806 



CALENDAR. 



February. Thus the year consisted of 12 months, and 

 350 days ; and, to make it agree with the course of 

 the sun, intercalations were made use of, after the 

 manner of the Greeks. These intercalations, how- 

 ever, were left to the discretion of the priests ; and, 

 as they made them very arbitrarily, according to the 

 exigencies of the state, or their own private views, 

 complaints and irregularities soon arose. Notwith- 

 standing this defect, the arrangement continued to 

 the end of the republican constitution. The calendar 

 of t lie Romans had a very peculiar arrangement. 

 They gave particular names to 3 days of the month. 

 The first day was called the calends. In the 4 months of 

 March, May, July and October, the 7th, in the others, 

 the 5th day, was called the nones ; and, in the 4 

 former, tin- loth, in the rest, the 13th day, was called 

 the ides. The other days they distinguished in the 

 following manner: They counted from the above 

 mentioned days backwards, observing to reckon also 

 the one from which they began. Thus the 3d of 

 March, according to the Roman reckoning, would 

 be the 5th day oefore the nonet, which, in Uiat 

 month, tall upon the 7th. The 8th of January, in 

 which month the nonet happen on the 5th, and the 

 idet on the 13th, was called the 6th before the ides 

 of January. Finally, to express any of the days after 

 the idet, they reckoned in a similar manner from the 

 calends of the following month. From the inaccu- 

 racy of the Roman method of reckoning, it appears 

 that, in Cicero's time, the calendar brought the vernal 

 equinox almost two months later than it ought to be. 

 According to the last letter of the 10th book of Cice- 

 ro's Epistles to Atticus, this equinox was not yet past, 

 although it was near the end of May, by their calen- 

 dar. To check this irregularity, Julius Caesar, on 

 being appointed dictator and pontiff (A. U. C. 707), 

 invited the Greek astronomer Sosigenes to Rome, 

 who, with the assistance of Marcus Fabius, invented 

 that mode of reckoning, which, after him who intro- 

 duced it into use, has been called the Julian calendar. 

 The chief improvement consisted in restoring the 

 equinox to its proper place in March. For this pur- 

 pose, two months were inserted between November 

 and December, so that the year 707, called, from this 

 Circumstance, the year of confusion, contained 14 

 months. In the number of days, the Greek compu- 

 tation was adopted, which made it 365. The num- 

 ber and names of the months were kept unaltered, 

 with the exception oi Quintilis, which was henceforth 

 called, in honour of the author of the improvement, 

 Juiiu-s. To dispose of the quarter of a day, it was 

 determined to intercalate a day every fourth year, 

 between the 23d and 24th of "February. This was 

 called an intercalary day, and the year in which it 

 took place was called an intercalary year, or, as we 

 term it, a leap year. 



This calendar continued in use among the Romans 

 until the fall of the empire, and throughout Christen- 

 dom till 1582. The festivals of the Christian church 

 were determined by it. With regard to Easter, how- 

 ever, it was necessary to have reference to the course 

 of the moon. The Jews celebrated Easter (i. e., the 

 Passover) on the 14th of the month Nisan (or March); 

 the Christians in the same month, but always on a 

 Sunday. Now, as the Easter of the Christians some- 

 times coincided with the Passover of the Jews, and it 

 was thought unchristian to celebrate so important a 

 festival at the same time as the Jews did, it was re- 

 solved, at the Council of Nice, 325 A.D., that, from 

 that time, Easter should be solemnized on the Sunday 

 following the first full-moon after the vernal equinox, 

 which was then supposed to take place on the 21st of 

 March. As the course of the moon was thus made 

 the foundation for determining the time of Easter, the 

 lunar cycle of Melon was taken for this purpose ; ac- 



cording to which, thb year contains 365| days, and 

 the new moons, after a period of 19 years, return on 

 the same days as before. The inaccuracy of the J u- 

 linn year, thus combined with the lunar cycle, must 

 liave soon discovered itself, on a comparison with the 

 true time of the commencement of the equinoxes, 

 since the received length of 365^ days exceeds the 

 true by about 11 minutes ; so that, for every such Ju- 

 lian year, the equinox receded 11 minutes, or a day 

 in about 130 years. In consequence of this, in the 

 16th century, the vernal equinox had changed its 

 place in the calendar from the 21st to the 10th ; i. . 

 it really took place on the 10th instead of the 21st. 

 on which it was placed in the calendar. 



Aloysius Lilius, a physician of Verona, projected a 

 plan for amending the calendar, which, after his 

 death, was presented by his brother to pope Gregory 

 XIII. To carry it into execution, the pope assem- 

 bled a number of prelates and learned men. In 1577, 

 the proposed change was adopted by all the Catholic 

 princes ; and, in 1582, Gregory issued a brief abolish- 

 ing the Julian calendar In all Catholic countries, and 

 introducing in its stead the one now in use, un- 

 der the name of the Gregorian or reformed calendar, 

 or the new style, as the other was now called the old 

 style. The amendment consisted in this, 10 days 

 were dropped after the 4th of Oct., 1582, and the 15th 

 was reckoned immediately after the 4th. Every 100th 

 year, which, by the old style, was to liave been a leap 

 year, was now to be a common year, the 4th except- 

 ed ; i. e., 1600 was to remain a leap year, but 1700, 

 1800, 1900, to be of the common length, and 2000 a 

 leap year again. In this calendar, the length of the 

 solar year was taken to be 365 days, 5 hours, 49 mi- 

 nutes and 12 seconds. Later observations of Zach, 

 Lalande, and Delambre, fix the average length of the 

 tropical year at about 27 seconds less ; but it is un- 

 necessary to direct the attention of the reader to the 

 error arising from this difference, as it will amount to 

 a day only in the space of 3000 years. Notwithstand- 

 ing the above improvement, the Protestants retained 

 the Julian calendar till 1700, when they also adopted 

 the new style, with this difference, that they assigned 

 the feast of Easter to the day of the first full moon 

 after the astronomical equinox. But this arrangement 

 produced new variations. In 1724 and 1744, the 

 Easter of the Catholics was eight days later than that 

 of the Protestants. On this account, the Gregorian 

 calendar was finally adopted, 1777, in Germany, un- 

 der the name of the general calendar of the empire, 

 or, as it is now called, the reformed calendar, in or- 

 der that the Catholics and Protestants might celebrate 

 Easter, and, consequently, all the movable feasts, at 

 the same time. Britain introduced the new style in 

 1752, and Sweden in 1753. Russia only retains the 

 old style, which now differs 12 days from the new. 



In France, during the Revolution, a new calendar 

 was introduced by a decree of the National Conven- 

 tion, Nov. 24, 1793. The time from which the new 

 reckoning was to commence was the autumnal equi- 

 nox of 1792, which fell upon the 22d of Sept., at 18 

 minutes and 30 seconds after 9 A.M., Paris time. This 

 day was selected as that on which the first decree of 

 the new republic had been promulgated. The year 

 was made to consist of 12 months of 30 days each, 

 and, to complete the full number of days, 5 jours com- 

 piementaires were added to the end of it, in common 

 years, and 6 in leap years. Each period of 4 years, 

 terminating with a leap year, was called a franciade. 

 Instead of weeks, each month was divided into three 

 parts, called decades, consisting of 10 days each ; the 

 other divisions being also accommodated to the deci- 

 mal system. The names of the months were so cho- 

 sen as to indicate, by their etymology, the time of 

 year to which they belonged. They were as follows: 



