5 Historical Reasons People Used to Dread the New Year

The new year should be a time for renewal and relief. Whatever happens next, at least the previous year is done, so that’s a reason to smile for many. Unless, however, we turn our eyes to history or folklore. If we do, we’ll spot some ways that New Year’s Day was actually a time of doom. 

1. A Time to Get Slapped
2. A Ghost Would Spy on You in the Bathroom
3. Heartbreak for Slaves
4. Space Stopped Working
5. The Aztecs Might Set You on Fire

A Time to Get Slapped

The earliest New Year observation we have from history is Akitu, a festival from 4,000 years ago in ancient Mesopotamia. Akitu lasted 12 days, and many of its traditions sound just fine and are similar to what we do today. People made New Year’s resolutions for Akitu, and they hosted parades. The only unpleasant part, oddly enough, was experienced by the king. 

On the fifth day of Akita, the king had to visit the high priest, who would strip him, as part of a humiliation ritual. Then the priest slapped him. This slap session needed a fair amount of force behind it because the goal was to make the king cry. Heavy tears made for a good omen, foretelling a prosperous year for everyone. 

The goal here was to temporarily lower him and make him suffer. That was the only way that he could continue being an effective leader. 

A Ghost Would Spy on You in the Bathroom

Speaking of perversion, let’s tell you about the demon known as Kanbari Nyūdō. This Japanese ghost haunts the bathroom on New Year’s Eve and watches you use the toilet. 

One account of Kanbari Nyūdō appears in a demon compendium from 1779, which collected legends from many centuries earlier. Kanbari Nyūdō, it was said, could be kept away by chanting, “Kanbari Nyūdō hototogisu,” where hototogisu means “cuckoo,” as the demon keeps a cuckoo bird in its mouth. If you didn’t chant this, it could curse you with constipation. Or, it would simply make physical contact with you in a number of highly unpleasant ways. 

This legend sounds like a warning against real voyeurs or other sorts of harassers. Analysts of this myth instead say that it taught potential victims hygiene and respect. “Stay mindful when using the toilet,” said the legend, and this lesson indirectly taught people to keep the bathroom area clean and to follow all rules of bathroom etiquette. 

Heartbreak for Slaves

In 19th-century America, January 1 was a standard date for settling debts. You might imagine that this deadline inspired much anxiety from farmers who owed money. However, that was nothing compared to the panic facing certain other people on the plantation. 

To settle debts, many farmers sold some of their slaves on January 1. So, slaves knew that this was the day when their families might be torn apart. It was known as Hiring Day or Heartbreak Day. 

Even those slaves who had no family, or who had already been separated from their families, dreaded being sold again. The assumption was that the next home would be even worse than the present one, and that assumption often proved valid. The passing of a bad year inspires the relief of knowing the worst is done, but not all situations call for that optimism.

Later, New Year’s Day did attain some better associations. The United States banned the import of slaves on January 1, 1808, and Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863. 

Space Stopped Working

If you blast away from this planet, our arbitrary calendar will no longer mean anything, and you can safely ignore all human dates and times. Unless, that is, your computer uses Earth time, in which case you could be in for some problems. 

Between 1981 and 2011, NASA’s Space Shuttle program launched 135 missions. During not one of these missions was a shuttle in flight as December 31 gave way to January 1. A shuttle could not be in flight at that time because the shuttle computer recorded the passage of days without considering the year.

On December 31, 2006, it would register the date as 365 days into the year, and then it would register the following day as the 366th day of that same year instead of the first day of the next. 

That wouldn’t necessarily be a problem. Except, a second clock aboard the shuttle, called the Master Timing Unit, did correctly note the next day as Day 1 instead of Day 366. These two clocks registering two totally different dates would lead to havoc.

Since no mission lasted much more than a couple of weeks, shuttles could launch during most times of the year without needing to worry about this year-end rollover bug, but some December missions did have to be carefully scheduled to circumvent this issue. 

Future missions, including the planned Artemis missions to the Moon, will use newer computers and will escape this problem altogether. 

The Aztecs Might Set You on Fire

The Aztecs had a 365-day calendar, the xiuhpohualli, which they used for dull business matters. They also had a separate 260-day calendar, the tonalpohualli, for rituals, and this one did not match up with the seasons the way the solar calendar did.

Every 52 years, the two calendars synced up so that a single day was the first day of both the solar year and the ritual year. This called for a rare celebration. It also might possibly mark the end of the world. 

This celebration was named the New Fire Ceremony. First, a few days before the new year, they’d extinguish every fire in the temple and in everyone’s houses. They’d wait to see if the world ended, which was prophesied to happen at the end of one of these 52-year cycles. If the world did end, there was no need to do anything else, but if it didn’t, it was time to relight the fires. One unlucky sacrificial victim would be the foundation for the new flame. 

They’d drill into the man’s chest with a stick called the mamalhuaztli. They’d light a fire on him. Then they’d drop his heart (which they had removed at some point) into this fire. They’d now light a torch from it and set a larger bonfire, and once that was burning strongly enough, they’d throw his already-burning body on top. Runners would take more torches and travel to other towns to take the fire there. 

The victim who started the fire would not get to see the joyous last part of the ceremony. But they could take some consolation in knowing that they themselves had a glorious end. 

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