The olde Old Calendar
http://oldbelievernews.livejournal.com/?skip=50 "While traditional Old Calendarists pride themselves on keeping the old Julian calendar for liturgical services, what they don't say (or perhaps know) is that the Julian calendar with the Anno Domini dating for years was introduced only in 1700 A.D. in Russia and in 1728 A.D. in Constantinople.
Before this, the Anno Mundi system, also known as the "Etos Kosmou" or Byzantine Creation Era was in use in the east. It starts with the creation of the world, which it dates to approximately 5500 years before the birth of Christ. Early church fathers, such as Theophilus of Antioch, Julian Africanus, and Hippolytus of Rome determined the age of the world to have been about 5530 years at the birth of Christ. They based their calculations in turn on earlier Jewish and Greek historians. By about 988 A.D.the date was finalized to be 5509 BC.
The strict old believers continue to use the Anno Mundi system. The first page of the Stoglav sobor contains the date Feb. 23, 7059. All of the ancient Slavonic writings use this system of dating. The year begins on Sept. 1, under this system, so Sept. 13, 2009 corresponds to August 31, 7517 and Sept. 14, 2009 was the first day of the new year with the date Sept. 1, 7518 AM. Todays date, Nov. 10, 2009, would correspond to Oct. 28, 7518 A.M.
The Anno Domini system was invented by Dionysius Exiguus and popularized by Venerable Bede and Charlemange and gradually spread over the west where it was adopted by every country in Europe by the 14th century, and as mentioned was formally adopted by Constantinople, Mt. Athos and Russia in the 1700s.
While the method of calculating years is certainly not a doctrinal issue, using the A.M. system puts one in the world of the early church fathers and the ancient orthodox saints of the east, whereas the A.D. system has a European origin and mindset. I think we should use the old Old Calendar whenever possible."
http://orthodoxwiki.org/Byzantine_Creation_Era The Creation Era was not by any means universally used by the Fathers, the Seleucid Era, the Era of Alexander, the Era of Martyrs (from Diocletian's reign) among others were used.
Dionysios came from the Apostolic See of Tomis (present day Constanta, Romania), and
is an ancient Orthodox saint of the East.
Talk about contradicting just to be contrary. The AD system is quite fine. For that matter, the Year of Creation is of European origin and mindset (the reason why St. Dionysios devised his system, based on the fullness of time-if the hymns of the Annunciation and Nativity are to be believed).
