Why Ethiopia is 7 years behind the rest of the world

Why Ethiopia is 7 years behind the rest of the world

- As countries around the world countdown to 2021, Ethiopia recently entered 2013

- The East African country is seven years behind the rest of the world because of the Calendar it adopted which is different from the one being used globally

- Ethiopia uses Coptic calendar, while other countries of the world use Gregorian calendar

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While it is year 2020 globally, Ethiopia on September 11 entered the year 2013 and the people in the country celebrated the new year amid the coronavirus pandemic ravaging the world.

You may be wondering why the East African country is seven years behind the rest of the world. Well, Ethiopia follows a calendar similar to the ancient Julian calendar, which started disappearing from the West in the 16th century.

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It should be noted that while Ethiopia uses the Coptic calendar, what the rest of the world adopts is the Gregorian calendar, which has 365 days in a year and 366 days in a leap year.

Why Ethiopia is seven to eight years behind the rest of the world
Ethiopian entered the year 2013 on September 11. Photo credit: Face2FaceAfrica
Source: UGC

According to Face2FaceAfrica, the difference in year numbering is believed to be because the Ethiopian Orthodox Church does not agree with the Roman Catholic Church about when Christ was born.

The Gregorian calendar is factored in the calculation of the year in which Jesus was born, while the Coptic calendar is factored in the calculation of the Annunciation (Jesus’s conception, not birth) arrived at by Egyptian monk-historian Annianus of Alexandria.

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The people around the country held a massive celebration to usher themselves into the new year as other countries around the world countdown to 2021.

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In other news, an Ethiopian crown from the 18th century has been returned home after being hidden in a Dutch flat for more than 20 years.

An Ethiopian identified as Sirak Asfaw was living in Netherlands as a refugee when he found the crown in 1998 in the suitcase of a visitor he hosted in his house.

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Source: Legit.ng

Authors:
Tunde Ososanya avatar

Tunde Ososanya Tunde Ososanya, a former senior editor, is a graduate of Mass Communication from the Nigerian Institute of Journalism. He's passionate about what he does and finds fulfilment in informing the people. Ososanya is the author of Later Tonight: a Collection of Short Stories.

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