As you may know, this Winter Solstice will be graced by a rare event this year. This year, for the first time in history of the Winter Solstice, Saturn and Jupiter will look like a “double planet” and provide an extraordinary amount of light on December 21st. This got me thinking as to why the Winter Solstice is important other than it is the shortest day of the year. Below are 5 interesting facts about the Winter Solstice.
- The word “Solstice” derives from Latin, meaning “Sun stands still”. Solstice derives from the Latin scientific term solstitium, containing sol, which means “sun,” and the past participle stem of sistere, meaning “to make stand.” This comes from the fact that the sun’s position in the sky relative to the horizon at noon, which increases and decreases throughout the year, appears to pause in the days surrounding the solstice.
- The Winter Solstice occurs at a particular time and moment. The Winter Solstice occurs on a specific day, but it also occurs at a specific time of day, corresponding to the instant the North Pole is aimed furthest away from the sun on the 23.5 degree tilt of the Earth’s axis. This is also the time when the sun shines directly over the Tropic of Capricorn.
3. The Shortest Day of the Year of marks the discovery of new and strange worlds. On December 21, 1620, the Pilgrims arrived at Plymouth to found a community which would allow them to worship freely. Same dday in 1835 HMS Beagle sails into Bay of Islands, New Zealand. Pierre and Marie Curie discovered radium the same day in 1898. And the Apollo 8 spacecraft launched on 21 December 1968, becoming the first manned moon mission. The Eleven of 12 former Soviet republics form commonwealth on December 21, 1991.
4. Festival of Saturnalia in the Ancient Rome Empire. The Roman holiday, which began as a festival to honor the agricultural god Saturn in 497 BCE, soon became a time of widespread revelry and debauchery during which social roles were reversed, with masters serving their slaves and servants being permitted to taunt their masters. Then over the centuries, Saturnalia was slowly replaced by Christmas but many of its rituals remain as traditions of Christmas.
5. Winter Solstice is the shortest day of the year for the Northern Hemisphere. The daytime lasts 7 hours and 49 minutes in London, 9 hours and 15 minutes in New York, and 9 hours and 20 minutes in Beijing. On this day, the Northern Hemisphere receives the least amount of solar energy, about 50% less than the Southern Hemisphere. Stonehenge is aligned to the sunset on the Winter Solstice. The primary axis of the megalithic monument is oriented to the setting sun, while Newgrange, another structure built around the same time as Stonehenge, lines up with the winter solstice sunrise.
