CALENDAR

, or Kalendar, a distribution of time as accommodated to the uses of life; or an Almanac, or table, containing the order of days, weeks, months, feasts, &c, occurring in the course of the year: being so called from the word Calendæ, which among the Romans denoted the first days of every month, and anciently was written in large characters at the head of each month. See Almanac, Calends, Month, Time, Year, &c.

In Calendars the days were originally divided into octoades, or eights; but afterwards, in imitation of the Jews, they were divided into hebdomades, or sevens, for what we now call a week: which custom, Scaliger observes, was not in use among the Romans till after the time of Theodosius.

Divers calendars are established in different countries, according to the different forms of the year, and distributions of time: As the Persian, the Roman, the Jewish, the Julian, the Gregorian, &c, calendars.—The ancient Roman Calendar is given by Ricciolus, Struvius, Danet, and others; in which we perceive the order and number of the Roman holy-days and work-days.—The Jewish calendar was fixed by Rabbi Hillel, about the year 360; from which time the days of their year may be reduced to those of the Julian calendar.—The three Christian calendars are given by Wolfius in his Elements of Chronology; as also the Jewish and Mohamedan calendars. Other writers on the calendars are Vieta, Clavius, Scaliger, Blondel, &c.

The Roman Calendar was first formed by Romulus, who distributed time into several periods for the use of his followers and people. He divided the year into 10 months, of 304 days; beginning on the first of March, and ending with December.

Numa reformed the calendar of Romulus. He added the months of January and February, making it to commence on the first of January, and to consist of 355 days. But as this was evidently deficient of the true year, he ordered an intercalation of 45 days to be made every 4 years, in this manner, viz, Every 2 years an additional month of 22 days, between February and March; and at the end of each two years more, another month of 23 days; the month thus interposed, being called Marcedonius, or the intercalary February.

Julius Cæsar, with the aid of Sosigenes, a celebrated astronomer of those times, farther reformed the Roman calendar, from whence arose the Julian calendar, and the Julian or old style. Finding that the sun per- formed his annual course in 365 days and a quarter nearly, he divided the year into 365 days, but every 4th year 366 days, adding a day that year before the 24th of February, which being the 6th of the calends, and being thus reckoned twice, gave occasion to the name bissextile, or what we also call leap-year.

This calendar was farther reformed by order of the pope Gregory XIII, from whence arose the term Gregorian calendar and style, or what we also call the new style, which is now observed by almost all European nations. The year of Julius was too long by nearly 11 minutes, which amounts to about 3 days in 400 years; the pope therefore, by the advice of Clavius and Ciaconius, ordained that there should be omitted a day in every 3 centuries out of 4; so that every century, which would otherwise be a bissextile year, is made to be only a common year, excepting only such centuries as are exactly divisible by 4, which happens once in 4 centuries. See Bissextile. This reformation of the calendar, or the new style, as we call it, commenced in the countries under the popish influence, on the 4th of October 1582, when 10 days were omitted at once, which had been over-run since the time of the council of Nice, in the year 325, by the surplus of 11 minutes each year. But in England it only commenced in 1752, when 11 days were omitted at once, the 3d of September being accounted the 14th that year; as the surplus minutes had then amounted to 11 days.

Julian Christian Calendar, is that in which the days of the week are determined by the letters A, B, C, D, E, F, G, by means of the solar cycle; and the new and full moons, particularly the paschal full moon, with the feast of Easter, and the other moveable feasts depending upon it, by means of golden numbers, or lunar cycles, rightly disposed through the Julian year. See Cycle, and Golden Number.

In this calendar, it is supposed that the vernal equinox is sixed to the 21st day of March; and that the golden numbers, or cycles of 19 years, constantly indicate the places of the new and full moons; though both are erroneous; and from hence arose a great irregularity in the time of Easter.

Gregorian Calendar, is that which, by means of Epacts, rightly disposed through the several months, determines the new and full moons, with the time of Easter, and the moveable feasts depending upon it, in the Gregorian year. This differs therefore from the Julian calendar, both in the form of the year, and in as much as epacts are substituted instead of golden numbers. See Epact.

Though the Gregorian calendar be more accurate than the Julian, yet it is not without imperfections, as Scaliger and Calvisius have fully shewn; nor is it perhaps possible to devise any one that shall be quite perfect. Yet the Reformed Calendar, and that which is ordered to be observed in England, by act of Parliament made the 24th of George II, come very near to the point of accuracy: For, by that act it is ordered that “Easter-day, on which the rest depend, is always the first Sunday after the full moon, which happens upon, or next after the 21st day of March; and if the full-moon happens upon a Sunday, Easter-day is the Sunday after.”

Reformed, or Corrected, Calendar is that which, | rejecting all the apparatus of golden numbers, epacts, and dominical letters, determines the equinox, and the paschal full-moon, with the moveable feasts depending upon it, by computation from astronomical tables. This calendar was introduced among the protestant states of Germany in the year 1700, when 11 days were omitted in the month of February, to make the corrected style agree with the Gregorian. This alteration in the form of the year, they admitted for a time; in expectation that, the true quantity of the tropical year being at length more accurately determined by observation, the Romanists would agree with them on some more convenient intercalation.

French New Calendar, is a quite new form of calendar that commenced in France on the 22d of September 1792. At the time of printing this (viz, in July 1794), it does not certainly appear whether this new calendar will be made permanent or not; but merely as a curiosity in the science of chronology, a very brief notice of it may here be added, as follows.

The year, in this calendar, commences at midnight the beginning of that day in which falls the true autumnal equinox for the observatory of Paris. The year is divided into 12 equal months, of 30 days each; after which 5 supplementary days are added, to complete the 365 days of the ordinary year: these 5 days do not belong to any month. Each month is divided into three decades of 10 days each; distinguished by 1st, 2d, and 3d decade. All these are named according to the order of the natural numbers, viz, the 1st, 2d, 3d, &c, month, or day of the decade, or of the supplementary days. The years which receive an intercalary day, when the position of the equinox requires it, which we call embolismic or bissextile, they call olimpic; and the period of four years, ending with an olimpic year, is called an olimpiade; the intercalary day being placed after the ordinary five supplementary days, and making the last day of the olimpic year. Each day, from midnight to midnight, is divided into 10 parts, each part into 10 others, and so on to the last measurable portion of time.

In this calendar too the months and days of them have new names. The first three months of the year, of which the autumn is composed, take their etymology, the first from the vintage which takes place from September to October, and is called vendemaire; the second, brumaire, from the mists and low fogs, which shew as it were the transudation of nature from October to November: the third, frimaire, from the cold, sometimes dry and sometimes moist, which is felt from November to December. The three winter months take their etymology, the first, nivose, from the snow which whitens the earth from December to January; the second, pluviose, from the rains which usually fall in greater abundance from January to February; the third, ventose, from the wind which dries the earth from February to March. The three spring months take their etymology, the first, germinal, from the fermentation and development of the sap from March to April; the second, floreal, from the blowing of the flowers from April to May: the third, prairial, from the smiling secundity of the meadow crops from May to June. Lastly, the three summer months take their etymology, the first, messidor, from the appearance of the waving ears of corn and the golden harvests which cover the fields from June to July; the second, thermidor, from the heat, at once solar and terrestrial, which inflames the air from July to August; the third, fructidor, from the fruits gilt and ripened by the sun from August to September. Thus, the whole 12 months are,

From these denominations it follows, that by the mere pronunciation of the name of the month, every one readily perceives three things and all their relations, viz, the kind of season, the temperature, and the state of vegetation: for instance, in the word germinal, his imagination will easily conceive, by the termination of the word, that the spring commences; by the construction of the word, that the elementary agents are busied; and by the signification of the word, that the buds unfold themselves.

As to the names of the days of the week, or decade of 10 days each, which they have adopted instead of seven, as these bear the stamp of judicial astrology and heathen mythology, they are simply called from the first ten numbers; thus,

In the almanac, or annual calendar, instead of the multitude of saints, one for each day of the year, as in the popish calendars, they annex to every day the name of some animal, or utensil, or work, or fruit, or flower, or vegetable, &c, appropriate and most proper to the times.

Astronomical Calendar, an instrument engraven upon copper-plates, printed on paper, and pasted on board, with a brass slider which carries a hair, and shews by inspection, the sun's meridian, altitude, right ascension, declination, rising, setting, amplitude, &c, to a greater exactness than ean be shewn by the common globes.