Zoroastrian calendar of the Achaemenids, and to a lesser extent, the standard
Babylonian calendar of the Near Eastern empires—embodied and reflected, in
structural terms, the political simplicity of these large kingdoms and empires,
all under autocratic or monarchic rule, in the context of which thesefixed
calendars arose.
I am suggesting, in other words, that ancient calendars can be interpreted as
structural replicas or reiterations of the socio-political order in which they
were formed and in which they operated. This does not necessarily mean
that ancient calendars should be read as‘allegories’of the socio-political order
(as argued by Feeney with reference to the Julian calendar: see above, n. 172).
I am proposing a more purely structuralist interpretation, which avoids
determining the calendar as asignifierin relation to the socio-political order
and focuses more neutrally on similarity, replication, and structural consis-
tency. Calendars, indeed, do not signify more than a certain perception of the
experience of time and events, and/or an imposition of structure upon the
latter. However, the cogency and meaning of calendars as time and event
structures depends on the extent to which these structures successfully repli-
cate, reflect, or are consistent with the other structures, especially socio-
political, with which they are profoundly interdependent and interrelated in
social life. Thefixed calendar that Julius Caesar instituted was structurally
analogous to his own rising position as dictator of an empire that was rapidly
expanding and unifying territories and peoples under single, autocratic rule.
The analogy or structural consistency between thefixed calendar and the new
Roman Empire under autocratic rule explains, perhaps, why the Roman
calendar developed the way it did.
Calendars and imperial administration: towards a macro-historyIt should be clear by now that the institution of the Julian calendar was not a
historical, teleological necessity, or—as has so often been assumed—an evolu-
tionary stage in the grand history of calendars. As has been argued above, the
institution of the Julian calendar did not respond to a need of abolishing an
(apparently to us) intrinsically defective calendar, nor was it the natural
outcome of scientific progress and enlightenment. It was, above all, the result
of political processes peculiar to the late Republic. Nevertheless, the adoption
in Rome of an Egyptian calendar (or at least a close derivative of it) stands in
direct, macro-historical continuity with the similar adoption of this calendar
in the earlier empires of thefirst millenniumBCE.
In this context we should reflect further on the implications of fast-
expanding empires, not in terms of their political structures (which I have
TheRise of the Fixed Calendars 223