 is AD 1. We may, of course, be incorrect, since AD (anno Domini) means year of our Lord, it would make more sense to have Christ's birth year as the first year of our Lord.
What this all boils down to is did Dionysius know at the time that Christ was born in March, or did he believe the church designated date? If he did know that Christ was born in March, did he pick 754 to start the AD system because the church date fell so late in the year? Or did he truly estimate 754 to be the birth year as that one source stated?
We have chosen to believe the 753/1 BC-754/AD 1 estimate because the number of sources using this estimate outnumbered the others. The only way to have a definitive answer for this discrepancy is to find some work written by Dionysius himself, or a reliable work about him that states outright the dates he used to start the Christian Era.
Before anyone gets confused about this, it still means that the century and millennium (and technical decade) still do not begin until 2001. No matter what year became AD 1, our system is still based on the 2 BC, 1 BC, AD 1, AD 2, pattern. All this means is that we don't know, as of yet, which year A.U.C. the year AD 2000 is. It could be 2753 A.U.C. or 2754 A.U.C. I only mention this because I would like to have the answer for the record and my own satisfaction.
If anyone knows of such a source, where we could find the definitive answer, we would certainly welcome the information.
Books:
Mapping Time: The Calendar and its History, E.G. Richards, Oxford University Press 1998
Calendar, David Ewing Duncan, Avon Books, Inc., New York 1998
The Medieval Soldier, A.V.B. Norman, Barnes & Noble edition 1993 - originally Harper Collins Publishers 1971
Medieval Wordbook, Madeleine Pelner Cosman, Facts On File, Inc., New York 1996
Who's Who in Roman Britain and Anglo-Saxon England, Richard Fletcher, Shepheard-Walwyn (Publishers) Ltd., London 1989
The Millennium - A Rough Guide to the Year 2000, Nick Hanna, Rough Guides Ltd., London 1998 - distributed by Penguin Books USA, inc.
The Cat Who Cried For Help, Dr. Nicholas H. Dodman, Bantam Books, New York 1997
No Naughty Cats: the first complete guide to intelligent cat training, Debra Pirotin, DVM, and Sherry Suib Cohen, Harper & Row, New York 1985
The Living Legend of St. Patrick (US Edition), Alannah Hopkin, St. Martin's Press, New York 1989
Patrick: Sixteen Centuries with Ireland's Patron Saint, Alice-Boyd Proudfoot, editor, MacMillan Publishing Co., Inc., New York 1983
Our Country's Presidents, Frank Freidel, National Geographic Society, Washington D.C. 1977
Reference:
Funk & Wagnalls New Encyclopedia, Robert S. Phillips, Editor in Chief, Funk & Wagnalls, Inc. 1983.
Instant Facts - The World Book Desk Reference Set, William H. Nault, Editorial Director, World Book Encyclopedia, Inc., Chicago, Illinois 1983
The Concise Columbia Encyclopedia
Encyclopedia Britannica
Year 2000 Grolier Multimedia Encyclopedia Deluxe, Grolier Interactive, Inc., Danbury, CT 1999
Magazines & other sources:
Renaissance Magazine, Phantom Press Publications, Massachusetts, various issues
National Geographic Magazine, March 1999 issue
The History Channel, The Learning Channel, and The Discovery Channel
On-Line:
Prior to creating this page on our Homestead site, there were 252 hits on the original AOL page between 12/31/1999 and 8/21/2004
Contact Us
