medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture

>> just to take 1147 (since that seems to be the year of interest), a French
>>charter dated March 5 of that year (n.s.) would also carry the year 1146,
>>because the year began on Easter --i.e., April 20, 1147.

>>so, for France at least, the annual dates for Ash Wednesday are "new
style"
>>--are they not?

Cheney (editor of HANDBOOK OF DATES, FOR STUDENTS OF ENGLISH HISTORY) says
(p. 83):

"CALENDARS FOR ALL POSSIBLE DATES OF EASTER

"The following thirty-six tables are based on those of Grotefend and Fry and
introduce certain new features. The 'Old Style years' at the head of the
left-hand pages include all years of the Julian calendar from A.D. 500 to
1752, when England celebrated Easter according to the Old Style reckoning
for the last time. The 'New Style years' on the opposite pages give all
years of the Gregorian calendar since its first introduction in Catholic
countries abroad in 1582. The example of Fry has been followed in the
provision of a special calendar for England in 1752 (table 36). It has not
seemed necessary to include in the calendars all the fixed feasts, somewhat
capriciously chosen, which Grotefend or Fry included; we have retained only
a few of which are of special importance in the dating of events (e.g. the
quarter days); on the other hand, the Ember days have been added to the
series of movable feasts.

"The calendars are followed by a chronological table of Easter Days. To find
the complete calendar for any year of grace from 500 to 2000, the student
has simply to look up the year in the chronological table and then turn to
the calendar for the appropriate date of Easter. He must be careful to
observe the difference between the dates of Easter as celebrated in Old
Style and New Style between 1583 and 1752, and consult the table at p. 162
for New Style calendars in this period.

"When the student uses these calendars to check a date, he must first
satisfy himself that the year-date is that of the 'historical' year, that
is, begins on 1 Janurary; if it is not, he must corrct it to the historical
year before turning to the table. Thus, an English record dated Wednesday,
29 February 1351 belongs to the historical year A.D. 1352 (a leap year), and
table 18 shows that 29 February fell, in that year, on a Wednesday."

So, it seems to me that we need to understand how the "historical year"
would be figured.

On page 1, after explaining how the Christian "new" era which spread to
every country of Western Europe except Spain of reckoning from A.D. I;
began, Cheney says, "In England this method was used for the dating of
official documents long before it was adopted by continental chanceries. The
year ab incarnatione is found in Anglo-Saxon diplomas very soon after the
death of Bede to replace or supplement dating by indiction, and was commonly
used for such royal documents as bore dates (even when they also used the
regnal year) until late in the twelfth century."

On pages 2 and 3 Cheney discusses the use of the indiction-year which is a
dating formula indictio prima, which shows the place which the year occupies
in an unspecified cycle of fifteen years. To calculate: "subtract 312 from
the number of the year of grace and divide by fifteen: the remainder will
correspond with the number of the year in the indiction and the quotient
will be one less that the number of the indiction. Since the beginning of
the year of grace does not, in most systems of reckoning, coincide with the
beginning of the indiction, the equation must take account of the day of the
year. As an example, take a document dated 1 November 1094: 1094-312=782;
782/15=52 with a remainder of 2. Therefore, the number of the indiction for
the greater part of 1094 is 2. But the date in question (1 November) falls
in the lesser part of the year according to the Greek and Bedan indictions:
it is therefore indictio tertia by these reckonings, indictio secunda by the
Roman reckoning."

Under "III. THE BEGINNING OF THE YEAR OF GRACE

"Historians' errors in translating dates are most often due to carelessness
about the various starting-points of the year of grace. Half a dozen
different reckonings have been used at one time or another, and it is not
uncommon to find two reckonings simultaneously used in adjacent countries or
even in one country in different types of record. This has long been a
matter of remark among historians. Gervase, the twelfth-centuy monk of
Canterbury, bewailed the confusion arising from various computations: he
himself had wavered between the systems of Christmas thd the Annunciation
before finally adopting the former for his chronicle and even then he made a
concession to the more poular system of one famous event, the death of
Thomas Becket on 29 December 1170. R. L. Poole furnishes an excellent
illustration of the varieties in use in the middle Ages: 'If we suppose (he
says) a traveller to set out from Venice on March 1, 1245 when he entered
Provence, and on arriving in France before Easter (April 16) he would once
more in 1244.' To take a case from the simpler conditions of the eighteeenth
century, a traveller who left England in January 1720 would arrive in France
to discover that the French had begun the year 1721. The student must
therefore do his best to discover what reckonings his authorities employ
before he accepts their chronology as it stands."

HTH clear some things up ... :-)

If you want to contact me off list, I will scan appropriate pages and share
if that would help.

For now, off to the grocery store! 

Best,
Ginny

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