Annus mirabilis

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Annus mirabilis is a Latin phrase that means "wonderful year", "miraculous year" or "amazing year". This term was originally used to refer to the year 1666 (see below), and today is used to refer to several years during which events of major importance are remembered. Prior to this, however, Thomas Dekker used the phrase mirabilis annus in his 1603 pamphlet The Wonderful Year, "Wherein is shewed the picture of London lying sick of the plague."^[1]

1492 – Catholic Monarchs

The Catholic Monarchs (Isabella I of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon) built in 1492 the most powerful monarchy in the Western World by the conquest of Granada (January 2) and (though this wonder began to manifest only upon the return of Columbus the next year) discovery of America (October 12). On March 31 they expelled the Jews from Spain. 1492 is also the year of construction of the first grammar of a modern language: Gramática de la lengua castellana; the author, Antonio de Nebrija (a prominent counselor of the Monarchs) said in it, comparing Spanish with Latin: siempre la lengua fue compañera del imperio ("the language was always the companion of empire").^[2]

In the history of the Hispanic monarchy there were arguably other anni mirabiles. John H. Elliott proposes 1625, in the middle of the Thirty Years War.^[3]

1543 – The year of science

The beginning of the Scientific Revolution^[4] when

• Andreas Vesalius publishes De humani corporis fabrica (On the Fabric of the Human Body), which revolutionises the science of human anatomy and the practice of medicine.
• Nicolaus Copernicus publishes De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres) in Nuremberg, Germany, which eventually alters the science of astronomy forever.

1666 – The year of wonders

John Dryden's poem

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the first known written usage of the Latin phrase "Annus Mirabilis" is as the title of a poem composed by English poet John Dryden about the events of 1666. The phrase "annus mirabilis" translates as "wonderful year" or "year of miracles". In fact, the year was beset by great calamity for England (including the Great Fire of London), but Dryden chose to interpret the absence of greater disaster as miraculous intervention by God, as "666" was then regarded as the Number of the Beast, and the year 1666 expected by some to be particularly disastrous.

In addition to this, the English fleet defeated a Dutch fleet in the St James' Day Battle, for a great victory at sea. (However, in 1667 the Dutch burned several major warships of the English fleet in the raid on the Medway and Charles II was forced to sue for peace.)

Isaac Newton

In the year 1666, Isaac Newton made revolutionary inventions and discoveries in calculus, motion, optics and gravitation. As such, it has later been called Isaac Newton's "Annus Mirabilis." It was in this year that Isaac Newton was alleged to have observed an apple falling from a tree, and in which he in any case hit upon the law of universal gravitation (Newton's apple). He was afforded the time to work on his theories due to the closure of Cambridge University by an outbreak of plague.^[5][6]

1759 – William Pitt

A series of victories by the British military in 1759 in North America, Europe, India, and in various naval engagements, is occasionally referred to as William Pitt's annus mirabilis, and was the decisive year of the Seven Years' War.^[7][8]

1776 – The Liberty year

For this year the term annus mirabilis is often used.^[9] David Hume died in August, but could experience The Wealth of Nations from Adam Smith and the Declaration of Independence by the later United States. Already on January 10 the famous pamphlet Common Sense, written by Thomas Paine, was published anonymously and became an immediate sensation.

1905 – Albert Einstein

The year 1905 has often been linked to the term annus mirabilis, as it was in this year that Albert Einstein made important discoveries concerning the photoelectric effect, Brownian motion and the special theory of relativity which included the famous E = mc² equation. His articles, collectively known as his Annus Mirabilis papers, were published in Annalen der Physik, all in 1905.^[10][11]

Other

This phrase has since been used to refer to other years. The examples here are primarily from the English-speaking world.

• 1644–1645 – The string of victories by the Scottish general, James Graham, 1st Marquess of Montrose, in 1644–1645 during the English Civil War is sometimes called the "Year of Miracles".
• 1666 – In Roman numerals, the year 1666 contains all the numerals in decreasing order: MDCLXVI.
• 1722 - one Mart. Scriblerus, Philomath (a pseudonym of either John Arbuthnot or Alexander Pope) predicted that on December 29, 1722, all men would be transformed into women, and all women transformed into men—preemptively declaring the coming year an "Annus Mirabilis". This is a satirical work, but nevertheless explores themes concerning transgender in a fairly thorough manner.
  • To read the full discourse: "Annus Mirabilis or, The wonderful effects of the approaching conjunction of the planets Jupiter, Mars, and Saturn."
• 1797 - William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote Lyrical Ballads and other important works of poetry.
• 1922 – In the English-speaking world, 1922 has been described as the annus mirabilis of Modernism, due to the publication of many major literary works, including James Joyce's Ulysses and T. S. Eliot's The Waste Land.
• 1932 – Three major discoveries in particle physics: Discovery of the neutron, Cockroft-Walton particle accelerator and artificial nuclear disintegration, discovery of the positron.^[12]
• 1939 – This phrase has also been used to describe 1939 Hollywood because of all the classic films produced this year.
• 1946 – The British Chancellor of the Exchequer Hugh Dalton described 1946 as the then Labour Government's 'Annus mirabilis'
• 1963 – The phrase "Annus Mirabilis" was also used by Philip Larkin as the title for one of his best-known poems, written in 1967 and published in High Windows (1974), which celebrated the onset of more relaxed sexual mores in 1960s Britain, specifically mentioning the year 1963 as a sort of personal "annus mirabilis".^[13]
• 1967 was Celtic F.C.'s annus mirabilis. The club won every competition they entered: the Scottish League, the Scottish Cup, the Scottish League Cup, the Glasgow Cup, and the European Cup (the quintuple).
• 1972 was Ajax A.F.C.'s annus mirabilis. The club won every competition they entered (4): Dutch league, European Cup, Dutch Cup and Intercontinental Cup (the Quadruple);^[14] as well the European Supercup final match but this latter result was not recognized by UEFA, making it an unofficial quintuple.
• mid-1970s – The phrase was used^[15] to describe the mid-1970s uptick in sugar prices which skyrocketed Cuban sugar-based earning.
• 1989 – Annus Mirabilis has been used to describe 1989 and the political events which took place in Eastern Europe, which saw the end of communist governments in several countries (See: Revolutions of 1989) including Poland, East Germany, Hungary and Czechoslovakia.^[16]
• 2006 was the annus mirabilis of the numerical relativity triple breakthrough that solved the binary black hole problem in supercomputers^[17] according to Jeremy Schnittman of NASA.^[18]
• 2009 was FC Barcelona's annus mirabilis. The club won all 6 competitions they entered: the Spanish League, the Spanish Cup, the Spanish Super Cup, the European Champions League, the European Super Cup, and the World Club Cup.^[14][19]

See also

• Annus mirabilis (Norway)
• Annus horribilis
• List of Latin phrases

Notes

Bibliography

• Blanning, T.C.W.The Culture of Power the Power of Culture: Old Regime Europe 1660–1789. Oxford University Press, 2002.
• Monod, Paul Kléber. Imperial Island: A History of Britain and Its Empire, 1660–1837. Wiley-Blackwell, 2009.