Taxing matters

From : http://rndman.blogspot.com/ in the UK.

"Although most of Europe adopted the Gregorian calendar in the 16th century, we in this country did not do so until 1752. By this time the Julian and Gregorian calendars were 11 days out from each other, so the Calendar Act had to abolish 11 days to put matters right - the 2nd September 1752 was followed immediately by the 14th September. This didn't go down too well with the ordinary people - a lot of them honestly believed that their lives were being shortened by 11 days, and there were several street riots, with people demanding "give us back our 11 days". Also taxes were traditionally due on March 25th (the old start of the year) but this would have meant that on 25th March 1753 you would have had to pay 365 days worth of taxes for a period of only 354 days, so the taxman - in an act of charity completely out of character for his office - advanced the date of payment by 11 days to April 5th, where it has been ever since."

Need to know ? Most certainly not. Nice to know ? Definitely.