Mesoamerican calendars was of ritual significance to a number of Mesoamerican cultures. A third major calendar form known as the Long Count is found in the inscriptions of several Mesoamerican cultures, most famously those of the Maya civilization who developed it to its fullest extent during the Classic period (ca. 200–900 CE). The Long Count provided the ability to uniquely identify days over a much longer period of time, by combining a sequence of day-counts or cycles of increasing length, calculated or set from a particular date in the mythical past. Most commonly, five such higher-order cycles in a modified vigesimal (base-20)
Adoption of the Gregorian calendar the Empire (except Scotland, which had already done so from 1600) changed the start of the civil year from 5 April to 1 January. Consequently, the custom of dual dating (giving a date in both old and new styles) can refer to the Julian/Gregorian calendar change, or to the start of year change, or to both. The British tax year traditionally began on Lady Day (25 March) on the Julian calendar and thus became 5 April, which was the "Old Style" equivalent. A 12th skipped Julian leap day in 1800 changed its start to 6 April. It was not changed