LEWTER-L Archives

From: "john v. burns" <>
Subject: [LEWTER] Dates of birth, death, ect.
Date: Fri, 4 Sep 2009 00:37:53 -0400

Many times over the years I have wondered how people kept track of dates in the early years of our country when calenders were not as avaliable as they are now. Especially in the "back country".

Recently I had a solution, or at least an idea of how this was done.

In my area we have a large settlement of Mhong tribesmen from the hills of Viet Nam, Thailand and Laos. Recently I was talking with a member of this group and the subject of how they kept track of dates of birth in the "Old country", where the people lived a life of almost stone age existance.

It was explained to me that the month was based on the moon, the planting time, the harvest time, etc. The year was remembered by association with some event. You can imagine how accurate one's age was using this method.

So, I suppose one could assume that the same method of recording could have been used in our early history.

Something I thought someone might be interested in.

John

This thread:

• [LEWTER] Dates of birth, death, ect. by "john v. burns" <>