History of New Year’s Resolutions
Goodbye dumpster fire year of 2020 and hello new hope of 2021! January heralds a time to shape the incoming year with promises of striving to be better, getting healthier and achieving goals. The next 12 months stretch out in front of us, a clean slate just waiting to be written on. However, making New Year’s resolutions and celebrating the incoming year isn’t a modern thing. It’s actually an ancient tradition that dates back many millennia.
Ancient Egypt
Let’s cast our minds back to Egypt, around 5,000 BC. There is no documented history of the ancient Egyptians celebrating New Year’s this early on. Still, historians know that they did honour the turn of the year with a festival called Wepet Renpet, which translates as “opening of the year”. The feast’s date depended on when the Nile flooded - which was around midsummer - bringing in a rich silt in which crops could be planted. This was a time to celebrate the death and rebirth of Osiris, the Egyptian Lord of the Underworld and Judge of the Dead, and, in turn, the rejuvenation and regeneration of the land, accompanied by rituals, singing and dancing, along with plenty of feasting and drinking.
Babylon
Many historians believe it was the ancient Babylonians who were the first to make such promises for the upcoming year some 4,000 years ago. They were also thought to be the first to hold recorded celebrations to honour the New Year with a huge religious 12-day festival called Akitu. This is where they would reaffirm their loyalty to their king or choose a new monarch.
Just like the ancient Egyptians, this festival centred around the seasons. The Babylonian New Year started around March, which was spring and the time to plant crops and they would make promises to the gods to pay back their debts and return any items that they had borrowed. If they broke their promises, well, no one wants to deal with an angry god.
China
Still celebrated today, Chinese New Year is thought to have started around 3,000 years ago during the Shang Dynasty. Like with all traditional festivals in China, the origins are shrouded with stories and myths.
The most famous legend tells the story of a monster called Nian (‘Year’) who would attack the villages at the beginning of each year. Nian was afraid of loud noises and red, so people would hang red lanterns or scrolls to stop it from coming inside the house, and they would also light cracking bamboo to scare it away. This was later replaced with firecrackers. People also held ceremonial sacrifices to honour the gods and honour their ancestors. Like today, the celebrations are centred around the lunar new year and ushers out the old and brings good luck and prosperity for the coming year.
Rome
The introduction of a written calendar by the Romans gave us 1 January as the start of the New Year. The month was named after Janus, the god of arches, gates, doors and transitions. The Romans imagined him with two faces, one facing forward and the other facing backwards to symbolise change. They would also make sacrifices to Janus and make promises of good behaviour.
The calendar went through many changes and emperors until 1 January was confirmed as the first of the month. It was first proposed in the Senate in 153 BC, but it took until 46 BC for Julius Ceaser to make it official. To do this, he let the previous year run for 445 days! He also added the leap years to keep the calendar in sync with the solar year.
Middle Ages
During this time, the Julian calendar bought in by the Romans fell out of favour, thanks to an error that added an extra seven days by the year 1,000. This caused a lot of confusion and meant that different societies celebrated the New Year at different times.
Like the ancient peoples before, feasting was a central theme. The Medieval knights supposedly renewed their chivalry vow, aptly named The Peacock Vow, at the end of the Christmas season by placing their hands on a live or roasted peacock. The first Vow of the Peacock was entirely fictional and created in 1312 by Jacques de Longuyon who wrote about the Nine Worthies of Chivalry’s ideas in a poem. It captured people’s imagination, and life quickly imitated art, which included knights making vows on peacocks and swans, herons, pheasants, and even a sparrowhawk.
Modern Day
By the 17th Century, it seems that making New Year’s resolutions were commonplace. In a series of pledges in her diary in 1671, the Scottish writer, Anne Halkett, noted: “I will not offend anymore”. On the 2 January, she has a page titled “Resolutions”.
The founder of Methodism, John Wesley, created the Covenant Renewal Service in 1740 known as the Watchnight service. It was typically held on New Year’s Eve or New Year’s Day and was a time to reflect on past mistakes and making a commitment to do better in the coming year. The Watchnight service has an added significance for the African American community because on 1 January 1863 U.S. President Abraham Lincoln issued an edict that freed the slaves of the Confederate states. They stayed awake all night on 31 December 1862 to see the Emancipation Proclamation come into effect and witness a new dawn.
It wasn’t until 1813 when the term ‘New Year’s Resolution’ was used in a Boston article stating: “And yet, I believe there are multitudes of people, accustomed to receive injunctions of new year resolutions, who will sin all the month of December, with a serious determination of beginning the new year with new resolutions and new behaviour, and with the full belief that they shall thus expiate and wipe away all their former faults”.
Today’s New Year’s resolutions are mostly non-religious, with people making promises to themselves rather than to the gods. According to a study from YouGov, nearly 80% of respondents who made some New Year’s resolutions for 2020 failed to achieve at least some of them. Last year was exceptionally hard, so, if you’re making them for 2021, go easy on yourself and don’t forget to celebrate your achievements, no matter how small they are.
Written by Sarah Rajabalee
Sarah used to work in the travel industry but Covid decided it wasn’t to be. She is studying to be a counsellor and spends a lot of her time writing assignments. She is also a photographer and you can find her on Instagram @SarahRajabalee.