By Tor Ormseth, Online Editor
If you ask anyone what year it is currently, they’ll probably tell you that it is 2017 A.D. That is common knowledge. But is it? According to German historian Heribert Illig, the years between 614 and 911 A.D. never actually happened.
He has proof to back up this claim.
The argument centers around Pope Gregory XIII, who replaced the Julian calendar with his improved Gregorian calendar. The Julian calendar was based around incorrectly calculated lunar cycles, which made each year 10 minutes longer than it should have been.
To correct this, the Gregorian calendar accounted for 10 days of difference amassed from when the Julian calendar was introduced. However, the Gregorian calendar was introduced 1,627 years after the Julian calendar, which means the Pope should have adjusted his calendar by 13 days if time had been progressing normally.
As the Catholic Church keeps very accurate records and there were undoubtedly people who checked his math; it doesn’t add up that this would be an accident.
But why 614 to 911 A.D.? Why isn’t this just a mathematical error by Pope Gregory XIII?
Listen closely.
When Mr. Illig and his companions were looking for a time period that may not have been, again and again, the early Middle Ages became the obvious choice.
There was a gap between 558 and 908 A.D. in the building of Constantinople. There was also very little progression in religious doctrine and philosophy between 600 and 1100 A.D., and according to Horst Fuhrmann, president of the Monumenta Germaniae Historica, most artifacts of this time period are clear forgeries by the Catholic Church that were created at a later date.
“But wait,” I can hear those of you versed in European history saying, “What about Charlemagne? Surely one of the greatest figures of French medieval history wasn’t a forgery.” Well, think about how many things he accomplished during his lifetime.
“I soon noticed that this ruler’s achievements would have required the lives of two, three, or four ‘normal’ men,” Illig said.
Is it so infeasible that the Catholic Church would create a kind of near superhero in their drive to show the power of faith?
What is probably hardest to believe is that this could be carried out without anyone noticing.
But think about the Middle Ages.
There’s a reason they used to call it the Dark Ages. Almost nobody could read or and few possessed a clock or a calendar. To find out what day it was, you had to ask a priest, and since this Phantom Time Hypothesis was perpetrated by the Catholic Church, the clergy had no problem convincing people to move their non-existent calendars ahead several hundred years.
However, the motivation for this theory is a bit weak. The few theories regarding motivation lack specific corroboration with everything else within this theory. The main one is that Otto III wanted to rule in the year 1000 because of Christian millennialism, so he shifted the Church calendar ahead, but people are still trying to figure out why even he would want to do this.
Other than motivation, the evidence appears to add up, as there is very little to show that the 297-year time span between 614 and 911 A.D. ever happened. Of course, this would upturn a lot of historically accepted data, but since most data from the time period is obviously fabricated anyway, the ramifications of shifting the date back to where it belongs would be minimal.
The biggest change would be adapting to what year it is now, but I’m sure it can be done.
Happy 1720, folks!