CW EXCLUSIVE: WHEN NIGERIA AND BRITAIN LOST 11 DAYS!! HOW WE GOT OUR CALLENDER.

This is crazywrita Exclusive:

  Have you heard of when the world lost 11 days? Yes it occurred. Some years ago people slept on Wednesday 2nd September 1752 and woke up 11 days after on Thursday 14th September 1752. How did it happen? Read the article below.

Gregorian and Julian, two competitors in the world of time. They are calendars. The Julian calendar is far older but was more widespread, introduced in 45 BC by Julius Caesar as a revision on the old Roman calendar. It was a revolution, greatly simplified and more accurate, each year was now 365 days with the occasional leap years.

Unfortunately it wasn’t accurate enough. There was a discrepancy of 11 minutes, which may not sound big until you see it added up to 10 days every 4 centuries. Something quite significant. So a change was instigated and a new calendar procured, not from the ether but from the Vatican.

A group of mathematicians came up with a separate and more convenient calendar which would be more accurate and not lose any time. In 1582 Pope Gregory XIII unveiled it to the world, announcing that during that year the two calendars would crossover perfectly, causing no confusions. The calendar was named the Gregorian calendar in his honour and was released to the world.


There were sceptics. Even with the wide influence of the Vatican, only eight countries switched over, including Spain, France, the Duchy of Lorraine and Savoy among others.

Then other countries were slowly swayed, with the increasing inaccuracy of the Julian calendar getting no better they saw the benefits. However countries do take a bit of time to realise things. The British Empire, and even Eastern USA switched over much later, in 1752.

To their suprise the spacing between the calendars was 11 days. When the switch was made the British Empire went to bed on Wednesday 2nd September 1752 and rose on Thursday 14 September 1752, missing the 11 days in between.

Then there was the reaction of the citizens. Many demanded to be paid full wages for the 11 days and when they weren’t there were widespread riots calling for their 11 days back, as they all believed Britain had stolen the days unjustly. Additionally many contracts due to start on the intermittent days were very muddled up and lawyers were scuttling around for weeks, but eventually things calmed down and the Gregorian calendar reined supreme.

Surmary is, during the transition from the old calendar to the new one days were lost. Great Britain, the father of Nigeria lost 11 days. Just overnight.

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