YEREVAN. – Armenia celebrates the Old New Year on Sunday and Armenian News-NEWS.am took an interview from an ethnologist Rafik Nahapetyan, who noted that the Old New Year is calculated on ancient Julian [on the name of Julius Cesar] calendar.

The expert said that Armenians while celebrating the New Year on ancient calendar preserved some traditions and customs. First of all, the fir tree entered into Armenian reality later, replacing an olive branch, which was taken to a church, and after the liturgy, it decorated the New Year table. Besides the olive branch, there were also flowers, fresh and dry fruits, which symbolized fullness and abundance, as well as the tarehats [bread with a “lucky” coin, and whoever finds that coin in his or her piece was allegedly lucky during the whole year] was an important attribute.

However, the expert believes that the New Year celebration currently has changed, traditions are no more preserved. At that time meat was banned on Jan. 1 to 6, while now it prevails.