User menu
Main menu

What is BC and AD?

60 second histories

This video covers:  An explanation of BC and AD as well as BCE and CE and the reasons they are used.

Free to view
When studying history you often come across a date with either BC or AD after it. These letters relate to a fixed point in history being either before or after the time of Jesus Christ. BC means before Christ, so fifty five BC means fifty five years before the year Jesus was born, which incidentally is the year the Romans invaded Great Britain. AD on the other hand means Anno Domini which is Latin for ‘in the year of our Lord’. So for example four ten AD is four hundred and ten years after the birth of Jesus and that was around the time the Romans left Britain. You might hear an alternative to BC and AD, which is “BCE meaning ‘before the current era” and CE meaning ‘current era’. This is used because many people don’t follow Christianity but the system still uses the time of Jesus as a fixed point in history it just doesn’t mention him. So the year fifty five BCE still means 55 years before the year Jesus was born.
Eras: 
General
Topics: 
Timeline
Character: 
Victorian school teacher
Key words: 
BC/AD, BC, AD, Before Christ, Anno Domini, Latin, BCE, current era, before the current era, Jesus