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A New Year's Invocation Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky, Ring out the old, ring in the new. Ring in the love of truth and right, Ring in the common love of good. Ring in the thousand years of peace. ~ The New York Almanac - 1870
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This month's New Year Trivia deals with things new and "first".
Have fun and enjoy!
(To find the answers, hover your mouse over the party hats following each question.
Answers also appear at the end of the quiz,
in case Father Time walked away with the hats!)
The
music you may hear from this page is the original Scottish melody to "Auld Lang
Syne"
For prior years' New Year Trivia, see
New Year Around the World (20004)
1. B) Julius Caesar in 46 BCE
2. D) Rudolph's Shiny New Year
3. D) the first person to cross the threshold after midnight at a Hogmanay celebration - a dark-haired gentleman is thought to bring good luck
4. A) Black-eyed peas – this is a tradition common to the Southern part of the United States, which says that the eating of black-eyed peas on New Year's Day will attract both general good luck and money in particular. Cabbage is another food that is considered lucky. The cabbage has long been a symbol for prosperity (its leaves represent bills of paper currency). In many parts of the world it is considered to bring you luck if you consume rice on New Year’s Eve. Whatever food you choose, best wishes for 2006.
5. B) Festival of Janus - January is named after Janus, the Roman God of gates and doors, and hence of openings and beginnings. Janus was always shown with two heads, or two faces. He looked back to the last year and forward to the new one. January was the 11th month of the year in the ancient Roman calendar; in the 2nd century BC, however, it came to be regarded as the first month. On January 1 the Romans offered sacrifices to Janus so that he would bless the new year.
6. C) The Festival of Saint Basil - Saint Basil was famous for his kindness, and Greek children leave their shoes by the fire on New Year's Day, with hope that he will come and fill the shoes with gifts. f
7. B) Babylonian - The king would be gone for a few days and everyone would do whatever they liked. Then the king would return, in a grand procession, dressed in fine robes. Then, everyone had to return to work and behave properly. Thus, each New Year, the people made a new start to their lives.
8. D) They begin to laugh - The laughter is supposed to bring them good luck in the New Year.
9. A) Samhain - The word means 'Summer's End' and the festival was held on November 1st, which some say marked the Celtic New Year. It was celebrated with bonfires.
10. B) Guy Lombardo - Born in London, Ontario, Guy Lombardo traditionally welcomed the New Year at the Waldorf Astoria in Manhattan. Lombardo turned an old, odd Scottish tune into a New Year's Eve tradition when he and his Royal Canadians played their first gig at the Grill Room in New York's Roosevelt Hotel in 1929. The show was broadcast over the radio, Auld Lang Syne went out to Americans coast to coast, and you know the rest of the story.
11. A) “Frankenstein” - Mary Shelley's classic novel was published on January 1st, 1818.
12. D) Orange - This is just one of a variety of ways in which Hindus celebrate the New Year. For instance, the people of West Bengal like to wear flowers at New Year, and they use flowers in the colors of pink, red, purple or white. Women like to wear yellow, which is the color of spring.
13. B) Scotland - Edinburgh's Hogmanay is the biggest New Year party held anywhere in the world and with four days packed with festive activities of all shapes and forms you might need the rest of the year to recover! There are many theories for the origins of the word Hogmanay, including the Anglo Saxon 'Haleg Monath', meaning holy month, and the Gaelic 'Oge Maidne', meaning new morning. Whatever the origins, there are few places on the planet that know how to throw a better New Year's bash than Scotland.
14. A) Robert Burns - Robert Burns was known as the “Bard of Ayrshire”, he died on July 21st, 1796, aged 37. An annual “Burns Night” is held on his birthdate, January 25th. By the way, “Auld Lang Syne” is sung at the stroke of midnight in almost every English-speaking country in the world to bring in the New Year.
15. C) “Times gone by” - The song recalls the days gone by and says we will always remember them. “Should auld acquaintance be forgot?'' it asks. No, the chorus replies: “For auld lang syne (for times gone by), we'll tak (drink) a cup o' kindness yet.”
16. A) Hymns and prayers - Hymns are sung and prayers offered in a rededication to God. Many of the Watch Night Services in Black communities that we celebrate today can be traced back to gatherings on December 31, 1862, also known as "Freedom's Eve." On that night, Americans of African descent came together in churches, gathering places and private homes throughout the nation, anxiously awaiting news that the Emancipation Proclamation had become law. Then, at the stroke of midnight, it was January 1, 1863, and according to Lincoln's promise, all slaves in the Confederate States were legally free. People remained in churches and other gathering places, eagerly awaiting word that Emancipation had been declared. When the actual news of freedom was received later that day, there were prayers, shouts and songs of joy as people fell to their knees and thanked God.
17. B) A family-friendly, non-alcoholic New Year’s Eve celebration - Typical events might include musical entertainment, arcades, multi-cultural events, carnival attractions, ice sculptures, dancing, storytelling, theater, poetry, films and, at the stroke of midnight, an elaborate fireworks display.
18. D) Make bonfires with them
19. B) A purple beach ball decorated with Christmas lights – A pickle is dropped in Mount Olive, NC and Dillsburg, PA; the live opossum in a cage is the choice in Brasstown, NC; Elizabethtown, PA drops the giant M&M. Other unusual items include a conch shell, a pirate wench and a red high-heel shoe (Key West, FL), a mossbunker fish (Point Pleasant, NJ), a walleye fish named "Captain Wylie Walleye" (Port Clinton, OH), a pretzel (Cleona, PA), a sled (Duncannon, PA), a stuffed goat (Falmouth, PA), a wrench (Mechanicsburg, PA), a cigar ( Red Lion, PA), an anchor (Shippensburg, PA), to name just a few.
20. C) Seattle, WA - the countdown is done going up in an elevator at the Space Needle, with fireworks from the top of the needle at midnight.
21. B) Rosh Hashanah - Rosh Hashanah means “beginning of the year”. Apples and honey are eaten to symbolize a sweet new year. Rosh Hashanah celebrates the Jewish New Year and the creation of the world. It is one of the holiest days of the Jewish year. It begins the observance of the Ten Penitential Days, a period ending with Yom Kippur that is the most solemn of the Jewish calendar. Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are known as the High Holy Days. The Bible refers to this holiday as Yom Ha-Zikkaron (the day of remembrance) or Yom Teruah (the day of the sounding of the shofar). The holiday was instituted in Leviticus 23:24-25.
22. C) Babylon – The Babylonians were the first civilization to recognize a New Year, which lasted for eleven days, over 4,000 years ago. In fact, they began the tradition of New Year’s resolutions. While modern resolutions include the promise to spend more time with family, lose weight or quit smoking. The most popular Babylonian resolution was to return borrowed farm equipment.
23. A) Using a baby to signify the New Year – It was their tradition at that time to celebrate their god of wine, Dionysus, by parading a baby in a basket, representing the annual rebirth of that god as the spirit of fertility. Early Egyptians also used a baby as a symbol of rebirth. The use of an image of a baby with a New Years banner as a symbolic representation of the new year was brought to early America by the Germans.
24. B) To allow the old year to go out – And speaking of doors, visitor arriving before 12 must not leave by the same door through which he came.
25. A) Throw out anything - "Never throw any ashes, or dirty water, or any articles, however worthless, out of your house on (New Year's Day). It betokens ill luck; but you may bring in as many honestly gotten goods as you can procure."
26. C) Colombia - Families stuff a life-size male doll with things that have bad memories or sadness associated with them, and then they dress it up in old clothes from each family member; then they set 'Mr. Old Year' on fire at the stroke of midnight. Burning "Mr. Old Year" is a New Year's tradition found among Colombians, Cubans, Puerto Ricans and Ecuadorians.
27. C) Spain - New Year's Eve in Spain is called "Nochevieja - The Old Night". Unlike many Spanish traditions the eating of grapes ("tomar las uvas") is of quite recent vintage. Early in the twentieth century, freak weather conditions resulted in an unseasonable bumper harvest of grapes. At a loss over what to do about so many grapes at Christmas time, the King of Spain and the grape growers came up with the idea of the New Year ritual.
28. C) Brazil - Most people wear white clothes on New Year's Eve to bring good luck and peace for the year that will follow. If they are in a beach city, after midnight people go to the beach, jump seven waves and throw flowers in the sea while making a wish. They say that the goddess who protects the sea will make their wishes come true. Because of that, some people also light candles in the sand on the beach.
29. D) Shakespeare - "You'd be so lean, that blast of January Would blow you through and through. Now, my fair'st friend, I would I had some flowers o' the spring that might Become your time of day." William Shakespeare, The Winter's Tale, Act IV Scene 4.
30. C) The Beatles
31. D) Every horse - No matter what time of year a horse is born, its first birthday is recorded as the first day of January. So, New Year's Day is the official birthday of every horse.
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