Almanac
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- For the album by the band They Might Be Giants, see Almanac: Live 2004.
- For the major breast cancer trial, see ALMANAC.
An almanac (also spelled almanack, especially in Commonwealth English) is an annual publication containing tabular information in a particular field or fields often arranged according to the calendar. Astronomical data and various statistics are also found in almanacs, such as the times of the rising and setting of the sun and moon, eclipses, hours of full tide, stated festivals of churches, terms of courts, lists of all types, timelines, and more. The word almanac comes from the Arabic al-manaakh, "the climate," reflecting its primary original purpose of providing information about the calendar and weather useful in agriculture.
The precursor to the almanac was the Greek weather-calendar, the parapegma. Ptolemy the Alexandrian astronomer (1st century CE) wrote a treatise, Phaseis—"phases of fixed stars and collection of weather-changes" is the translation of its full title—the core of which is a parapegma, a list of dates of seasonally regular weather changes, first appearances and last appearances of stars or constellations at sunrise or sunset, and solar events such as solstices, all organized according to the solar year. With the astronomical computations were expected weather phenomena, composed as a digest of observations made by various authorities of the past. Parapegmata had been composed for centuries.
Ptolemy believed that the astronomical phenomena caused the changes in seasonal weather; his explanation of why there was not an exact correlation of these events was that the physical influences of other heavenly bodies also came into play. Hence for him, weather prediction was a special division of astrology [1].
When almanacs were first devised, people still saw little difference between predicting the movements of the stars and tides, and predicting the future in the divination sense. Early almanacs therefore contained general horoscopes, as well as the more concrete information. One almanac, Poor Robin's Almanack (not to be confused with Benjamin Franklin's Poor Richard's Almanac) parodied these horoscopes in its 1664 issue, saying "This month we may expect to hear of the Death of some Man, Woman, or Child, either in Kent or Christendom." This sort of almanac still exists as Old Moore's Almanac, although their more mainstream modern descendants are the Your Year in the Stars supplements in the New Year edition of some newspapers and magazines.
Contemporary Almanacs
Currently published almanacs such as The New York Times Almanac have expanded their scope and contents beyond that of their historical counterparts. Today's almanacs include a comprehensive presentation of statististical and descriptive data covering the entire world. Contents also include discussions of topical developments and a summary of recent historical events.
Major topics covered by almanacs (reflected by their tables of contents) include: geography, government, demographics, agriculture, economics and business, health and medicine, religion, mass media, transportation, science and technology, sport, and awards/prizes.
Specialized almanacs also are being published, such as The Almanac of American Politics published by the National Journal.
