Through 1751, March 25 marked the beginning of the New Year in Great Britain and its North American colonies. With the adoption of the Gregorian calendar in 1752, the beginning of the year was changed to January 1.
By the time the Gregorian calendar was introduced in 1582, the Julian calendar that it replaced was ten days out of alignment with the seasons. However the acceptance of the new calendar worldwide took several centuries. Because the calendar had been developed under the sponsorship of Pope Gregory XIII, many Eastern Orthodox and Protestant countries were wary of the new system. The last Eastern Orthodox country to adopt the new calendar was Greece in 1923.
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