The Dead Days

[DeadDollKitty]

"The Dead Days. have you ever felt the stillness of that strange, quiet time b/w Christmas and the New Year? In ancient Egypt the calendar was made from 12 months of 30 days each, giving 360 days to the year. the Egyptians were smart enought to know there were actually 365 days in each solar year. They reconciled this difference with a story in which Thoth, their ibis-headed god of wisdom, wins five extra days from the reigning gods in a game of dice and gives them to the goddess of the night, and thus to the people too. These days did not belong to any of the Egyptian months and were felt to be outside normal time. The Aztecs, using a similar calendrical system, also added five days, but feared them as days of bad omen and dubbed them Dead Days. Of course, these days bore no relation to Christmas, but I've always felt that the time b/w Christmas and New Year's is outside the hurly-burly of the rest of the year, and so I fixed the Dead Days there. The dates of Christmas and New Years have varied widley through time and from cultrue to culture. A quick count will show you there are six days b/w the two modern feasts. Though the 5 days are set in the five culmination on New Year's Eve." ~Marcus Sedgwick, The Book of Dead Days Does any body else believe that the Dead Days truley exist during this realm of time at the end of December? What makes you beleive this is so? ~R~ (sorry if this is in the wrong Topic)

[DeadDollKitty]

Yes the story is science-fiction, but i still beleive that it holds some convincing truth in its pages ~R~

[Roller]

In my experience the days before Christmas are anything but quiet. Interesting points about calendar dates though - a lot of civilisations have mucked around with different calendars. What exactly do these Dead Days entail?

[DeadDollKitty]

its the days after xmas .. the ones b/w xmas and newyears.. not before.. im just wondering if there are anyone else who believe this is the place where the DeadDays fall.. b/c we are not sure where the Egyptians placed them. the DeadDays seem to stretch themselves out... do you think so? ~R~

[Seeker]

Well, I know in business, we try our best NOT to schedule any major projects that must be completed during that time. It seems everyone just winds down and decides to take up the fight again after the new year.

[Keeper]

I think all (or most) ledgends are based on fact-history, so I think there really are "dead days" as you put it, though there origin my be diffeent as to how it was portrade in Egyptian culture