Assyrian calendar

History

Historically and also in some sources in the modern day, Assyrians dated their calendar according to the Seleucid era (Syriac: ܕܝܲܘܢܵܝܹ̈ܐ, romanized: d-yawnāyē, lit. 'of the Greeks'), beginning on the first day of Tešrīn Qḏīm in 312 BC.

The modern Assyrian calendar, however, uses a different reckoning: 4750 BC was set as its first year in the 1950s, based on a series of articles published in the Assyrian nationalist magazine Gilgamesh; the first came in 1952 and written by Nimrod Simono and dealt with the Akitu festival, then an article by Jean Alkhas in 1955 (April, issue 34) fixed the year 4750 BC as the starting point. Alkhas referenced his information to a French archaeologist, whom he did not name, as stating that a cuneiform tablet dating to 4750 BC mentioned the year of the calming of the great flood and beginning of life.