All these years I have been harboring a mistaken impression of what A.D. meant. I always thought that one of the ways of interpreting A.D. was "after death" or after the death of Jesus. I always knew that Anno Domini (A.D) meant "in the year of our Lord" but thought it was calibrated from his death on the cross. However, instead it is calibrated from his conception in Mary's womb and so that date is as accurate as anyone was capable of guessing in the year 525 A.D. However, it could be plus or minus 5 or 10 years because in those times a lot of things weren't that accurate. The concept didn't become in wide usage until after 800 A.D.
I found this out in Wikipedia under the heading "A.D."
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