Nowruz is an ancient Mesopotamian Spring Festival celebrated for 13 days in Iran, Afghanistan, various central Asian and other countries. It is a Zoroastrian holiday as well as a holy day for adherents of Sufism and the Bahá’í Faith.
To all the Persians and others who celebrate this wonderful occasion around this Spring Equinox, a very Happy Nowrouz نوروز or Happy New Year to you!
To those wanting to learn more, I can heartily recommend Homeyra’s wonderful Nowruz post features:
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Thank you PPGG:)
I shall add that Nowruz is also celebrated by Christian and Jewish Iranians. It is, par excellence, a testimony to friendship among people who were/are able to manage among themselves. Unless modern day “liberators” … you know the rest!
The vernal equinox really is the most sensible time for the New Year, isn’t it? What a beautiful tradition, and I echo, a great post from homey.
It’s spring in Dixie, that’s for sure. You can walk out my front door with a butter knife and cut through the pollen in th—achoo! {sniffle}—in the air.
Do you know that the Roman calendar was based on the same? Septe-mber = month 7, Octo-ber=8, Nove-mber, dece-mber…
Well, I never really thought about it, but that certainly makes sense, given the roots of the names!
According to Wikipedia, the pre-Julian Roman Calendar went like this: Martius, Aprilis, Maius, Junius, Quintilis, Sextilis, and then the familiars through December. That was only ten months, leaving about 60 days of winter that were outside the calendar. A reformer added January and Feburary to the end, but how January came to be the starting point I do not know. It doesn’t make as much sense to me.