Today is not the Ides of March!! It may be the 15th, by our calendar, but please remember that the IDES ARE Roman Calendar date. The Ides needs to fall on a full moon. Ides is from the Latin Idus, which refers to the middle divider. The ides are the 15th in March, May, July and October. The other months have their ides are the 13th. But keep in mind that the calendar was set so the Ides were always on the full moon. The New moon, marked the beginning of the month. So if we were in ancient Rome today would be the first of a month. Of course, there were flaws with the Roman attempt to co-ordinate the Lunar months to the solar year. The first Roman calendars was short over 60 days that "didn't count" in the winter, making March the first "official" month of the year. Later there were 2 months added to the calendar, so the 10 extra days were "holidays" and didn't count. Then in 45 BCE, the Julian calendar added up to 365 day with the leap years every 4 years. Maybe this link will help.
geek rant over.
So do you want me to post a retraction????? Love your geekiness my friend!
ReplyDeleteThis was way Geeky LOL But excellent I must say :)
ReplyDeleteI remember this lesson from first year Latin in high school. Thanks for the refresher course.
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