link to gregorian calendar the gregorian calendar is a relatively recent invention, which is somewhat surprising taking into account how predominant it has become and its importance to the functioning of human societies nowadays. even for countries where other calendars are traditional, it still created an important social footprint which allows a certain degree of commonality between different peoples. the definition of which day corresponds to the first day of the year is an even more recent one, being an invention made in england only during the 18th century.
it would be the eventual influence of that country in the world for the years that would follow that made the gregorian calendar as ubiquitous as it is today. such fact was further reinforced by the growing importance of the american economy during the first half of the 20th century. the celebration of the new year in itself is traditional to most societies, but this growing prevalence of the gregorian date and the growth of tourism during the second half of the 20th century made many festivities evolve into grand events with fireworks and large parties, in order to bolster revenue. such developments ended up becoming part of the local traditions, and rio de janeiro would be no exception to such trend.
