Who invented months of the year

July is the first month in the calendar that bears the name of a real person, rather than a deity. August represents another Roman ruler having been enshrined. The names for October octo , November novem , and December decem suggest that they would be the eighth, ninth, and tenth months. And they once were, when the Roman lunar calendar started the year in March at harvest time.

But all that changed in 46 B. About the author Related Posts. Richard Lederer. Test Your Phrase Knowledge! Halloween Jokes, Groans, and Puns. September 23, Famous Excuse Notes to School. Previous Post. Next Post. Recipe Rating Recipe Rating. Newest Oldest Most Voted. Inline Feedbacks. Reply to MWH. Victory Ogaga. Reply to Nita. September , October , November and December are named after Roman numbers 7, 8, 9 and 10 — they were originally the seventh, eighth, ninth and tenth months of the Roman year!

Before July and August were renamed after Roman rulers, they were called Quintilis and Sextilis, meaning fifth and sixth months. How boring! Wood engraving, c. So now you know why we call the months what we do. Map Data. Terms of Use. Report a map error.

Museum stories What's in a name? Months of the year We mark time in many different ways. One unit — the month — has been in use for thousands of years. We use their names all the time, but what do the months' names mean and where do they come from?

Take a closer look Detail from the 'Kalendar of Johannes de Gamundia'. Woodcut, — British Museum 29 December More stories. This brings us to the second myth about the Roman calendar: Augustus taking a day away from February to avoid having a shorter namesake month than Julius.

This myth has its origins in the writings of a 13 th -century Parisian scholar named Sacrobosco. To avoid having three long months in a row, the senate also switched the lengths of September and October, and of November and December. This narrative is demonstrably false, particularly because it conflicts with surviving wall paintings that show the months were already irregular before Julius reformed them. The Julian calendar persisted virtually unchanged for 1, years.

Over the centuries, the Julian system of leap days — in which every fourth year got an extra day — threw the calendar off. By the 16th century, people noticed that the first day of spring had drifted 10 days ahead of the intended 20th of March.

Basically, history had used a leap-day year 10 more times than was useful. Pope Gregory XIII had a scholar named Aloysius Liliusa devise a new system that would keep the calendar in sync with the seasons and keep Easter as close to the spring equinox as possible. In the Gregorian calendar, every fourth year was a leap year; however, century years that were divisible were exempted.

So, for example, the years and were leap years, but not , or To get the new calendar aligned with the seasons, the pope had 10 days cut from the current calendar. Thursday, Oct. The changes were controversial. At the time, the pope only had the authority to reform the calendar of Spain, Portugal, the Polish—Lithuanian Commonwealth and most of Italy.

The British Empire including the American colonies did not adopt the change until Japan adopted it in , Korea in , and China in Many Eastern European nations chose to opt out until the early 20th century. Greece, in , was the last European country to change.

Today the Gregorian calendar is accepted as an international standard, but several countries have not adopted it, including Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Iran, Nepal and Saudi Arabia. Many countries use the Gregorian calendar alongside other calendars — Israel also uses the Hebrew calendar, for example — and some use a modified Gregorian calendar.