of the politically dominant—by diverting it, perverting it, and distorting it—
and control it by striving to possess it.^9
Specific examples of hybridity, sometimes clearly subversive, will be en-
countered case by case, but in general nearly all the lunar calendars discussed
in this chapter share, as a common feature, a tendency towards standardiza-
tion andfixation that were characteristic of the Julian calendar and most
probably influenced by it. The Gallic lunar calendar was thus reinvented as a
fixed cycle—with some elements that may have been drawn directly from the
Julian calendar—and publicly displayed in a way reminiscent of the Roman
fasti. Italian lunar dating practices developed into thefixed lunar calendars of
the Christian Easter cycles. The Jewish rabbinic calendar also underwent
fixation in this period; although this is likely to have been due to peculiar
historical factors, the broader historical context of this process—including the
possibility of direct borrowing from the politically dominant Christian Easter
cycles—cannot be ignored. Thus in a hybrid fashion, in spite of their dissi-
dence or perhaps because of it, these subcultural calendars joined in the
general, macroihistorical trend of the official calendars of the great empires
by proceeding towards increasing schematization, formalization, andfixation.
- THE GALLIC CALENDAR IN ROMAN GAUL
A calendar inscribed in Celtic language on a monumental bronze tablet, dating
from the Roman period, was discovered in the late nineteenth century in the
east of France, in the town of Coligny in thedépartementof Ain. This rare
finding revealed the existence of a Gallic lunar calendar which had been
sufficiently important to be enshrined in this impressive inscription.
The calendar’s structureThe calendar has been described in detail elsewhere, and I shall restrict myself
to its main features.^10 Although fragments amounting to only half the tablet
(^9) Fanon (1952), Bhabha (1994), Ashcroft, Griffiths, and Tiffin (2006) 137–8 and (citing
R. Young) 158–62, eid. (1998) 118–21, 139–42 (s.vv.‘hybridity’and‘mimicry’). Post-colonial
theory tends to focus on a simple, dualistic opposition between ruler and ruled,‘hegemonic’and
‘subaltern’, but the reality is usually more complex: thus the Gallo-Roman aristocracy that
produced the calendar to be discussed below was in a certain sense‘ruled’in relation to the
Roman Empire, but in another sense an inherent part of the political, economic, and even
military power structures of Roman imperial society.
(^10) The most sober study remains Duval and Pinault (1986). A more detailed (but difficult to
comprehend) analysis of the contents of the calendar is Olmsted (1992). See also Monard (1999),
Lehoux (2007) 194–8.
Dissidence and Subversion 303