out to be unnecessary; although it could be argued that without it, the army
would not have had the confidence to take the city. Earlier in the same work,
Plutarch describes how before the battle of the Granicus in 334BCE, Alexander
respected a religious objection tofighting in the month of Daisios and re-
named it instead‘second Artemisios’. It is not clear whether this was the
intercalation of an extra month (and second Artemisios was subsequently
followed by Daisios), or simply the renaming of Daisios (which, in that year,
would have been suppressed from the sequence).^140 The practice of renaming
months (as opposed to intercalation) is also attested in 302BCE, when the
Athenians renamed the month of Mounychionfirst‘Anthesterion’, and then
‘Boedromion’, so as to enable the Macedonian king Demetrius I, then visiting
Athens, to be initiated in one go through all the stages of the Eleusinian
mysteries.^141 Here, calendar tampering would have served important, if igno-
ble, diplomatic purposes.
In some cases, intercalation of days was justified for religious reasons, for
example, for the effective coordination and performance of public rituals.
Thus a law from Eretria (on the island of Euboea) from the early third century
BCEgrants authority to the officials of four Euboean cities to intercalate up to
three days in the month, so as to provide more time for the theatrical troupe to
travel across the island during the Dionysiac festivals.^142 It has been argued
that the intercalation of days at the beginning of the Athenian month Boe-
dromion, prior to the battle of Marathon in 490BCE, was to give more time to
the ephebes to bring sacred objects to the temple of Eleusis; and similarly, that
the decree to intercalate a second month Hekatombaion at Athens, some time
in the laterfifth centuryBCE, was to give longer notice of the date at which, by
this decree, thefirst fruits were to be delivered at Eleusis, probably during the
festival of Eleusinia in the month of Boedromion.^143 It has also been argued
that the intercalation in 270BCEof four days after 9 Elaphebolion (in the
Athenian calendar) was to give more time to prepare for the Dionysiac festival
on 10–14 Elaphebolion.^144
Some have plausibly argued that in certain cases, the intercalation or sup-
pression of days may have been required for purposes of calendar regulation
(^140) Plutarch,Alexander16: see Pritchett (2001) 25–6. An intercalated Artemisios is attested in
the Macedonian calendar in P.Oxy. XVII 2082 (the date of Cassander’s deathc. 297 BCE,as
recorded in chronography from the 2nd c.CE); but this does not prove (as proposed by Edgar
1931: 51) that Artemisios was the normal month to be intercalated.
(^141) Plutarch,Demetrius26; the renaming of months in this year appears to be epigraphically
confirmed (Woodhead 1989).
(^142) IGxii/9. 207, ll. 28–9: Pritchett (1947) 243 n. 39, id. and Neugebauer (1947) 20–2; and
Pritchett (2001) 26–7.
(^143490) BCE: Dunn (1998) 219. First fruits: above, n. 22.
(^144) Dinsmoor (1954) 299, 308–9, Pritchett (2001) 27 (and p. 28 with another possible example
of this kind).
Calendars of AncientGreece 65