Why was the medieval calendar so awful?

[PolishMagnet]

Recently I've been on a medieval streak, and it got me thinking, once again, about the absurdity of the Roman calendar. It was carried over into medieval europe and remained the standard for quite some time.

Each month has touchstone days: calends (first of the month), nones (4 or 6 days after calends), and ides (8 days after nones). May, October, July and March have nones 6 days after (ie the 7th of the month), while other months have it 4 days after (ie the 5th).

On a day that is not calends, nones, or ides, you would could down to that day. That is to say 14th of February would be

Calends 1 + nones 4 + ides 8 = 13, so we need to use the calends of the next month. If we say February has 28 days (not sure about medieval calendars), then 14 February would be 14 days to the calends of March.

This form of calendar seems incredibly impractical and difficult to use on the fly. Why would people not just use a sequential number up to the end of the month? Were there other proposals for calendars?

 

[Alex Zetsu]

Well because it's hard to break tradition from the Romans

 

[Evil Crusader]

Because ancient calendars were lunisolar, providing info about seasons and lunar cycles that were far more practical to use for agrarian people who had comparatively little need to keep track of distant dates; most activities were instead tied to clearly recognizable moments such as the harvest instead, regardless of the actual date.
A more workable calendar only gets useful as people start keeping track of more and more dates, like it happened in the Late Middle Ages OTL.

 

[Basils]

I always found it weird, the engineers they the Romans were and their calendar was a joke. It’s a weird thing that’s kinda funny when you think about itb

 

[Falecius]

Because calendars were lunisolar, providing info about seasons and lunar cycles that were far more practical to use for agrarian people who had comparatively little need to keep track of distant dates; most activities were instead tied to clearly recognizable moments such as the harvest instead, regardless of the actual date.
A more workable calendar only gets useful as people start keeping track of more and more dates, like it happened in the Late Middle Ages OTL.

Uh? There was nothing lunisolar about the Roman Julian calendar, their year was fully solar and their month lengths totally detached from moon phases.

 

[PolishMagnet]

Well because it's hard to break tradition from the Romans

Yeah this is kinda what I figured. Especially once feast/religious days are fixed, it's kind of set in stone and becomes a "well that's just how we do it"

 

[Legofan4]

How much does the actual date matter throughout most of history? I would assume that most people's lives are dominated by the agricultural harvest and planting. The opposite of today where the actual day and date dominate how we operate.

 

[Analytical Engine]

How much does the actual date matter throughout most of history? I would assume that most people's lives are dominated by the agricultural harvest and planting. The opposite of today where the actual day and date dominate how we operate.

The calendar kept getting really out of sync, though.

Also, there are festivals held on specific dates.

 

[PolishMagnet]

How much does the actual date matter throughout most of history? I would assume that most people's lives are dominated by the agricultural harvest and planting. The opposite of today where the actual day and date dominate how we operate.

Banks? Loans? These are things which existed in the 12the century.

 

[JanWellem]

In the middle ages a far more ubiquitus calender was the calendar of saints. Every day of the year was dedicated to one or in some cases several saints. Tithes e.g. usually had to be paid on St. Martin's Day. Several important events in history are to this day named in accordance with the calendar of saints, be it the St. Brice's or St. Bartholomew's Day massacres or the first and second St. Marcellus floods,

 

[Diego]

In the middle ages a far more ubiquitus calender was the calendar of saints. Every day of the year was dedicated to one or in some cases several saints. Tithes e.g. usually had to be paid on St. Martin's Day. Several important events in history are to this day named in accordance with the calendar of saints, be it the St. Brice's or St. Bartholomew's Day massacres or the first and second St. Marcellus floods,

Or the famed speech of St. Crispin's Day wrote by Shakespeare.

 

[Fabius Maximus]

I was under the impression that the Calends/Nones/Ides system had dropped out of use by the medieval period. Admittedly I haven't been able to find a source for when exactly this happened, but I don't recall them being commonly used in medieval texts, and I was under the impression that by the late Roman Empire it was more common just to say "the Nth day of such-and-such a month", as we do today.

This form of calendar seems incredibly impractical and difficult to use on the fly. Why would people not just use a sequential number up to the end of the month? Were there other proposals for calendars?

According to Wiki, it's a survival of an old (and, by the time we have records, largely defunct) lunar calendar, with the Calends representing the new moon, the Nones the quarter moon, and the Ides the full moon.

The calendar kept getting really out of sync, though.

It wasn't too bad after the Julian reform.

In the middle ages a far more ubiquitus calender was the calendar of saints. Every day of the year was dedicated to one or in some cases several saints. Tithes e.g. usually had to be paid on St. Martin's Day. Several important events in history are to this day named in accordance with the calendar of saints, be it the St. Brice's or St. Bartholomew's Day massacres or the first and second St. Marcellus floods,

I was watching a TV show set in (I think) Spain a couple of weeks ago, and a character said "Everyone has their St. Martin's Day" to mean something like "You can't wriggle out of the consequences for your actions forever." It's interesting to see where such phrases come from.

 

[Alex Zetsu]

I was under the impression that the Calends/Nones/Ides system had dropped out of use by the medieval period. Admittedly I haven't been able to find a source for when exactly this happened, but I don't recall them being commonly used in medieval texts, and I was under the impression that by the late Roman Empire it was more common just to say "the Nth day of such-and-such a month", as we do today.

I saw both being used around the 800s, but the "Nth day of such and such month" seems to be more common with 10 writers of that time using it but only 3 using the old system. And I saw a late Roman Author used the more modern system. So I just kind of assumed the older system was only used rarely but the literate class understood both.

 

[Legofan4]

The calendar kept getting really out of sync, though.

Also, there are festivals held on specific dates.

It was close enough for most people after the Julian reforms. By the time of the Gregorian reform the Julian calendar was only out of sync with the seasons by 10 days. Which isn't that bad for running for over 1500 years.

Banks? Loans? These are things which existed in the 12the century.

Which only really mattered to maybe the upper nobles and urban dwellers which are paid in times other than when the harvest comes in. Most farmers if they took out a loan would repay it if possible at the next harvest. They have no real other way of gaining money to pay off a loan which brings us right back to the agricultural harvest.

 

[Evil Crusader]

Uh? There was nothing lunisolar about the Roman Julian calendar, their year was fully solar and their month lengths totally detached from moon phases.

OP was talking about the original Roman calendar, whose components (calends, nones, ides), were lunar like so many other ones in the whole Mediterranean area.
The Julian calendar was, indeed, solar only because it had to be working on autopilot as opposed to needing an intercalar month to catch up to the solar year.

 

[Falecius]

OP was talking about the original Roman calendar, whose components (calends, nones, ides), were lunar like so many other ones in the whole Mediterranean area.
The Julian calendar was, indeed, solar only because it had to be working on autopilot as opposed to needing an intercalar month to catch up to the solar year.

Ok, now I get your point. The Early Roman calendar looks like quite the mess to us actually.