The Moon Turned a Crimson Red

   Welcome to the Wannaskan Almanac for Friday.

    It's the Ides of March today. Even people with no knowledge of the assassination of Julius Caesar, let alone the Roman calendar, will say, "It's the Ides of March," when they hear it's March 15th.

   When I was studying Latin in high school, we spent considerable time trying to make sense of the Roman calendar. It's a mess! The calendar goes back to Rome's early days in the eight century BC. For the first few decades it only had ten months. Winter was kind of ignored as that rainy time when the grapes didn't grow. The calendar was based on the moon, which will always get out of sync with earth's circuit of the sun.

   March was the first month. It began when the new moon was sighted. The Ides came on the 15th at the full moon. Religious ceremonies were held on the Ides and it was a deadline for repaying debts. The date was figured in relation to the new, the half and the full moon.
   As I say, after a few years, the months would get out of whack with the seasons. Whoever was high priest had the power to adjust things to keep Spring in March. But he tended to lengthen the year when his friends were in power and shorten it when his enemies held office. Talk about gaming the system!

   When Caesar became Counsel, or chief of state, one of his yearly terms lasted 446 days. That's not what he was assassinated for though. He was assassinated for getting himself appointed dictator. He planned to share Rome's great wealth with the common people. This threatened the wealthy, so he had to go.
   Several Senators conspired to kill Caesar on his way to speak in the Senate. A soothsayer had warned Caesar to "Beware the Ides." Soothsayers foretold  future events by examining the entrails of sacrificial animals. The soothsayer had told Caesar he should definitely stay home that day. Caesar passed the soothsayer on his way to the Senate and joked that the Ides had come. "Aye," responded the soothsayer, "but they have not gone."
   Caesar was set upon by several men on the Senate steps. He was stabbed 23 times. The conspirators marched through the streets calling out, "People of Rome, we are once again free." But the people had locked themselves inside their homes. Caesar's body lay where it fell for three hours. After it was removed, a mob gathered and, as a mobs always do, started a fire.
   Caesar's death marked the end of the Roman Republic, After several years of civil war, Caesar's adopted heir, Augustus, emerged as the first Roman emperor. On the fourth anniversary of Caesar's death, Augustus slaughtered anyone remotely connected with the assassination. Of course it was on another Ides of March.
   Augustus solidified reforms Caesar had begun, including what came to be known as the Julian calendar which remained in use until Pope Gregory XIII replaced it with a calendar named after himself. Great Britain and its American Colonies did not switch to the Gregorian calendar until 1752. This required a leap ahead of 11 days. I don't want to hear any griping about having to leap ahead one hour for daylight savings time.
 

Beware the red letter day (image Mike Anderson).