Re: BCE/CE

On Sat, 23 Oct 1999, Luigi Cajani wrote:

> Dear Colleagues,
> I'd like to know the origins and diffusion of the years denomination BCE 
>and
> CE instead of BC and AD, and possibly something about the discussion
> concerning this choise.
> Thank you very much

I'm not sure as to the exact origin and/or spread of the terms, but I do
know that they were used in the Soviet dating system much earlier and more
commonly than in the West.  I therefore suspect that their introduction is
somehow linked to the international socialist movement or to secularism
generally, so it must have arisen between 1870 and the 1920's, possibly
after the Bolshevik Revolution.  In any case, that's the first place I'd
look...

-- 
Boris Stremlin
bc70219@binghamton.edu