Calendar and clock in ancient greece plan. Greek calendar: its immediate origin

It was a lunisolar calendar with primitive and irregular intercalation rules. From about 500 B.C. spread octatery (octaeteris) - 8-year cycles in which five ordinary years of 12 months were combined with three years of 13 months. Subsequently, these rules were borrowed by the Roman calendar. Octateries in Greece continued to be used even after Julius Caesar's reform.

The beginning of the year was in the middle of summer.

Athenian months:

		12. Scirophorion

chronology

In the second half of the 3rd century BC. e. the ancient Greek historian Timaeus (about 352 - 256 BC) and the mathematician Eratosthenes (about 276 - about 196 BC, Eratosthenes is considered the father of chronology, he owns the idea of ​​​​a unified reference system of years) introduced the chronology from first Olympic Games. The games were held once every four years on days close to the summer solstice. They began on the 11th and ended on the 16th day after the new moon. When counting years for the Olympiads, each year was designated by the serial number of the games and the number of the year in the four years. The first Olympic Games opened on July 1, 776 BC. according to the Julian calendar. In 394 AD Emperor Theodosius I banned the Olympic Games. The Romans called them " otium graecum” (Greek idleness). However, the chronology according to the Olympiads was preserved for some time.

Greek and Egyptian astronomy

It is necessary to note the following fact, which, of course, influenced the development of the European calendar. In the era of Alexander the Great and the Seleucids, Egypt becomes part of the Greek world. Alexandria is founded in Egypt, which becomes the greatest center of ancient science and astronomy. It was the Greek Alexandrian astronomers who developed the Julian calendar. In Alexandria, the calculations of the first Paschals of the Christian calendar were carried out, Ptolemy Claudius (2nd century AD) worked here, who wrote the Almagest, an outstanding work that influenced the formation of all modern astronomy.

Despite their knowledge of astronomy, the Greeks used their imperfect calendar for a long time, and the calendars differed in different parts of the Greek world.

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At the beginning of the 1st millennium BC. e. Greece, which consisted of separate city-states (polises), was under the cultural influence of many countries of the East. The ancient Greeks colonized neighboring islands and coasts from Asia Minor to southern Italy and even the northern shores of the Black Sea. And those of them who swam, and those who were engaged in agriculture, needed certain knowledge, they needed a calendar,

For the timely implementation of agricultural work, the ancient Greeks coordinated their lives with the change of seasons, with the visible annual movement of the Sun across the sky. That is why already in the poems of Homer (VIII century BC) it is testified that the ancient Greeks had the concept of a solar year, although ... there is no evidence that they used solar calendars at that time. It can only be argued that already somewhere in the IX century. BC e. The ancient Greeks knew how the appearance of the starry sky changes in rhythm with the change of seasons. They used this annually repeated change in the visibility of individual groups of stars and constellations in everyday life as a kind of solar calendar.

This is confirmed by the advice that the poet Hesiod (8th century BC) gave to rural workers:

“Start harvesting when the Pleiades rise, and plowing when they are about to set. When Sirius is overhead, cut trees. Arcturus appears in the evening - cut the vines. Orion and Sirius go to the middle of the sky - pick grapes. Fifty days after the solstice, goods can be transported by sea for sale ... With the setting of Orion and the Pleiades, the year is completed.

As can be seen, the beginnings of specific field work are clearly compared with the view of the starry sky. In particular, the sickle should be taken during the first morning (heliacal) rise of the Pleiades (for the time of Hesiod at the latitude of Greece, this is about May 12 according to the modern calendar), when the Pleiades set at dawn (early November), it is time to plow. Towards the end of February, when the star Arcturus rises from the sea in the evening, the vines must be pruned, etc.

Moments of the morning and evening sunrises and sunsets of several of the most remarkable stars, at the latitude of Athens in 501 BC. e. and 300 AD e. are given in table.

Table. Rise and set of "calendar" stars at the latitude of Athens according to the Gregorian calendar

	BC e. (-)	Evening	Morning	Evening	Morning
Alcyone
Betelgeuse
(α Orionis)
(α Bootes)

It is easy to see that due to the precession, the visibility conditions of specific stars and their groups are continuously changing. Therefore, in our time, the advice of Hesiod can no longer be used ...

"... In days and months - with the Moon"

As the ancient Greek scholar of the 1st c. before. n. e. Gemin in his "Elements of Astronomy", the Greeks had to make sacrifices to their gods according to the customs of their ancestors, and therefore "they must maintain agreement with the Sun in years, and with the Moon in days and months." Indeed, in their business and social life, the Greeks used lunisolar calendars. The names of the months of these calendars usually came from the names of the festivals celebrated in the corresponding month. So, the Athenians in the first month of their calendar solemnly sacrificed one hundred bulls - “hecatomb”, therefore the month was called Hecatomveon. On the first day of it, civil servants took office, on the 12th day there were holidays dedicated to the god Chronos, who personified time. On the seventh day of the third month - Voidromion - a holiday was celebrated in honor of Apollo Voidromius - "helping in the battle with a cry", and the day before the Greeks honored the dead. In the month of Pianepsion on the 7th day, the Greeks celebrated the feast of grapes, on the 10-14th - a women's holiday, on the 28th day in every fourth year there were Hephaestias accompanied by a torchlight procession - festivities in honor of Hephaestus - the god of fire and blacksmithing, the next two days and were the holidays of blacksmiths. On the eighth month - Anfestirion - there was a holiday of the beginning of the pouring of new wine (“small dionysias”), the corresponding “feast of flowers” ​​event was called Anfestiria. Marriages took place in the month of Hamilion.

The most famous were the Athenian and Macedonian lunisolar calendars. The first of them, in particular, was used by Greek astronomers, the second became widespread in the East after the conquests of Alexander the Great. Here is an approximate correspondence between the months of the Athenian (left), Macedonian and our calendars:

According to some sources, the ancient Greeks originally began their year around the winter solstice. Then its beginning was postponed to the summer solstice, since meetings usually took place at this time, at which officials were elected.

The day of the ancient Greeks began at sunset and consisted of night and the day following it. The days of the month were divided into three decades (such a division is already found in Hesiod). The first 10 days were simply counted - from the first to the tenth, the next 9 were called “first”, “second”, etc. with the addition of the words “after ten”, the remaining days were counted in reverse order: “ninth from the end of the month”, “eighth from the end of the month ”, etc. The 30th day was called“ old and new ”, and the previous 29th was“ anticipatory ”; in a month consisting of 29 days, it was excluded from the account.

The name of the 30th day has a deep meaning. For them, the Greeks, in the count of days, seemed to “break away” from observations: they considered the next day the 1st day of the new calendar month, regardless of whether the crescent of the moon is visible in the sky or not (after all, in autumn at the latitude of Athens it can be seen only on the third day after the conjunction ).

It is noteworthy that the ancient Greeks on each day of the month honored one or more gods, to whom this day was dedicated. In Athens, in particular, the first and last day of each month was dedicated to Hekate - a goddess who was first considered the patroness of human affairs, later - the goddess of ghosts, nightmares, the mistress of shadows in the underworld, sometimes she was identified with the moon goddess Selene. The 1st day of the month was also dedicated to Apollo and Hermes, the 3rd, 13th and 23rd days - to Athena. The last three days of each month were considered unlucky, they were dedicated to the dead, as well as to the underground gods.

In Gemin we also find some information about the structure of the ancient Greek lunisolar calendars: "For business and social life, the duration of the monthly period was rounded up to 291/2 days, so that two months were 59 days." The calendar year consisted of 12 months. In order to harmonize the duration of the civil year with the solar one, according to Geminus, "the ancients inserted an additional month (in Athens it was usually the winter Posideon) every year." This means that the Greeks at that time used the trieteris, the most primitive two-year lunar cycle. How long this lasted, how the Greeks brought their lunar calendar into harmony with the solar one, is unknown.

Another piece of evidence about ancient Greek calendars comes from Herodotus (484-425 B.C.): "The Greeks inserted a month in every second or third year for the (correspondence) of the seasons." Apparently, it is already talking about the use by the Greeks of an 8-year cycle - octaetherides, which was supposedly introduced in Greece by the poet and politician Solon (640-560 BC) in 593 BC. e.

In fact, information about the reform carried out at that time is very contradictory. Plutarch (46-126) about Solon says this: “Noticing the inequality of the month and the fact that the movement of the Moon is not consistent with either the sunset or the sunrise, but often on the same day the Moon catches up with the Sun and moves away from it, he decided call this day "old and new", believing that part of this day before the conjunction (of the Moon with the Sun) belongs to the expiring month, the rest of the beginning.

The writer Diogenes Laertius (1st half of the 3rd century BC) limited himself to the statement that Solon ordered the Athenians to count the days according to the moon. According to the philosopher Proclus (410-485), before Solon, the Greeks did not seem to know at all that lunar months do not always have 30 days.

Apparently, Solon coordinated the calendar with the Moon by inserting additional days, and possibly not by the Sun, throwing out the intercalated month to bring the beginning of the lunar year to the summer solstice. It is possible, of course, that he actually introduced octaetheride. The embolismic years were the 1st and 3rd years of the odd Olympiad and the 2nd year of the even Olympiad.

It would seem that, observing the phases of the same Moon, the same neomeni, the citizens of different policies would have to start counting the day in months from the same days (another thing is that the months themselves could be called differently). But this was just not the case. Partly, apparently, because the system of octaetherides was not accepted then everywhere, and it “worked” still poorly. As a result, as Plutarch noted, there was no agreement between the individual calendars in counting days in months. We confine ourselves to just one example. Describing one of the events of the war of 431-421. BC e., Aristotle's student Aristoxenus (however, more than a hundred years later) wrote that at that time "the tenth day of the month among the Corinthians corresponded to the fifth day among the Athenians and the eighth according to some other calendar." Apparently, this particular day corresponded to the 7th or 8th day of the moon, but in Athens the calendar was two or three days behind the change of the phases of the moon, while in Corinth it was ahead of it ...

One can therefore understand the great enthusiasm with which in 432 BC. e. during the Olympic Games, the discovery of the astronomer Meton was met. Meton derived a relationship connecting the tropical year with the synodic month, and also calculated and compared on special tables the change of annual risings and sets of stars with the change in the phases of the moon in a 19-year cycle. These tables were carved on stone slabs and installed in city squares for all to see. Such a stone calendar is called a parapegma.

Praise of the parapegma

The very word "parapegma" means "to attach", "to stick". But what relation it has to calendars was established only in 1902, when fragments of such a parapegma were found during excavations of a theater in the city of Miletus (a former Greek colony on the southwestern coast of Asia Minor). One of its fragments is shown in Fig.

Rice. Fragment of the ancient Greek calendar-parapegma

Here you can see the inscriptions arranged in rows, to the left of which, as well as between them, there are a number of holes, there are 30 of them on the right column. To better understand the principle of this calendar, let's number all the holes, putting numbers in front of the lines (they are not on the monument). The inscriptions say the following:

1 O Sun in Aquarius 2 O Leo begins to set at dawn and Lyra sets O O 5 O Swan sets at evening dawn OOOOOOOOOO 15 O Andromeda begins to rise at dawn in the morning O O 18 O Aquarius begins to rise in the middle 19 O Pegasus begins to rise at dawn in the morning O 21 O Centaur sets entirely in the morning 22 O Hydra sets entirely in the morning 23 O Whale sets at evening dawn 24 O Arrow sets, bringing Zephyr (spring) season O O O O 29 O Full Cygnus sets at evening dawn 30 O Arcturus rises at evening dawn

An analysis of these inscriptions shows that we are talking about a change in the conditions for the visibility of the rising and setting of stars in Greece during the passage of the Sun through the constellation Aquarius. The left side of the table obviously spoke of similar phenomena occurring thirty days earlier. It can be assumed that there were six such tables in total, and each was “painted” for 61 days. The duration of one year in the metonic cycle is on average 6940:19 = 365.26 days. During this time, Meton believed, the Sun passes through 12 zodiac constellations, lingering in each of them for 365.26:12 = 30.4 days.

So, on the parapegma, the civil lunisolar calendar was compared with changes in the appearance of the starry sky during the solar year and with the corresponding change in the seasons. Let us try, following Meton, to "set into motion" the fragment of the parapegma at our disposal. Suppose that in the year that we take as the initial one (we will call it conditionally the first year of the cycle), the new moon (or neomenia) took place at the moment when “The entire Swan sets at evening dawn”, corresponding to hole 29. Insert a pin into this hole with number 1, into the next hole (30) - with the number 2, etc. These will be the calendar numbers of the lunar month of this year. Similarly, after 29 and 30 days, the same pins will be installed on other tables (including the left side of the parapegma and the upper part of the right side). Thus, the change in the appearance of the starry sky (not so clearly striking!) Will be compared with a well-observed phenomenon - the change in the phases of the moon. Somewhere on one of the tables it will be recorded on what date and which lunar month “In the morning the Pleiades rise”, announcing the harvest time ...

After 12 lunar months, the same new moon will come 11 days earlier. Therefore, in the next, second year of the 19-year cycle, the same month will begin when the “Aquarian middle rises” - hole 18 (=29-11). Consequently, all the pins with the numbers of days must be moved 11 positions back in the holes. On the third year of the cycle, the beginning of the month moves back another 11 days (on this fragment of the parapegma, it will fall on the hole 18-11 = 7). Accordingly, we rearrange all the pins with the numbers of days. During these two years, the beginning of the month has moved back by 11 11 = 22 days. Therefore, in the third year, the insertion of the 13th month will be made. As a result, with the beginning of the month in the fourth year, the pin will move 30-11 = 19 days ahead - into the hole 7 + 19 = 26. In general, the numbers of the holes of this parapegma fragment, corresponding to the beginning of the lunar month in subsequent years of the 19-year lunar cycle, can be written in tabular form:

After 19 years, the cycle is completely repeated. What is interesting here is the following. There are holes on the parapegma fragment corresponding to 30 days. Meanwhile, as can be seen from the tablet, if the Metonic cycle were perfectly accurate, the new moon could occur only in 19 of them. These days can be somehow distinguished, for example, by gilding the corresponding holes and writing in gold numbers next to each of them the number of the year in the 19-year cycle, in which the lunar month is counted from this hole (corresponding to a certain position of the stars in the sky!) If this is done, then it's okay that the pins fell out of the hole during the transportation of the parapegma, or the inquisitive boys rearranged them for fun at night. Remembering the number of the year in the 19-year cycle, we will immediately find places (holes) for the first days of the months, after which it is not difficult to establish all the others.

A perennial herbaceous plant that blooms in early spring, before the leaves appear. The flowers are large, broadly bell-shaped, light purple, at the beginning

11.01.2016

The ancient Greek calendar is a calculus system used in ancient Greece and neighboring states in the first millennium BC. This calendar is currently not in use. Any wall calendars familiar to us, desktop, flip and pocket calendars represent the Gregorian calculus, adopted several centuries later than the Hellenic.

What is the ancient Greek calendar

The solar-lunar calendar used by the ancient Greeks was created taking into account astronomical cycles. The year consisted of 12 months, oriented to the lunar cycle. Each month contained 29 or 30 days, the year was equal to 354 days. Approximately once every three years, another month was added.

The calendar of the ancient Greeks was corrected several times. A cycle of 8 years was introduced, in which an extra month was inserted at 3, 5 and 8 years. The 8-year cycle was first introduced in Athens in 594 BC, the idea belonged to the politician and poet Solon. Approximately 50 years later, the astronomer Meton suggested using a more accurate 19-year cycle, which had 7 intercalated months. The new style was put into use for quite some time; later decided to abandon its use.

Features of use

The inconvenience of the ancient Greek system was that in each city the inhabitants used their own calendar and their own names of the months. Usually they coincided with the names of the holidays that were celebrated in this month.

In theory, each new moon was supposed to give rise to a new month, but in practice this did not happen every time, which introduced confusion and forced the use of such terms as “lunar new moon” and “civil”. Thus, the astronomical calendar diverged from the public one.

Confusion arose with the beginning of the year. According to the calendar of Athens, the first new moon after the summer solstice was considered the beginning of the year, according to the calendar of the city of Thebes (the Boeotian calendar), the year began after the winter solstice. The Boeotian calendar was closest to the modern Gregorian system.

The Hellenic chronology was based on traditional Greek sports competitions - the Olympic Games. Competitions were held every 4 years in the city of Olympia and took on the character of folk celebrations. The opening of the games was timed to the beginning of the year. The beginning of the ancient Greek chronology refers exactly to the year of the first Olympic Games.

The harmonious names of the Hellenic months - Poseidon, Hecatombeon, Elaphebolion, etc. - are now almost forgotten. People use the Gregorian calendar, which is more accurate in terms of astronomy and easier to use. This system of calculating time is firmly established in the public mind. Each of us uses calendars - this is an affordable and useful device.

The printing industry has reached an unprecedented development in recent decades. Today printing of calendars has become a quick and relatively inexpensive event.

Nilsson, whose Primitive Time-Reckoning is the most authoritative of the ancient history of the calendar, claims that the Greek calendar was not Greek in origin and that it was introduced no earlier than the 7th century, or at most the 8th. century BC. e. under the supervision of the Delphic priesthood.
The first part of this conclusion is undoubtedly correct in the sense that the Greek calendar did not belong to the local tradition of Greek-speaking immigrants in the Aegean region. They adopted it from those cultures with which they had previously come into contact. But when? If it was a product of religious belief, as Nilsson suggests, then it is highly likely that, like much else in Greek religion, it was inherited from the Minoan era. There are positive reasons for considering it more ancient and less dependent on Delphi than Nilsson admits.
If this calendar was compiled at Delphi relatively recently, we would expect to find some uniformity in the beginning of the calendar year and in the names of the months. But it's not. Only in Athens and Samos the year begins, as in Delphi, with the summer solstice. The Delphic names for the five months occur sporadically elsewhere, but the rest of the names are unique. Moreover, the comparison of the Attic-Ionian and Doric names suggests that their history followed the history of the dialects themselves.
The Attic names agree closely with the Delian ones, indicating an Attic-Ionic prototype older than the Ionian migration. We naturally turn to Boeotia. There we find the month of laziness, mentioned by Hesiod; it is found both in Delos and throughout Ionia. In Athens, the festival of Lenaeus was held in the same month, and no doubt, like other cults of Dionysus, this cult came to Athens from Boeotia. Likewise, the month of Poseidon, which is found only in the Ionian calendars, resembles the panionic cult of Poseidon Heliconios, who, as the name indicates, originated in Boeotia.

Athens Hecatombius* Metageitnius Boedromius Pianopsius Maimacterius Posideon Hamelius Anthesterius Elaphebolius Munichius Targelius Skyrophorius
Business with
Hecatombium
Metagateny
Bufonius
Apaturius
Aresius
poseideon
Leney*
Hieros
Galaxia
Artemisius
Targely
Panemos
Rhodes. Panamos Karney Daly
Thesmophorium*
Sminthia
Diostius
Theudeius
Pedagogical
Badromy
Artamity
Agrianius
Hyakinthius
Delphi Apellei* Bukatiy i
Boatoy; - Gerey
Daidophorium
Poitropius
Amaliy
Bisiy
Theoxenium
Endispoytropium
Heracles
Iley

* First month of the calendar year.
The Doric names are different, but within themselves they are surprisingly uniform. Carney and hyacinthia, related to the ancient Doric festivals, are almost everywhere. The same is true of Pedageitnia, Badromia, and Theudeisia. The first two, although they are placed in different places, are the same names as the Attic-Ionian metageitnia and boedromium, and badromium or boedromium correspond in their meaning to the Delphic boatoi. But, since they occupy different places in the calendar, it is difficult to assume that they were borrowed at Delphi so late - in the 8th or 7th century. And, finally, Doric agrianium, which is found in Aegina, Sparta, Rhodes, Kos, Kalymnos and Byzantium, is not found anywhere else, except for Thebes and three other cities of Boeotia (Cheronea, Libadeia, Oropos). Likewise, the feast of Agriania is known only in Boeotia and Argos (see Vol. I, pp. 192-193) and it is clear that it came to Argos from Boeotia. In Argos he contacted the Proitis, who repeated the Miniades from Orchomenus, and Melampus, who was descended from Minius (see Vol. I, p. 222). Where and when did this name of the month appear in the Doric calendar? Not in Argos, because that would not explain its widespread use in other Dorian communities. Most likely, the Dorians borrowed it from Boeotia before they entered the Peloponnese.
If the Attic-Ionian and Doric calendars go back to a common source in Boeotia, their origin should be attributed to the Minoan period. This brings us to the next question. What is the relationship between the Boeotian and Delphic calendars? We do not know what to answer to this, because the materials on Boeotia have been preserved only in fragments. If the calendars go back to the Minoan age, then there is no reason to give Delphi precedence over Thebes and Orchomenus. All we can say with certainty is that both the Attic-Ionian and Doric calendars derive from a prehistoric original located in central Greece.
If we accept this hypothesis, it will immediately provide us with the connection with the East that we were looking for. Cadmus, the founder of Thebes, was a Phoenician connected through Europe with Minos of Knossos. It should be remembered that Europa was abducted from Phoenicia by Zeus in the form of a bull and that one of the religious texts from Ugarit reports how the bull-god El was united with the mother goddess Asherat (see vol. I, pp. 376-377).
If the Greek calendar was of Minoan origin, how, one might ask, is it that only one name of the month is mentioned in Hesiod's Works and Days, a poem dedicated to the annual cycle of agricultural work, and none of the months is mentioned at all by Homer? As regards Hesiod, the answer is "this: because of the Greek system of intercalation, which will be discussed in the next paragraph, the calendar names of the months were useless for his purpose, which was to prescribe the exact time of the year when the husbandman should start various works. This could only be done by referring to the solar year, as it is revealed in the annual movement of the stars. As for Homer, it would be a mistake to assume, as Nilsson did, that the Greeks of Homeric times did not have names of months because these names are not mentioned in the Homeric poems.Because the goal of the epic poets was to present an idealized picture of the heroic past, they avoided any mention of those institutions that had only a local or short-term significance, and on this basis references to the calendar were excluded, since the names of the months were different in different cities. *
In Works and Days we find some confirmation of the hypothesis that the Greek calendars, as we know them, come from prehistoric Boeotia; but before proceeding to this subject, we must disassemble the Greek system of insertion into the calendar.