The Sack of Rome, then part of the Papal States, followed the capture of Rome on 6 May 1527 by the mutinous troops of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, during the War of the League of Cognac. Charles V only intended to threaten military action to make Pope Clement VII come to his terms. However, most of the Imperial army (14,000 Germans, including Lutherans, 6,000 Spaniards and some Italians) were largely unpaid. Despite being ordered not to storm the city, they broke into the scarcely defended city and began looting, killing, and holding citizens for ransom without any restraint.[3] Clement VII took refuge in Castel Sant'Angelo after the Swiss Guard were annihilated in a delaying rear guard action; he remained there until a ransom was paid to the pillagers.
Benvenuto Cellini, eyewitness to the events, described the sack in his works. It was not until February 1528 that the spread of a plague and the approach of the League forces under Odet de Foix forced the army to withdraw towards Naples from the city. Rome's population had dropped from 55,000 to 10,000 due to the atrocities, famine, an outbreak of plague, and flight from the city. The subsequent loss of the League army during the Siege of Naples secured a victory in the War of the League of Cognac for Charles V. The Emperor denied responsibility for the sack and came to terms again with Clement VII. On the other hand, the Sack of Rome further exacerbated religious hatred and antagonism between Catholics and Lutherans.
The growing power of the King of Spain and Holy Roman Emperor Charles V alarmed Pope Clement VII, who perceived Charles as a threat to the papal power. Clement VII formed an alliance with Charles V's arch-enemy, King Francis I of France, which came to be known as the League of Cognac.[4]
Apart from the Pope and the King of France, the League also included the Duchy of Milan, the Republic of Venice, the Republic of Genoa, and the Florence of the Medici. The League began hostilities in 1526 by attacking the Republic of Siena, but the undertaking proved to be a failure and revealed the weakness of the troops at the Pope's disposal.[5]
The Imperial Army defeated the French army, but funds were not available to pay the soldiers. The 34,000 Imperial troops mutinied and forced their commander, Duke Charles III of Bourbon, to lead them towards Rome, which was an easy target for pillaging due to the unstable political landscape at the time.[citation needed]
The Duke of Bourbon left Arezzo on 20 April 1527, taking advantage of chaos among the Venetians and their allies after a revolt broke out in Florence against Pope Clement VII's family, the Medici. His largely undisciplined troops sacked Acquapendente and San Lorenzo alle Grotte, and then occupied Viterbo and Ronciglione, reaching the walls of Rome on 5 May.[citation needed]
After official talks with the Swiss leaders, the pope will make the short journey to the WCC headquarters for an ecumenical prayer session with local church representatives. After lunch at the Ecumenical Institute at the Chteau BosseyExternal link in neighbouring canton Vaud, he will return to the WCC for talks.
Why is the pope visiting the WCC? I thought the Roman Catholic Church was not a member of the Geneva-based organisation.
Founded in 1948, the World Council of Churches (WCC)External link brings together the world’s Orthodox, Anglican, Methodist, Baptist, Lutheran and Reformed churches but not the Catholic Church, with whom it has had a complicated relationship. The pope’s visit goes under the motto ‘Walking, praying and working together’ and is the result of five years’ efforts by WCC officials to persuade him to come to Geneva following Francis’ appointment in 2013.
Despite not being affiliated, around 50 Vatican observers participate in WCC committees dealing with issues such as peace promotion, religious doctrine and education. The pope’s trip is thus seen as a highly significant working visit and attempt to boost Christian unity.
Geneva will be the second European visit by Francis with a clear ecumenical accent after his visit to Lund in Sweden in October 2016 to mark the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation alongside leaders of the Lutheran World Federation.
Will he hold a mass?
Yes. The pope is due to hold a mass at 5.30pm at the Palexpo convention centreExternal link next to Geneva Airport. Some 41,000 lucky ticket-holders will be waiting for him but the event will also be broadcast live on Swiss public television, RTS/SRF/RSI.
Most of the Swiss population are Christian but Christianity is on the decline and the percentage of non-believers is growing. Catholics are the biggest faith group – 37% of permanent residents in 2016, down from 47% in 1970, according to the Federal Statistical Office.
Over a quarter of all Swiss Catholics attend a religious service between six to 12 times a year. A survey commissioned by the Swiss Catholic Bishops Conference on marital and family issues in 2014 revealed liberal attitudes to sex and marriage.
The percentage of Swiss Protestants has fallen sharply since 1970 from 49% to 25% in 2015. Geneva, the city of Jean Calvin, is sometimes referred to as the Protestant Rome. However, times have changed. In 2016, around 35% of the city’s residents claimed to be Catholic, while 24% said they were Protestant.
El nombre de la ciudad en francés es Sion ([sjɔ̃]). En alemán el topónimo es Sitten ([zɪtən]), en italianoSeduno y en latínSedunum. Este nombre deriva del pueblo céltico local: los sedunos (Sedunii). Sobre el actual sitio de Sion existía un oppidum identificado con el de Drousomagos, ¿mercado de Druso?, mencionado por Ptolomeo.
El actual solar de Sion fue ocupado desde el período neolítico (necrópolis del Petit-Chasseur). El origen del poblado, sin embargo, data de la época celta, cuando los sedunos establecieron una fortaleza (oppidum) denominada Drusomago, en las proximidades de Martigny.
Hasta finales de la época romana, Drusomago estuvo bajo la sombra de Massongex y de Martigny, en ese entonces llamada Octodurus, que se hallaban sobre la ruta estratégica del Gran San Bernardo. En esa época, como gran parte de las ciudades galas, cambió su nombre por uno que aludía a los pueblos de la región, en este caso los sedunos. En el siglo v, el obispo desplazó la sede episcopal a Seduntum es decir Sion, y la ciudad se convirtió en el centro sociocultural de la región.
Basílica de Valère.Castillo ruina TourbillonLa Catedral de Nuestra Señora de Sion
La ciudad guarda con celo su increíble patrimonio arquitectónico, dos castillos (de los cuales uno está en ruinas) forman parte del paisaje de esta ciudad, además de la catedral del siglo xii, de estilo gótico, y las calles en la ciudad vieja cuentan la historia de esta ciudad, que ha sido colonia italiana, alemana y francesa.
Actualmente el idioma oficial de la ciudad es el francés, aunque se encuentra cerca de la frontera lingüística del Röstigraben, y tiene una población germana que constituye el 5 % de la población total.
Sion es considerada como la ciudad más agradable para vivir en Suiza, debido a la variedad de actividades que es posible practicar allí, su clima y por su amueblamiento urbano generalmente adornado durante todo el año.
La ciudad es visitada por miles de turistas cada año; en verano por su clima especialmente caluroso (en comparación con las otras ciudades suizas) y en invierno porque está encerrada entre los Alpes, lo que posibilita la práctica de deportes de invierno como el esquí y el snowboard, entre otros. La ciudad se ha presentado tres veces como candidata para los Juegos Olímpicos de Invierno, pero hasta ahora siempre ha llegado en segunda posición en 1976, 2002 y 2006. En un referéndum celebrado en el cantón de Valais en junio de 2018, una mayoría del 53 por ciento de los votantes votó en contra del apoyo financiero a la candidatura para los Juegos Olímpicos de Invierno de 2026 en Sion.
Sion tiene un equipo de fútbol, el FC Sion, que ha ganado once veces la Copa Suiza.
La ciudad cuenta con el aeropuerto de Sion, que presta servicio internacional en la época invernal, aunque esto es muy restringido, ya que se trata principalmente de un aeropuerto militar utilizado por la Fuerza Aérea Suiza.
Sion cuenta con una estación de trenes que la conectan principalmente con las demás ciudades del cantón y con los principales centros urbanos de Suiza. Además la ciudad tiene una red de trenes regionales que la comunican con los centros urbanos del valle del Ródano. También cuenta con una terminal de autobuses que permiten acceder a las principales estaciones de esquí de la región.
Are you ready to discover the history and geography of Sion in Switzerland? This city, founded several centuries ago, is a place rich in history that has influenced Swiss and European cultures. Embark on an exciting adventure in the Valais region.
On your journey through these cultural wonders, you’ll explore the castles of Valère and Tourbillon, one of the town’s historic gems. You will also learn all about the emergence of the canton’s most important city and its evolution.
History of Sion in Switzerland
Sion is a town in the canton of Valais, Switzerland, and is the administrative capital of the canton. It was founded at the turn of the century and is considered an important place for historical and geographical research.
The first written mention of Sion as a town dates back to the year 1160, and in 1189 the county became the episcopal principality of Sion. By this time, the town had already prospered to become a politically important and strategic site.
Over the centuries, through destruction, fire and regional power struggles, its population gradually grew and it experienced several periods of development.
Integrated into the Germanic Holy Roman Empire at the beginning of the 11th century, the principality of Sion was at the centre of conflicts between Switzerland and Savoy, between counts, episcopates and local communities, until the creation of the Republic of the Seven Tithings*.
In 1798, the Upper Valais, including Sion, united with the Lower Valais to create a single canton and join the Helvetic Republic.
The construction of the Valère and Tourbillon castles between the 11th and 13th centuries also played a major role in the history of the town and its establishment as the central place of the region.
Origins and development of the town
Sion is an ancient Roman city built around the Castrum Sedunum by Roman legionaries around the year 40. The Latin name is said to have originated with the Seduni a Celtic people who had settled in the Valais since the 1st century BC.
Until the seat of the episcopate was moved to Sion in the 5th century, the town remained in the shadow of the present-day towns of Martigny and Massongex, both of which were located on the axis of the Great St Bernard Pass, a passageway between the Valais and the Aosta Valley since the Neolithic period.
Development and expansion of the town
The arrival of the train in the Rhone Valley from the Lake Geneva port of Bouveret in the 19th century stimulated the development of the town, as it did for Martigny and the other towns on the railway axis. A provisional station was built in 1860 and the final version was completed in 1873.
The establishment and gradual improvement of rail and road links between neighbouring towns and in the valley from Geneva facilitated trade and travel throughout the region.
Since then, Sion has steadily developed its tertiary sector and its tourist capacities, to the detriment of the agricultural sector and in particular the dairy industry, which has seen its importance decline for several decades. Only the wine industry has been able to survive this agricultural decline.
Geography and heritage of Sion in Switzerland
Sion is located in the heart of the Valais, in the southwest of Switzerland. The town is situated at an altitude of 512 metres on the right bank of the river Rhône, for the historic centre, and shares the two banks over the whole of the commune.
Geographical location and climate
Nestled in the valley of the nascent Rhone and protected from the influences of the high peaks of the Alps, the climate is generally temperate throughout the year, with average temperatures varying between 6°C in winter and 19°C in summer.
Location map of the city of Sion in the Swiss Valais:
Physical and natural characteristics
The surrounding landscape is mostly composed of mountains covered by alpine forest, offering an unimaginable variety to admire: impressive rocks and peaks, limpid bodies of water with turquoise reflections, magical valleys invaded by daffodils and thousand-year-old glaciers like the Aletsch.
Important places and monuments
The most visible and most important site of the town is located on the heights of the town, with the castle of Tourbillon and the fortified basilica of Valère.
The castle, dating from the 13th century, is built on the ramparts of the lower town and its magnificent towers dominate the town.
The basilica dates from the 12th century and has been undergoing a complete restoration since 1987.
The Tourbillon and Valère castles, the Sorcerers’ Tower, Notre-Dame de Sion Cathedral with the old town, the Town Hall and the Rue du Grand-Pont, are the places not to be missed during a visit to the town’s heritage.
Culture in Sion, Switzerland
Spoken languages and dialects
The spoken language is French and the regional language, Valaisan, is used. German and Romansh are also spoken in a minority.
Cuisine and gastronomy
Sion offers a wide variety of culinary delights from all over the Valais and Switzerland. Local specialities include rösti potatoes, tartiflettes, fondue of course, but also game (rabbit, venison, etc.), dried meat or Valais rye bread.
As the most important wine-producing region in Switzerland, it is difficult to escape from one of the 60 grape varieties that the Valais has to offer and which the Sion region has been able to take advantage of, for example with the wine tour of the region starting from the city.
Arts, music and entertainment
The artistic culture is very present in Sion. The town has several museums to discover, such as the Valais Art Museum, the History Museum, the Nature Museum and the Fellini Foundation.
The music scene has also developed rapidly in recent years, with numerous concerts and festivals throughout the year, from classical music at PALP to Opéra Viva under the stars.
Discovering the city is an enriching experience thanks to its prolific past and its current dynamics: passing through Sion on a journey along the Rhône River will delight travellers, whether for a short time or for a longer stay.
Per pale Argent a Crosier issuant and a Sword inverted in saltire in chief a Mullet of Five all Gules and Azure a Tower Argent masoned, windowed and doored Sable, overall a base Vert. Željko Heimer, 22 March 2000
On 1 January 2017 Les Agettes became part of Sion.
Salins (until 31 December 2012)
image by Pascal Gross
Azure, between two Mullets [of Six] Or as many Garbs of the same in saltire. Željko Heimer, 21 April 2000
Everybody knows that there are 24 hours in a day, 60 minutes in an hour, and 60 seconds in minute. But in 1793, the French smashed the old clock system in favor of French Revolutionary Time, which was a 10-hour day, with 100 minutes per hour, and 100 seconds per minute. This thoroughly modern system had a few practical benefits, chief among them being a simplified way to do time-related math. If we want to know when a day is 80% complete, decimal time simply says "at the end of the eighth hour," whereas standard time requires us to say "at 19 hours, 12 minutes." French Revolutionary Time was a more elegant solution to that math problem. The problem was that every living person already had a well-established way of telling the time, and old habits die hard!
French Revolutionary Time officially began on November 24, 1793 although conceptual work around the system had been going on since the 1750s. The French manufactured clocks and watches showing both decimal time and standard time on their faces (allowing for both conversion and confusion). These clock faces were spectacularly weird.
The system proved unpopular. People were unfamiliar with switching systems of time, and there were few practical reasons for non-mathematicians to change how they told time. (The same could not be said of the metric system of weights and measurements, which helped to standardize commerce; weights and measurements often differed in neighboring countries, but clocks generally did not.) Furthermore, replacing every clock and watch in the country was an expensive proposition. The French officially stopped using decimal time after just 17 months. French Revolutionary Time became non-mandatory starting on April 7, 1795. This didn't stop some areas of the country from continuing to observe decimal time, and a few decimal clocks remained in use for years afterwards, presumably leading to many missed appointments!
LIVE NORMAL AND DECIMAL TIME
Live NORMAL time
Live DECIMAL time
DECIMAL TO NORMAL / NORMAL TO DECIMAL TIME CONVERTER
Enter decimall time:
Use HH:MM:SS format
Result in "normal" time:
Enter "normal" time:
Use HH:MM:SS format
Result in decimall time:
Some applications using decimal time are available in both Google Play and the Apple Store. For example, for Android - DecimalTime ; for Apple - DeciTime .
Se denomina tiempo decimal a la expresión de la extensión del día utilizando unidades que se encuentran relacionadas mediante un sistema decimal. Este término es utilizado para referirse específicamente al tiempo revolucionario francés, el cual divide al día en 10 horas decimales, cada hora decimal en 100 minutos decimales y cada minuto decimal en 100 segundos decimales, en contraposición al tiempo estándar usual, en el cual el día se divide en 24 horas, cada hora en 60 minutos y cada minuto en 60 segundos.
El tiempo decimal fue utilizado en China a lo largo de casi toda su historia junto con el tiempo duodecimal. Hacia el año 1000 a. C. el día que se extendía desde una medianoche a la medianoche siguiente se encontraba dividido en 12 horas dobles (chino tradicional: 時辰; chino simplificado: 时辰; pinyin: shíchen) y 100 ke (Hanzi: 刻; Pinyin: kè).[1] Durante tres períodos breves se utilizaron un número diferente de kes por día, 120 ke durante 5–3 A.d. C., 96 ke durante 507–544, y 108 ke durante 544–565. Varios de los casi 50 calendarios chinos también dividieron cada ke en 100 fen, aunque en otros cada ke era dividido en 60 fen. En 1280, el calendario Shoushi (Season Granting) subdividió a cada fen en 100 miao, creando un sistema decimal completo de 100 ke, 100 fen y 100 miao.[2] El tiempo decimal chino dejó de ser utilizado en 1645 cuando el calendario Shixian (Constant Conformity), basado en la astronomía europea llevada a China por los jesuitas, adoptó 96 ke por día junto con 12 horas dobles, con lo cual cada ke corresponde exactamente a un cuarto de hora.[3]
En tiempos modernos, el tiempo decimal fue introducido durante la Revolución francesa por un decreto promulgado el 5 de octubre de 1793:
XI. Le jour, de minuit à minuit, est divisé en dix parties, chaque partie en dix autres, ainsi de suite jusqu’à la plus petite portion commensurable de la durée.
XI. El día, desde medianoche hasta la medianoche siguiente, se divide en diez partes, cada parte a su vez se compone de diez partes, y así sucesivamente hasta la duración de tiempo más pequeña que se pueda medir.
Se les dio nombre a estas partes el 24 de noviembre de 1793 (4 Frimario del Año II). Las divisiones primarias se denominaron horas, y se agregó:
La centième partie de l'heure est appelée minute décimale; la centième partie de la minute est appelée seconde décimale. (énfasis en el original)
La centésima parte de una hora es denominada minuto decimal; la centésima parte de un minuto es denominada segundo decimal.
Por lo tanto, medianoche correspondía a la hora 10, mediodía a la hora 5, etc. Si bien se fabricaron relojes con cuadrantes mostrando el tiempo estándar con los números 1–24 y el tiempo decimal con los números 1–10, el tiempo decimal nunca contó con gran aceptación; no fue utilizado de manera oficial hasta comienzos del año Republicano III, 22 de septiembre de 1794, y el uso obligatorio fue suspendido el 7 de abril de 1795 (18 Germinal del Año III), mediante la misma ley que introdujo el sistema métrico original. Por lo tanto, inicialmente el sistema métrico no poseía una unidad de tiempo, y versiones posteriores del sistema métrico utilizan el segundo, igual a 1/86400 de día, como unidad de tiempo métrico.
El tiempo decimal fue introducido como parte del calendario republicano francés, en el cual además de dividir el día en forma decimal, dividió al mes en tres décadas de 10 días cada una; este calendario fue abolido a finales del 1805. El comienzo de cada año era determinado según el día en él tenía lugar el equinoccio de otoño, en relación con el tiempo solar aparente o verdadero en el Observatorio de París. El tiempo decimal habría sido expresado también según el tiempo solar aparente, dependiendo de la posición desde la cual se lo registraba, como ya era la costumbre general para ajustar los relojes.
En 1897 los franceses realizaron otro intento de decimalizar el tiempo, cuando se creó la Commission de décimalisation du temps en el Bureau des Longitudes, siendo secretario el matemático Henri Poincaré. La comisión propuso un compromiso, al mantener el día de 24 horas, pero dividir cada hora en 100 minutos decimales, y cada minuto en 100 segundos. El plan no tuvo buena acogida y fue abandonado en 1900.
Hay exactamente 86.400 segundos estándar (véase SI para una definición actual del segundo estándar) en un día estándar, pero en el sistema de tiempo decimal francés hay 100.000 segundos decimales en un día, por lo que el segundo decimal es más corto que su contraparte.
Son los científicos y los programadores de computadoras lo que utilizan en forma más asidua el tiempo decimal del día en forma de día fraccional. El tiempo estándar de 24 horas es convertido en un día fraccional simplemente mediante dividir el número de horas pasadas desde la medianoche por 24 para obtener una fracción decimal. Por lo tanto medianoche es 0,0 día, mediodía es 0,5 d, etc., lo cual se puede componer con cualquier tipo de fecha, tales como:
Es posible utilizar tantos sitios decimales como sea necesario de acuerdo a la precisión requerida, de forma que 0,5 d = 0,500000 d. Los días fraccionarios a menudo son expresados en UTC o TT, aunque las fechas Julianas utilizan fecha/tiempo astronómico anterior a 1925 (cada fecha comenzaba en el 0h por lo tanto ".0" = mediodía) y Microsoft Excel utiliza la zona de tiempo local de la computadora. El uso de días fraccionarios reduce el número de unidades utilizadas en cálculos de tiempo de cuatro (días, horas, minutos, segundos) a una sola (días). A menudo los astrónomos utilizan días fraccionarios para registrar sus observaciones, y fueron indicados haciendo referencia al Paris Mean Time por el matemático y astrónomo francés del siglo xviii Pierre-Simon Laplace en su libro, Traité de Mécanique Céleste, tal como en estos ejemplos:
... et la distance périhélie, égale à 1,053095 ; ce qui a donné pour l'instant du passage au périhélie, sept.29,10239, temps moyen compté de minuit à Paris.
Les valeurs précédentes de a, b, h, l, relatives à trois observations, ont donné la distance périhélie égale à 1,053650; et pour l'instant du passage, sept.29,04587; ce qui diffère peu des résultats fondés sur cinq observations.
Días fraccionales fueron utilizados durante el siglo xix por el astrónomo británico John Herschel en su libro, Outlines of Astronomy, como se ilustra en estos ejemplos:
Between Greenwich noon of the 22d and 23d of March, 1829, the 1828th equinoctial year terminates, and the 1829th commences. This happens at 0 d•286003, or at 4 h 51 m 50 s •66 Greenwich Mean Time ... For example, at 12 h 0 m 0 s Greenwich Mean Time, or 0 d•500000...
En general el sistema de segundos fraccionales es más utilizado que el de días fraccionales. En efecto, esta es la representación en una única unidad que utilizan numerosos lenguajes de programación, incluidos C, y parte de los estándares UNIX/POSIX utilizados por Mac OS X, Linux, etc.; para convertir días fraccionales en segundos fraccionales, multiplican el número por 86400. Tiempos absolutos son a menudo expresados relativos a la medianoche del 1 de enero de 1970. Otros sistemas pueden utilizar un punto cero distinto, pueden contar en milisegundos en vez de segundos, etc.
El 23 de octubre de 1998, la compañía fabricante de relojes Suiza, Swatch, presentó un tiempo decimal denominado Swatch Internet Time, el cual divide al día en 1000 beats (cada uno 86,4 s) contados en el rango 000–999, con @000 medianoche y @500 mediodía CET (UTC +1), en contraposición al UTC.[4] La empresa ha vendido relojes que indican el Tiempo de Internet.
Internet Time ha sido criticado por utilizar un origen diferente al utilizado por el Horario universal, tergiversar CET al presentarlo como "Biel Mean Time", y por no tener unidades más precisas, aunque ciertas organizaciones han propuesto los "centibeats" (864 ms) y "milibeats" (86.4 ms).
Distintas personas han propuesto un rango de variaciones al tiempo decimal, dividiendo al día en diferente número de unidades y subunidades con diversos nombres. La mayoría están basados en días fraccionarios, de forma que un formato de tiempo decimal puede ser fácilmente convertido en otro, de forma tal que todos estos son equivalentes:
Algunas propuestas de tiempo decimal están basadas en unidades de medidas alternativas del tiempo métrico. La diferencia entre el tiempo métrico y el tiempo decimal es que en el tiempo métrico se definen las unidades para medir intervalos de tiempo, tal como se lo mide con un cronómetro, mientras que el tiempo decimal define el tiempo del día, tal como lo mide un reloj. Así como el tiempo estándar utiliza como base el segundo la unidad métrica de tiempo, las escalas de tiempo decimal propuestas pueden utilizar otras unidades métricas.
Swatch Internet Time (or .beat time) is a decimal time system introduced in 1998 by the Swatch corporation as part of the marketing campaign for their line of ".beat" watches. Those without a watch could use the Internet to view the current time on the watchmaker's website, but now a dedicated wiki serves the purpose.[1] The concept of .beat time is similar to decimal minutes in French Revolutionary decimal time.[2]
Instead of hours and minutes, in Swatch Time the mean solar day is divided into 1,000 equal parts called .beats, meaning each .beat lasts 86.4 seconds (1.440 minutes) in standard time, and an hour lasts for approximately 42 .beats. The time of day always references the amount of time that has passed since midnight (standard time) in Biel, Switzerland, where Swatch's headquarters is located. For example, @248 BEATS indicates a time 248 .beats after midnight, or 248⁄1000 of a day (just over 5 hours and 57 minutes; or 5:57 AM UTC+1).
There are no time zones in Swatch Internet Time; it is a globally unified timekeeping system based on what Swatch calls "Biel Mean Time" (BMT), the time zone conventionally known as Central European Time or West Africa Time. Note that it is based on the time zone and not the actual mean solar time measured in Biel. Also, unlike civil time in Switzerland and many other countries, Swatch Internet Time has never observed daylight saving time (DST), even prior to more recent decisions to abandon DST in certain locales.[3]
Swatch Internet Time was announced on 23 October 1998, in a ceremony at the Junior Summit '98,[4] attended by Nicolas G. Hayek, president and CEO of the Swatch Group, G.N. Hayek, president of Swatch Ltd., and Nicholas Negroponte, founder and then director of the MIT Media Lab. During the summit, Swatch Internet Time became the official time system for Nation.1, an online country (supposedly) created and run by children.
A Swatch watch showing .beat time in the bottom part of the display
During 1999, Swatch produced several models of watch, branded "Swatch .beat", that displayed Swatch Internet Time as well as standard time, and even convinced a few websites (such as CNN.com) to use the new format.[5]PHP's date() function has a format specifier, 'B', which returns the Swatch Internet Time notation for a given time stamp.[6] It was also used as a time reference on ICQ, and the online role-playing gamePhantasy Star Online used it since its launch on the Dreamcast in 2000 to try to facilitate cross-continent gaming (as the game allowed Japanese, American and European players to mingle on the same servers). In March 2001, Ericsson released the T20e, a mobile phone which gave the user the option of displaying Internet Time. Outside these areas, it is infrequently used. While Swatch still offers the concept on its website, it no longer markets Beat watches.[citation needed] In July 2016, Swatch released Touch Zero Two, its second wirelessly connected watch, with Swatch Internet Time function.
In early 1999, Swatch began a marketing campaign about the launch of their Beatnik satellite, intended to service a set of Internet Time watches. They were criticized for planning to use an amateur radio frequency for broadcasting a commercial message (an act banned by international treaties). The satellite was intended to be deployed by hand from the Mir space station. Swatch instead donated the transmitter batteries for use in normal Mir functions, and the satellite never broadcast.[7]
The concept was touted as an alternative, decimal measure of time. One of the supposed goals was to simplify the way people in different time zones communicate about time, mostly by eliminating time zones altogether. It also does away with the division of the day into 12 or 24 parts (hours), then 60 parts (minutes), then 60 parts (seconds), then 1000 parts (milliseconds). Furthermore, there is no confusion between the AM/PM system and 24-hour time.
Instead of hours and minutes, the mean solar day is divided into 1,000 parts called .beats. Each .beat lasts 1 minute and 26.4 seconds. One .beat is equal to one decimal minute in French decimal time.
Although Swatch does not specify units smaller than one .beat, third party implementations have extended the standard by adding "centibeats" or "sub-beats", for extended precision: @248.00. Each "centibeat" is a hundredth of a .beat and is therefore equal to one French decimal second (0.864 seconds).[8][9]
There are no time zones; instead, the new time scale of Biel Mean Time (BMT) is used, based on the company's headquarters in Biel, Switzerland. Despite the name, BMT does not refer to mean solar time at the Biel meridian (7°15′E), but to the standard time there. It is equivalent to Central European Time and West Africa Time, or UTC+1.
Like UTC, Swatch Internet Time is the same throughout the world. For example, when the time is 875 .beats, or @875, in New York, it is also @875 in Tokyo. Unlike civil time in most European countries, Internet Time does not observe daylight saving time, and thus it matches Central European Time during (European) winter and Western European Summer Time, which is observed by the United Kingdom, Ireland, Portugal and Spain's Canary Islands during summer.
The most distinctive aspect of Swatch Internet Time is its notation; as an example, "@248" would indicate a time 248 .beats after midnight, equivalent to a fractional day of 0.248 CET, or 04:57:07.2 UTC. No explicit format was provided for dates, although the Swatch website formerly displayed the Gregorian calendar date in the order day-month-year, separated by periods and prefixed by the letter d (e.g. d31.01.99).[citation needed]
Suffice to say, the French Revolution left a lasting legacy on the world. To rattle off a few of the lesser achievements: the rise of liberal democracy, the weakening of the Catholic Church and feudal systems, and the plain decoration of the rights of men. Of course, none of these hold a candle to Internet Time.
You know the metric system? Depending on where you live, it’s either the natural order of measurement or a sick perversion of freedom. The metric system was one of the innovations borne out of the French Revolution. But not every unit of measurement devised by the French stuck. You’ve got your meters and your grams, of course, all divisible and multipliable by ten. But when was the last time you used a decimal minute?
A French decimal time pocket watch. Photo from Svalbard, who still makes decimal wristwatches available for purchase.
There are 100 decimal minutes in a decimal hour and 100 decimal seconds in a decimal minute. A day has 10 decimal hours. Ten days make a décade—a week—and three décades make a month. Unfortunately, thanks to our planet’s pesky revolution around the sun, the calendar still needed 12 months, plus a few bonus days at the end of the calendar to round out the year. The French Revolutionary Calendar was introduced in 1793 and abolished by Napoleon just 13 years later, but decimal time didn’t even make it out of the First Republic—it was made “non-mandatory” in just 17 months after pretty much everyone decided to stick with their existing watches.
Fast forward to the turn of the century, and a couple of Swiss visionaries had a crazy idea for a new way of thinking about time. The year was 1998. The internet was on the rise and globalization in full force. More than ever, people were working across borders and across time zones. You know time zones—those fake bands of standardized time invented by railroad companies? They make it annoying as heck to schedule a meeting across the country, across the pond, or across the world. Which 9 A.M. did you mean? Why did Tim schedule a meeting during my lunch? So on, so forth.
Swatch—the watchmaker best known for their casual plastic watches—knew that this problem would only get worse as the internet developed and the world population became more intertwined. So, like the railroad companies of old, they created a solution.
Swatch Internet Time—or .beat time, if you prefer the generic brand—divides the day into 1000 equal parts, called .beats. Yes, that’s “dot beats.” As in, “dot com.” And you note time with an “@” symbol just like email—as in, the meeting is @625.beats (“at 625 dot beats”). It’s not decimal time, it’s internet time, baby.
A Swatch MOON OR.BEAT III wristwatch.
A single .beat is 86.4 standard seconds long, so just under a standard minute and a half. There are no beat hours or beat seconds—though some implementations include “centibeats,” or 1/100th of a beat—no Daylight Savings Time, and, most importantly, no time zones. No matter where you are in the world, we march to the .beat of the same clock.
Unlike the French government, Swatch could introduce a ton of watches featuring decimal time to the masses. But .beat time wasn’t just limited to a few cheap wristwatches. Internet Time made it onto CNN, was implemented by the instant messaging app ICQ, and was even used as the time system in Phantasy Star Online, a groundbreaking online RPG.
But, just like the French back in the late 1700s, the world just wasn’t ready for decimal time. It never caught on, and within a few years, Swatch Internet Time was a mostly forgotten oddity. While it solves the problem of communicating about time zones by completely abolishing them, it makes it a lot harder to actually communicate about time. The internet clock resets at the same time for everyone—midnight in UTC+1, the time zone where Swatch’s headquarters in Biel, Switzerland is located, natch—but for everyone outside of that time zone, .beats just don’t line up with your actual day. While 11 P.M. means late night vibes around the world, the same can’t be said for @166.beats.
Swatch was on to something, though. They saw an interconnected future where people would need an easier way to communicate about time—something universal, divorced from local context. I don’t think we’ve come any closer to cracking that. Internet Time might not be a perfect solution, but the next time you’re trying to plan a meeting with someone on the other side of the globe, think of .beats and the world that could’ve been.
Want to keep Internet Time? While Swatch no longer sells watches with .beat displays, thanks to the magic of smartphones and smartwatches, it’s never been easier to keep Internet Time. I use a great app called BeatTime that works on pretty much every Apple device—you can set a lock screen widget on your phone so checking Internet Time is just a tap away. I can’t personally attest to the quality of this Android widget, but it looks to achieve the same effect. Of course, you can also do it all in your head—just multiply the current hour in UTC+1 by 3600, add that to the current minute in UTC+1 multiplied by 60, then take that number and divide it by 86.4. Round down the result, and you’ve got .beats.
Based on Dan “DaVinci Code” Brown’s bestselling novel of the same name, Angels & Demons (2009) follows the exploits of Robert Langdon (played by Tom Hanks) as he gallivants across Rome and the Vatican trying to foil the murderous exploits of the secret society known as the Illuminati. With his slicked-back-hair and action-movie pedigree, Langdon is reminiscent of Nic Cage’s character Benjamin Franklin Gates in National Treasure – only Langdon doesn't wear a Rolex. His wristwatch is far more playful.
Image courtesy, Columbia Pictures
Why We're Watching
It's the final day of Character Watch Week! If you haven't read our coverage ranging from Pokemon to the Black Panther, be sure to check it out. We even ranked our favorite Mickey Mouse watches of all time, which is where Robert Langdon comes into play. He may very well be one of the top minds in the field of art history and symbology (he's a Harvard professor, after all), but he doesn't let that get to his wrist.
While he most certainly has the means for all manner of luxury watches, he opts for a timepiece more fitting for a rumpled professor. That would be a Mickey Mouse watch, complete with moving arms that tell the time. (Happy now, Jack?)
Robert Langdon (Tom Hanks) with the Vatican police, trying to solve the mysteries of the Illuminati with his Mickey Mouse watch. Screengrab courtesy, Columbia Pictures
Langdon's watch is an unassuming variation on the longstanding Mickey tradition. It's small and fitted to a black leather strap with the literal words "Mickey" and "Mouse" printed vertically on the dial. The history of these watches is long (and still continuing) but it dates back to the early 1930s, when the Ingersoll watch company (which would one day become Timex) unveiled a Mickey Mouse pocket watch – later followed up by the wristwatch which has been iterated on countless times over the years. Langdon's appears to be a Bradley Mickey Mouse watch, specifically.
Similar Bradley Mickey Mouse watch to the one worn by Tom Hanks in Angels & Demons. Image courtesy, Goodwill
This is a character watch no matter how you want to define the category. But the question lingers: Why does he wear this? Why not choose a more rugged timepiece fit for his continent-hopping adventures? While we don't find that answer in the movie, we do find it in the pages of Dan Brown's novels.
In The DaVinci Code, we learn about Langdon's history with the watch:
"Pulling back the sleeve of his jacket, he checked his watch – a vintage, collector's-edition Mickey Mouse wristwatch that had been a gift from his parents on his tenth birthday. Although its juvenile dial often drew odd looks, Langdon had never owned any other watch; Disney animations had been his first introduction to the magic of form and color, and Mickey now served as Langdon's daily reminder to stay young at heart. At the moment, however, Mickey's arms were skewed at an awkward angle, indicating an equally awkward hour."
Langdon, alongside CERN scientist Vittoria Vetra (played by Ayelet Zurer), in Angels & Demons. Screengrab courtesy, Columbia Pictures
It goes even deeper than that, believe it or not, and you can read the book for yourself if you want additional context. We're interested in the movie that brings the watch to life. And since Langdon's watch is covered up throughout The DaVinci Code movie, that brings us to Angels & Demons.
When We're Watching
Nearly an hour into the film, Langdon is hot on the trail of the Illuminati's plans. Alongside Vittoria Vetra (Ayelet Zurer) – a CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research) scientist, and the Vatican police – he arrives at St. Peter's Square hoping to catch the secret society in the act of wrongdoing. The setting is teeming with tourists, news trucks, and reporters. As he makes his way through the crowd, Langdon takes a moment to check the time [00:54:10]. This is when we get the money shot. Underneath his blue dress shirt sits a vintage Mickey Mouse watch, with its active hands busy telling the time. You don't often get such overt watch shots in films – and never a Mickey Mouse watch – but it jives with the absolute lack of subtlety at large on the part of this movie franchise
Screengrab courtesy, Columbia Pictures
In the third act, Langdon convinces the Italian police force to take him to the Piazza Navona where he's certain the Illuminati are planning to brand and murder a Cardinal. When they arrive on the scene, they see a suspicious van pull up and turn its lights off. The police make their way over to the van to investigate and are immediately taken out by an assassin (who happens to be wearing a two-tone Rolex Datejust). The assassin proceeds to wheel the Cardinal out from the van, on a rig with bench press weights attached and drop him into a fountain. Langdon jumps in – eventually aided by good samaritans and manages to save the drowning Cardinal. All the while he has his Mickey Mouse watch on [00:01:30], which becomes visible as he rests his drenched arm on the outside of the fountain. There's no way this watch has that kind of water resistance but … movie magic right?
Screengrab courtesy, Columbia Pictures
Angels & Demons (starring Tom Hanks and Ewan McGregor) is directed by Ron Howard, with props by Trish Gallaher Glenn, and Federico Ciommo. It's available to stream on Netflix and rent on iTunes or Amazon.
Nous sommes heureux de partager avec vous, amis pèlerins, la joie de la rencontre fraternelle ! Ce chemin se veut être une démarche de pèlerinage dans l’esprit de Saint François. Accueillir la fraternité comme un cadeau, rechercher la simplicité et même la sobriété, vivre l’instant présent sans se soucier, c’est s’imprégner petit à petit de l’esprit de l’évangile tel que St François a choisi de le vivre. Le chemin est ouvert à toutes et tous et il apportera une joie authentique à celles et ceux qui auront au plus vrai d’eux-mêmes la paix du cœur.
Chemins de foi, chemins pour tous
Depuis de nombreux siècles, des pèlerins ont traversé l’Europe pour se rendre en Terre Sainte, à St Jacques de Compostelle, à Rome … pour des raisons spirituelles essentiellement mais ensuite aussi pour des raisons économiques et, plus récemment, pour goûter aux plaisirs de la marche, des paysages, du silence et de la solitude …
Aujourd’hui, de plus en plus de personnes, croyantes ou non, empruntent ces chemins tracés par les premiers pèlerins.
Un peu partout, des associations se sont créées pour redonner vie à ces itinéraires, notamment ceux vers Compostelle, mais aussi celui de Canterbury à Rome (« via francigena »), le Chemin de St-Michel, et bien d’autres. C’est aussi le cas pour ce « récent » chemin de 1500 km vers Assise.
Ainsi, elles témoignent d’un intérêt renouvelé pour la découverte du patrimoine culturel et artistique et pour une autre forme de ressourcement personnel ou de recherche d’épanouissement par un nouveau style de loisirs.
Argomento precedente
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French Revolutionary Time officially began on November 24, 1793 although conceptual work around the system had been going on since the 1750s. The French manufactured clocks and watches showing both decimal time and standard time on their faces (allowing for both conversion and confusion). These clock faces were spectacularly weird.
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