The Roman calendar changed its form several times in the time between the foundation of Rome and the fall of the Roman Empire.
Table of contents |
2 Days of the week 3 Years 4 References |
Months
To begin with it was a lunar calendar containing ten months, starting at the vernal equinox, traditionally invented by Romulus, the founder of Rome about 753 BC. However it seems to have been based on the Greek lunar calendar. The months at this time were
- Martius (31 days)
- Aprilis (30 days)
- Maius (31 days)
- Junius (30 days)
- Quintilis (31 days)
- Sextilis (30 days)
- September (30 days)
- October (31 days)
- November (30 days) and
- December (30 days)
The first reform of the calendar was attributed to Numa Pompilius, the second of the seven traditional Kings of Rome. He is said to have reduced the 30-day months to 29 days and to have added January (29 days) and February (28 days) to the end of the calendar around 713 BC, and thus brought the length of the calendar year up to 355 days. This still left a gap of about ten days. In order to prevent the calendar year from getting out of line with the solar year, a leap month of 27 or 28 days, Mercedinus, was supposed to be added every second year at the end of February, which was shortened to 23 days.
The Romans had special names for 3 specific days in each month. The system was originally based on phases of the Luna (moon), and these days were probably declared when the lunar conditions were right. After the reforms of Numa Pompilius, they occurred on fixed days.
- Kalends - first day of the month, from which the word "calendar" is derived
- Nones – depending on the month, could be the 5th or the 7th day; traditionally the day of the Half Moon
- Ides – depending on the month, could be the 13th and 15th day; traditionally the day of the Full Moon
- In March, July, October, May
- The IDES fall on the 15th day
- The NONES the 7th.
- The rest besides take 2 days less
- For Nones and Ides.
Before the Julian calendar, the months (March, May, July and October) that had Ides on the 15th had 31 days and the other months had 29 days, except February with 28 days. Occasionally an extra month of Mercedinus was added with 22 or 23 days. This was supposed to happen on alternate years, to keep the civil year in touch with the seasons. The adding of the additional was the responsibility of the pontifex maximus, whom not always was aware of the importance of his office, and in practice happened less often, causing the need for the Julian calendar reform instituted by Julius Caesar.
The example of September
Notice that by counting inclusively and by having a special name for the day before a named day the Roman calendar loses the possibility of saying: 2 days before a named day.An example from Shakespeare
In Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar, the dictator is warned of a plot against his life by the famous quote: Beware with the Ides of March…. History would prove the warning to be truthful because Julius Caesar was indeed killed in March 15 44 BC.Days of the week
The days of the week were dedicated to gods, the sun or the moon. They were (note the similarities of some of the days with English, French and Spanish languages):
Years
In the early days of the Roman Republic, the years were not counted. Instead they were named after the consulss who were in power at the time (see List of Republican Roman Consuls). For instance:
- 205 BC was The year of the consulship of Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus and Publius Licinius Crassus
see also: Calendar – Julian calendar – Ancient Rome