What was going on when I was born?

Archeologists working here have discovered an English-style Renaissance garden dating from 1680 with a central broad walk of sand, the earliest documented formal garden in America. Last June, in the excavation of what was assumed to be a 19th-century garden, test holes turned up a concentration of 17th-century pottery shards, wine-bottle fragments and seals. The distribution pattern of artifacts under the sand paths was uninterrupted, and the archeologists realized that the fragments could have been deposited only at the time of construction. They had found a second, older garden.

THE 29th Gold and Silver Ball was no stereotypical teen-age get-together. But the gathering of East Coast prep and public school students eager to rock into their Christmas vacations has become an annual opportunity to discover what fashions fit the mood of sophisticated youth. This year conformity was revealed as the rage, and cool was a matter of quiet sophistication. No one crashed. The only casualties in the infirmary were two broken bra straps. Though some smooched in dark corners, not a single jaded youth was seen sipping from a flask, despite the fact that only soft drinks were served. And when the rare political opinion was expressed, it was likely to reflect Reaganism. Yet for the thousand-plus 14- to 19-year-olds who attended this year's benefit for the Youth Counseling League at the Grand Hyatt Hotel Sunday night, the $125-a-ticket black-tie dance was still an occasion to let loose.

At least 53 people were reported today to have been killed when 2,000 Zulus clashed with 3,000 members of the Pondo tribe in what police officers called the worst factional fighting in years between tribes in South Africa. A police spokesman said the fighting, reportedly involving combatants armed with spears, knives and possibly firearms, erupted Tuesday night at Umbumbulu, 20 miles south of Durban on South Africa's Indian Ocean coast. The reasons for the fighting remained unclear tonight. Clashes have arisen in the past over such issues as water rights, but there was no indication tonight if that had set off the latest dispute.

Among the 150 worshipers at the 11 A.M. mass yesterday at St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church on the Upper East Side were two women who were not scriptural readers or communion servers but were nonetheless important to the church this Christmas. One was Pam Shiells, a 38-year-old bank administrator in her ninth month of pregnancy. Mrs. Shiells had not been to church regularly for five years because, she explained, ''I think I just got lazy.'' But she returned, she said, partly because Christmas was a time she wanted to ''feel close to God'' and partly because ''I want to raise my child a Catholic.'' A Lawyer The other woman was a slender, well-dressed lawyer in a fur coat accompanied by her 7-year-old daughter. The woman, who did not want to give her name, described herself as a lapsed Catholic who grew angry with the church in her college days because she found its sermons outdated.

Companies The GAF Corporation raised its all-cash tender offer for the Union Carbide Corporation to $74 a share, from $68. Analysts say the new offer is roughly equal in value to a package of cash and securities that Carbide offered for 35 percent of its shares. [Page D1.]

In a yellow clapboard house here on West Main Street, a group of veterans gathers each week to discuss the horrors of their service in Vietnam and the drugs and alcohol they have consumed in the 15 wild and angry years since they returned home. Bill snorts cocaine because ''it makes it easier to be obnoxious'' when he is overcome by rage and guilt, the residue of a steamy jungle day, he says, when he shot a pregnant woman and her daughter. Lenny regularly gets picked up for drunken driving, which is what brought him here, to the Long Island Vet Center, where he talks of using alcohol to quiet his clamorous nightmares. Jim also drinks and sometimes ''gets these rage feelings where I just go nuts,'' injuring himself or ransacking his home. Jerry used to ''do dope, acid, you name it,'' and started barroom brawls each time somebody asked, ''How did it feel to kill somebody?''

The Evening Hours column last Friday misidentified a guest at a party for the movie ''The Color Purple.'' She was Phylicia Ayers-Allen.

WHEN it comes to coping with the nearly universal need of city apartment dwellers to make the most of their space, architects who are doing their own places produce some of the most ingenious solutions. They go all out - bartering with the neighbors for a few extra square feet or using every ounce of technical skill to squeeze a bedroom or a bathroom into available space. ''I told him to make a miracle,'' said Gail Green Estreich, an interior designer, when she and her husband, David, an architect, and their 3-year-old son, Jonathan, moved into a two-bedroom apartment on the Upper East Side. ''We did start out with a pretty depressing place,'' Mr. Estreich said. ''Although it was spacious enough, it really didn't suit us at all.''

Companies eager to take advantage of rising stock prices are surging into the market with new offerings of common stock at the fastest pace since the record-breaking year of 1983. The rate of stock issues in general has nearly doubled from 43 a month in the first quarter to 80 a month during the last three months, with offerings by companies that have never sold shares to the public up even more sharply. The steep rise in stock prices since September accelerates the trend. ''Things are beginning to heat up,'' said Norman Fosback, editor of New Issues, a Florida-based publication that tracks major first-time offerings, known as initial public offerings. ''Our late November issue recorded 35 sales and 90 registrations with the Securities and Exchange Commission. That suggests a real upsurge is coming in January.''

International Tribal fighting in South Africa killed at least 53 people as about 2,000 Zulus clashed with 3,000 members of the Pondo tribe in what police called the worst factional fighting in years. Police said the fighting, involving thousands with knives, spears and possibly firearms, erupted Tuesday night at Umbumbulu, 20 miles south of Durban on South Africa's Indian Ocean coastline. [Page A1, Column 6.] Moscow may restore diplomatic ties with Israel and dramatically increase the number of Jews permitted to emigrate to Israel, according to reports of a conversation between a representative of an American Jewish group and a Soviet diplomat. The Jewish representative met a few days ago with an unidentified Soviet official who predicted the restoration of full Soviet-Israeli diplomatic relations and an increase in emigration to Israel. [A1:4-5.]

Andrew, a Los Angeles businessman in his 40's, received some bad news last week: His application for health insurance had been turned down by a major California insurance company. According to his independent insurance broker, Brent O. Nance, the company feared that Andrew might contract AIDS. Andrew, who is single, had disclosed that he had suffered earlier this year from shingles, a skin inflammation that is sometimes associated with AIDS. His case reflects the mounting efforts by life and health insurers to avoid covering anyone who might develop acquired immune deficiency syndrome. Increasingly, companies are trying to prescreen applicants for AIDS, either through blood tests to see if they have been exposed to the disease or by making judgments based on applicants' personal and medical profiles. A few months ago, no insurance company apparently conducted such blood tests. Today more than 75 companies do.

A Soviet diplomat was reported today to have told a representative here of an American Jewish organization that he believes Moscow will restore diplomatic relations with Israel in February and dramatically increase the number of Jews permitted to emigrate to Israel. The conversation, which occurred a few days ago, was disclosed in a telephone interview today by Rabbi Marvin Hier, dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles. According to Rabbi Hier, the Soviet diplomat, attached to the embassy here, initiated the luncheon and seemed eager to put across two points. These were that he ''thinks'' there will be full diplomatic relations between Israel and the Soviet Union in February, before the Communist Party congress that month, and that Moscow is going to allow many more Jews to leave than are permitted now.