>One of the interesting things is the difference that occur as a result of having a lunar calendar and a solar calendar. I'd be interested in your thoughts here. Mine range from the prophecies of Daniel to the notion that the Earth's orbit has ever-so-slightly changed to cause additional grief for calendar-ologists*

I'm not totally sure what you're asking here. But a couple of points. First, even our so-called solar calendar is still in part lunar. After all, the whole idea of a month is based on the lunar cycle - even the name reflects the word "moon".

As for why there are different ways of measuring time, I believe that lunar calendars are older. That makes sense to me because ancient man could see the cycles of the moon and learn to measure them. As for why they came up with 12 cycles in a year, surely they observed the passing of seasons and did the reckoning (math <g>) to make things match up.

However, eventually, they surely noticed the discrepancy. I'm not sure when the solar calendar was introduced. But my guess is that more tools for measuring the earth's movement and the sun's were available by then.

Tamar