ANOTHER FIRST FOR VINDOLANDA & ROMAN BRITAIN
Archaeologists excavating the massive twin fort granaries at Vindolanda have
come across part of an object never found in Britain before - a Roman
perpetual calendar. The fragment, just 8cms long and made of bronze,
features the month of September, with, below, a line of punched holes, each
representing two days. The correct days are marked for the Kalends,
(Kalendae) here abbreviated by a K, the first day of the month, followed by
N for the Nones (nonae) the 5th, and ID for the Ides (idus) the 13th, as
well as the autumn Equinox, the 23rd, here marked as AE, short for
Aequinoctium.
The complete calendar would have been a portable circular disc, around
25 centimetres in diameter, and every two days a peg would have been moved
into the next hole, so that the correct date could be read. Director of
Vindolanda Research, Robin Birley, was astonished by the find. "I had
always wondered how the soldiers could keep track of dates, without the
benefit of daily newspapers and diaries. In the larger towns and cities a
calendar would be inscribed or painted onto the side of a building, but
without some method of indicating the passing of days, it could have been
somewhat confusing. The army system of a portable calendar, like the
Vindolanda example, was brilliantly simple - as long as the clerk
responsible for moving the pegs every two days did his job properly!"
This calendar is the only example to be found in Britain so far and, as far
as is known, none have been found in other parts of the Empire. The
Vindolanda Trust's Director of Excavations, Andrew Birley, commented: "This
is an extraordinary find, and it ranks with the famous writing tablets as
one of the rarest objects ever found at Vindolanda"
The calendar will be exhibited at the Vindolanda museum this autumn when
conservation is completed in the museum laboratory.
Notes:
Even though Julius Caesar reformed the calendar in 46 BC, neither he nor
anyone else simplified their archaic system of naming the days of the month.
There were three fixed points. The Kalends were so called because on the 1st
the times of the Nones and various festivals were "called out". The Ides got
their name from being at the middle or dividing, point of the month, and the
Nones from being the ninth day before the Ides. To complicate matters
further, although the Nones were on the 5th of the month for eight months
out of twelve, they were on the 7th in March, May, July and October-because
in those months the Ides had to be on the 15th instead of the 13th. Dates
between the Kalends and Nones, Nones and Ides and Ides and the next Kalends
had to be calculated backwards. To give an example, the 4th September was
pridie Nonas Septembres [the day before the Nones], but, yet another oddity,
as the Romans counted inclusively, the 3rd September was III Non. [the third
day before the Nones], the 2nd was IV Non. Similar rules applied throughout:
the 30th September was "the day before the Kalends of October" (prid. Kal.
Oct.), the 29th was "the third day before the Kalends of October" (III Kal.
Oct.).
Roman Vindolanda: Roman Vindolanda is situated in the heart of the Hadrian's
Wall World Heritage Site, just to the north of the village of Bardon Mill,
Northumberland. Roman Vindolanda is one of the most exciting sites along
Hadrian's Wall with its wealth of archaeological remains and ongoing
excavations.
Excavations: The Vindolanda 2008 excavations, with a large contingent of
volunteers drawn from all over the world, will continue every day until mid
September (weather permitting).
Roman Vindolanda is open 7 days a week from 10am. For further information
visit www.vindolanda.com or telephone 01434 344 277.