Burying a toad in a pot was once a sure-fire way to guarantee a happy new year and a good harvest.
Or, so the ancients thought.
Resolutions and rituals to secure a prosperous new year have a history stretching back at least 4,000 years.
But they started out very differently from modern resolutions, which most of us will set this January.
The Babylonians were the first known people to come up with good intentions for the new year.
That was when the year began in mid-March, around the time that new crops were being planted.
The practice of celebrating the start of the year in March continued with the Romans — and still to this day for some communities in the Mediterranean region.
“The Romans made what we call – or could translate as – ‘vows’ on New Year,” says Tamara Lewit, a Roman wine and oil historian at the University of Melbourne.
“But that meaning was a little bit different from what we think of as resolutions.
“At the time, the view of the future wasn’t the same kind of science-based view that we might have.
“They saw their world as determined by deities, by gods and goddesses, or spirits, or even magic spells.”
Invoking a good year
New year vows were pledges made to please the gods in return for a good year and a good harvest, Dr Lewit says.
Spells, such as “abracadabra”, were invoked to bring good health, while farmers who wanted to protect crops from diseases or bad weather would bury a toad in a pot in the field.
Husbands and wives were legally allowed to exchange gifts — the only time of year when this wasn’t forbidden — and pregnant women would literally let their hair down on visits to temples for the goddess Juno.
“But the most quirky thing which the Romans did on this festival in March was a role reversal between slaves and slave owners,” Dr Lewit says.
“Women served a meal to their household slaves, instead of the slave serving the slave owners.”
New resolutions
The first day of January would later become the beginning of the Roman year and was cemented in modern times with the Gregorian calendar of the 16th century.
Modern resolutions have been around for at least 200 years and were common enough by the 19th century to become the butt of satirical jokes.
Now, our resolutions are promises to ourselves for self-improvement, which may make them all the harder to keep.
Eating healthier, exercising more and losing weight are the top goals of most Australians, according to an annual Finder consumer survey.
About 10 per cent of all respondents said they planned to quit smoking, vaping or gambling in 2024.
And zero baby boomers vowed to quit drinking, compared to 5 per cent of gen Z respondents.
So, would the Romans have vowed to eat better or drink less alcohol in the new year?
“That’s a very modern type of resolution,” Dr Lewit says.
“Wine was absolutely essential to the diet in the ancient world … because wine was safer to drink than water.
“Wine was not only essential for drinking, but it was an absolutely fundamental religious ritual.
“The main offering that you would make to a deity in a festival, whether it was new year or any other kind of festival was … offerings to the wine god.”