How Do We Measure History?(2)
Naturally people did not reckon dates backward before the birth of Christ. Each country had its own method of counting time, or system of chronology. Some reckoned from the reign of a particular king. The ancient Greeks counted from the first recorded occasion of their Olympic Games (776 B.C.). The Romans reckoned from the time when they thought their city had been founded (753 B.C.). Jewish people count for religious purposes from their reckoning of the creation of the world.
Exactly what do such ｅxpressions as B.C., A.D., and A.U.C. mean in this connection? Look up in such a reference book as the World Almanac the number of the present year according to different systems of reckoning. What is meant by saying that something happened "c.1540" or "c.1800"?
One way to represent history is by a time-line. For convenience, let an inch represent one thousand years, and let the end of a line be 2000 A.D. on this line mark the year when Columbus discovered America; the year when the independence of the United States was declared; 4000 B.C., when many think, people began to keep historical records. Judging by the location of these marks, has the history of the United States occupied a long space in the recorded history of the human race? (205 words)
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