JULIAN DATE

1. The sequential day count reckoned consecutively beginning January 1, 4713 B.C. Note: The Julian date on January 1, 1990, was 2,446,892. 2. The sequential day count of the days of a year, reckoned consecutively from the first day of January. Note: In modern times, the definition of Julian date has been corrupted to use the first day of the year as the point of reference. To avoid ambiguity with the traditional meaning, "day of year" rather than "Julian date" should be used for this purpose. ( 188 )