December (Roman month)

The Romans did not number days of a month sequentially from the first day through the last. Instead, they counted back from the three fixed points of the month: the Nones (5th or 7th), the Ides (13th or 15th), and the Kalends (1st) of the following month. The Nones of December was the 5th, and the Ides the 13th. The last day of December was the pridie Kalendas Ianuarias,The month name is construed as an adjective modifying the feminine plural Kalendae, Nonae or Idūs. "day before the Januarian Kalends". Roman counting was inclusive; December 9 was ante diem V Idūs Decembrīs, "the 5th day before the Ides of December," usually abbreviated a.d. V Id. Dec. (or with the a.d. omitted altogether); December 24 was IX Kal. Ian., "the 9th day before the Kalends of Ianuarius," on the Julian calendar (VII Kal. Ian. on the pre-Julian calendar, when December had only 29 days).

On the calendar of the Roman Republic and early Principate, each day was marked with a letter to denote its religiously lawful status. Each day was marked with a letter such as:Scullard, Festivals and Ceremonies, pp. 44–45.

• F for dies fasti, days when it was legal to initiate action in the courts of civil law.
• C, for dies comitalis, a day on which the Roman people could hold assemblies (comitia), elections, and certain kinds of judicial proceedings.
• N for dies nefasti, when these political activities and the administration of justice were prohibited.
• NP, the meaning of which remains elusive, but which marked feriae, public holidays.
• EN for endotercissus, an archaic form of intercissus, "cut in half," meaning days that were nefasti in the morning, when sacrifices were being prepared, and in the evening, while sacrifices were being offered, but were fasti in the middle of the day.Scullard, Festivals and Ceremonies, pp. 44–45.

By the late 2nd century AD, extant calendars no longer showed days marked with these letters, probably in part as a result of calendar reforms undertaken by Marcus Aurelius.Michele Renee Salzman, On Roman Time: The Codex Calendar of 354 and the Rhythms of Urban Life in Late Antiquity (University of California Press, 1990), pp. 17, 122. Days were also marked with nundinal letters in cycles of A B C D E F G H, to mark the "market week".Jörg Rüpke, The Roman Calendar from Numa to Constantine: Time, History, and the Fasti, translated by David M.B. Richardson (Blackwell, 2011, originally published 1995 in German), p. 6.

• December, for the modern calendar month.

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Category:Months of the Roman calendar

Category:Roman calendar