98 BCEbetween Ephesus and Sardis, dated respectively 27 Taureon and 27
Daisios in the calendars.^53
Epigraphic evidence of calendar agreement between various cities, and
hence of calendar regularity and conformity to the moon, may reflect in this
later period the influence of the Seleucid calendar. As we shall see in Chapter 5,
in the Seleucid Empire the Macedonian calendar was assimilated to
the Babylonian calendar, which itself was regular, conforming entirely to the
new moon (see Chapter 2), and served as official calendar throughout
the Seleucid Empire. The Seleucid calendar is likely to have influenced the
calendars of neighbouring Greek cities like Miletus, Magnesia, Ephesus, and
Sardis (along the western edge of Asia Minor)—where the above-mentioned
evidence appears—even after they achieved independence from the Seleucids
during the second centuryBCE.^54 It is possible that other Greek calendars also
increased in regularity and conformity to the new moon during the Hellenistic
period because of Seleucid influence.^55
Regularity: the intercalation of monthsBecause of the discrepancy of ten or eleven days between twelve lunar months
and the solar year, a lunar calendar can only remain in stable relation to the
solar year through the intercalation, every two or three years, of a thirteenth
month. In Athens, different months of the year were intercalated throughout
Antiquity, which has been taken by some as an indication that nofixed rule of
intercalation was followed.^56 Plato (Laws6. 767C), in his description of an
ideal city, refers to the new year as beginning in the month following the
Asia Minor, would have had access to a much better view of the western horizon (where the new
moon is sighted) than land-locked Magnesia, which may explain why, in this case at least, the
Milesians declared the new month one day earlier.
(^53) Dittenberger (1903–5) ii. 11 no. 437, ll. 90–2(=Inscr. Perg.268); cited in Samuel (1972)
- 54
Note that in Sardis Macedonian month-names were retained: Samuel (1972) 132–3.
(^55) As the Athenian and other mainland Greek evidence, cited in the previous paragraph,
might perhaps suggest. I take issue with Hannah, who states, almost in reverse:‘explicit evidence
for tampering with the festival calendar in thefifth century is very limited. There is more later,
from the Hellenistic period, which is usually, but probably anachronistically, taken to represent
similar practices in earlier times’(Hannah 2005: 50).Whatever is exactly meant here by
‘tampering’, political interference with the calendar, whether or not disruptive, is clearly attested
in the 5th-c.BCE‘Firsts fruits’decree (see above, n. 22); whilst evidence of calendarirregularityin
the 5th–4th cc. (cited above) suggests political interference in this earlier period.
(^56) Follet (1976) 353–66, pointing out, however, that from the mid-2nd c.CEonwards,
Athenian intercalation may have become more regularized by becoming restricted to the
month of Poseideon (now renamed Hadrianion). She attributes this, tentatively, to an Athenian
tendency in this period towards archaism, or alternatively, to the Roman administration’s
preference for order and predictability.
38 Calendars in Antiquity