The ancient Babylonians are said to have been the first people to make New Year’s resolutions, some 4,000 years ago. They were also the first to hold recorded celebrations in honor of the new year—though for them, the year began not in January but in mid-March, when the crops were planted.
During a massive 12-day religious festival known as Akitu, the Babylonians crowned a new king or reaffirmed their loyalty to the reigning king. They also made promises to the gods to pay their debts and return any objects they had borrowed. These promises could be considered the forerunners of modern New Year’s resolutions. If the Babylonians kept to their word, their (pagan) gods would bestow favour on them for the coming year. If not, they would fall out of the gods’ favour—a place no one wanted to be.
A similar practice occurred in ancient Rome, after Emperor Julius Caesar changed the calendar and established January 1 as the beginning of the new year circa 46 B.C. Named for Janus, the two-faced god whose spirit inhabited doorways and arches, January had special significance for the Romans. Believing that Janus symbolically looked backwards into the previous year and ahead into the future, the Romans offered sacrifices to the deity and made promises of good conduct for the coming year.
For Christians in the Middle Ages, the first day of the new year became the traditional occasion for thinking about one’s past mistakes and resolving to do, and be better in the future. In 1740, John Wesley, founder of Methodism, created the Covenant Renewal Service, most commonly held on New Year’s Eve or New Year’s Day. Now known as watch night services, they included readings from Scriptures and hymn singing. A form that is now popular within evangelical Protestant churches where watch night services are held on New Year’s Eve, and are often spent praying and making resolutions for the coming year.
Despite the tradition’s religious roots, New Year’s resolutions today are mostly a secular practice. Instead of making promises to the gods, most people make resolutions only to themselves, and focus purely on self-improvement (which may explain why such resolutions seem so hard to follow through on). But that dismal record probably won’t stop people from making resolutions anytime soon—after all, there’s been 4,000 years of practice.
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This is an adaptation of an article that first appeared as one of history.com new year staples.