Leap Day

[journaldan]

My apologies to the group.

 

Reading a recent posting between Martin and Primuspilas about a Roman calendar, I realized we missed a good chance to talk about the Roman Empire's influence on our calendar system and its most fascinating quirk, i.e. Leap Day. Having a son born on Leap Day, I should have been a bit more in tune.

 

So, apologies for not posting this prior to Feb. 29, 2004.

 

I am intrigued by the concept of Pope Gregory XIII's decree that the day after October 4, 1582 would be October 15, 1582. This was done to offset calendar irregularites caused by the lack of leap days up until that point. Of course, we live in wildly different times today, but could you even imagine such a change taking place now? It would be Y2K to the nth degree!

 

I am constantly amazed at the scientific and mathmatic prowess exhibited by scholars in the so-called Dark Ages period. It is amazing to me, given the realities of the time, and the lack of tools, such as calculators, and even such things as pencils with erasers and cheap paper, the discoveries that were made in those times.

 

Here's one link with the basic thumbnails on Leap Day and the changes in the calendar system:

http://scienceworld.wolfram.com/astronomy/...anCalendar.html

[Primus Pilus]

Its amazing to me, that in ancient times, the Romans were even able to recognize the failures of their own calendar. The fact that the Julian calendar was in use for 15 centuries and was only off by the same number of days is shows the scientific capability of the time.

 

Today there are still several calendars in use... The Gregorian or that of 'west, several middle-eastern versions, and even more in the far east. Yet somehow, international commerce seems unaffected. People all over the world recognized January 1, 2000 as the change in the millenium, even though they use different calendars, go figure. Of course, all that celebrating was technically done a year early, but who's counting

[Viggen]

Were Calenders on Public Places displayed, like Temples? I mean how did the average person know what day it was?

 

Where there small calenders for the home?

[Martijn]

Some interesting reading on Roman calendars:

 

http://webexhibits.org/calendars/calendar-roman.html

[journaldan]

Good question, Viggen about the availability of calendars. It seems like loans made for agricultural purposes, i.e. the purchase of seed; property rents or purchases made on time; even the collection of taxes could have been tracked without the use of a calendar. These things could have been done on lunar cycles, or in the case of agriculture, based on growing season cycles.

 

Even in the U.S., the keeping of time was not standardized until well into the Railroad era when it became necessary for the engineers/conductors to not have to change their time-pieces -- and their schedules -- every time they pulled into a new depot.

 

Again, the question then arises, how did the people of Rome in the 1500s even come to realize that their calendar was off by a dozen days or so? And really, what difference did it make to some poor schlep in a toga if today is March 12 or March 25?

[kama]

The romans realised it the same way the mayans, incas, and aztecs could predict what exact time an eclipse would happen 20,000 years into the future. All about astrology and recognizing patterns.

 

First useful, and 100% always on the right time, clock was invented to make it possible to keep track of how long and how fast ships we're going. Also lead to being able to find their direction on north and south.

 

Nobody really kept track of time except nobility. In medieval times, barely anybody knew the day of their birth except royalty and nobility. Nobody really cared what day they we're born, there was no celebration of their birth until much later.

 

Only way to keep track of time was to make an estimated guess on the suns position in the sky. Or a sun dial.

[Viggen]

I actually never heared about the romans were good in archaeology, I may be wrong though.

 

cheers

viggen

[Caine]

Julius Caesar is said to have known about the insignifant fraction of a day in each solar year, but decided not to include it because of the fact that it would no show any real change for such a long time (ie. it only ff by 11 days over 1500 years)

 

The actual Gregorian calender differs from the Julian one in the fact that ever so many years you skip a leap year to make up for that small fraction.

[Viggen]

Just a reminder that we have now our own Roman Calendar Section on Unrv.com