‘subversion’that will be discussed in this chapter in relation to the Roman
Empire were undoubtedly expressions of political resistance, but less explicitly
and less overtly aimed at actively resisting imperial rule. They certainly had no
connection with any of the overt rebellions against Rome: the Jewish calendar,
for example, albeit arguably dissident, was not implicated in the revolutionary
activism that led to the great Jewish revolts against Rome in 66–74, 115–17, and
132 – 5 CE—unlike other revolts in history, such as the French Revolution, in
which calendar reform became one of the revolutionary policies. In the Roman
Empire, dissidence and subversion were generally not calls for rebellion but only
a subculture that offered subtle and ongoing resistance to the dominant culture
and political structures of the Empire.^1
The calendars discussed in this chapter were dissident not only by virtue of
their unofficial status and their independence from political authorities, but
also because they differed fundamentally from the calendars of the political
rulers. In the Roman Empire, dissident calendars were lunar and resisted
adaption to thefixed, 365-day year of the Julian calendar which most other
calendars in the Roman East had opted for by the early imperial period. Some
of these lunar calendars, which will not be discussed in this chapter but which
could still be included to some extent in the category of dissident, were
reasonably well integrated into official political structures. The calendars of
Greece (or at least of Athens), which remained lunar throughout the Roman
period, were controlled as previously by city magistrates and city councils, and
thus in a certain sense belonged to the political establishment of the Roman
Empire and its provincial administration (see Chapter 1). Nevertheless, the
refusal of Greek cities to adapt to the Julian calendar can be interpreted as a
form of dissidence, or at the very least a strong expression of political
autonomy and freedom towards the Roman Empire (even if, in real terms,
this perception of autonomy and freedom was largely illusory). The same
applies, in lesser form, to those cities of the Roman East that did not adopt
the Julian calendar wholesale, but designed their own 365-day calendar
scheme (as we have seen in Chapter 5): these calendars can also be interpreted
as mildly dissident or subversive.
But dissidence was not necessarily the only reason in the Roman period
for lunar calendars to be retained. Athens, in particular, considered itself
the navel of Hellenistic civilization, and for cultural reasons alone may have
seen it as its duty to preserve the Greek tradition of lunar calendars.^2 This
cultural concern, although tinged with a strong element of local patriotism,
is likely to have been approved of by the Roman rulers who were generally
ready to acknowledge their cultural debt to the Hellenistic, and more
(^1) As noted in slightly different terms by Alcock (1997) 111,Webster (1997) 170.
(^2) See further Ch. 1 n. 136. On Hellenistic identity in the Roman East, seeWoolf (1994) and
Alcock (1997).
300 Calendars in Antiquity