Here’s one for all you word freaks (of which I norally count myself as one). I’m confused. I’ve seen two competing references to the date suffix A.D., one that says it’s “Anno Domini” (in the year of Our Lord) and one that says “Ante Diem” (before the day). Both of these are Latin. I have it on pseudo-reliable sources that B.C. is simply “Before Christ” - which is not Latin. If it were latin it would be Ante Christus (which I can see would be highly unpopular)…
So my questions are:
(1) Why is A.D. in Latin, but B.C. is not?
(2) Which A.D. is it?
(3) If it’s Ante Diem, what specific day are we talking about?