Common Era
Common Era, abbreviated as
CE, is an alternative naming of the traditional calendar era,
Anno Domini.
BCE is the abbreviation for
Before the Common/Current/Christian Era. The CE/BCE designation uses the year-numbering system introduced by the 6th-century Christian monk Dionysius Exiguus, who started the
Anno Domini designation, intending the beginning of the life of Jesus to be the reference date. Neither notation includes a year zero, and the two notations are numerically equivalent; thus "2014 CE" corresponds to "AD 2014", and "399 BCE" corresponds to "399 BC". The expression "Common Era" can be found as early as 1708 in English, and traced back to Latin usage among European Christians to 1615, as
vulgaris aerae, and to 1635 in English as
Vulgar Era. At those times, the expressions were all used interchangeably with "Christian Era", with "vulgar" meaning "ordinary, common, or not regal" rather than "crudely indecent". Use of the CE abbreviation was introduced by Jewish academics in the mid-19th century.