Gregorian [?] calendar?

Question

This is purely curiosity and a slightly faulty memory, lol. I heard once, I think from my seventh grade math teacher, that the people who devised the Gregorian calendar made an error somewhere, and pushed us up four years. So this year would actually be 2003... Any accuracy to this? If so, please give me sources.

Answer 1

No, the problem is not with the Gregorian calendar. That was simply a 16th century correction of the older Julian calendar in which the length of a year was slightly too long. The Gregorian calendar adjusted for this by skipping over 11 days (except for those who switched to it later and had to skip MORE days), and providing that every century year would NOT be a leap year, unless divisible by 400 (hence 1600 and 2000 were leap years, 1700, 1800 and 1900 were not).

What you are probably thinking of is the original fixing of the Christian era system (AD/Anno Domini). That happened still under a Julian calendar in the early 6th century. The monk who calculated and 'sold' the idea -- Dionysius Exiguus -- is thought to have been off perhaps four or five years in his calculations.

For more start with:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05010b.htm
http://www.westarinstitute.org/Periodicals/4R_Articles/Dionysius/dionysius.html
http://www.struggler.org/birth3.htm

Answer 2

The article I found says that the Gregorian calendar subtracted 10 days from October & altered how leap years would occur.

This site may be of interest to you, too: http://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/docs/JulianDate.html

also: http://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/calendar/