Palindromic Millennium

The foreshortened ten-year interval between palindromic years, or special period of balancing, occurs only at millenniums and would appear to present special opportunities. (Between nonmillennial centuries the interval is much longer, 109 years, as was the case recently, and will be soon again, between 1881-1991 and then 2002-2112, and in such long oblivion, generations may come and go without ever awakening to a palindromic year. On the other hand, the interval at the turn of the first millennium shrank to only one year, resulting in the continuous triennial millennium 999-1000-1001 and quite a rush we should think, but this phenomenon will not repeat until the end of the tenth millennium.) The present period of balancing, 1991-2002, a dozen years enclosing a decade embracing a millennium, like all such periods has its point of greatest balance not at the actual millennium point but at its own midpoint, which turns out in this case to be the moment of New Year's 1997.

Let others argue whether the real millennium occurs in 2000 or 2001 and at what time of year. (They will.) Our palindromic millennium is already upon us, will last a full dozen years and will halve itself for us conveniently, like a carton of eggs, in a fleeting and precise moment of maximum balance, 1996 becoming 1997, prefiguring yet actualizing the millennial transition at least three years before most people will realize that anything millennial could possibly have yet happened. (This early celebration of the millennium has the added bonus and virtue of being in complete agreement with the traditional birthyear of Creation, 4004 B.C., since 4004 + 1996 = 6000, and of being within a week of complete agreement with the traditional birthday of Christ, on December 25, 4 B.C., insomuch as 4 + 1996 + 2000. For all these reasons, the holiday season of 12/25/96 through 1/1/97 -- better yet, make that Thanksgiving, or even Halloween, 1996 right on through to Groundhog Day 1997 inclusive -- ought to be an unusually interesting season for partying. See also: 999 and 4004.)

Following are signal palindromic years, with selected historical events found in them.
4004 B.C. The year of Creation, the exact date being October 23, as first reckoned from various biblical and other information by James Ussher in A.D. 1650. A similar or possibly the same scheme traditionally places the moment of Christ's birth (presumably on December 25) in the year 4 B.C. The peculiar and exact four and four-thousand relationship between these two widely-believed-in, symbolically foursquare years seems almost a bald incitation to millennialism and cabalistic numerology.... 999 [A.D.] ... Toward year's end, all across Europe and the Byzantine, monasteries and churches are thronged with faithful believers bearing gifts of land deeds, jewels, valuable manuscripts, and wagonloads of possessions in hopes of favorable Judgment. As church bells ring continuously on December 31, nobility kneel with peasants, and many are amazed when the world does not come to an end at midnight.

From I LOVE ME, VOL. I : S. WORDROW'S Palindrome Encyclopedia, revealed and interpreted by Michael Donner (Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, 1996, 424-page paperback, $15.95 at bookstores).

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