More recently Osborne (2008), (2009), following several earlier attempts by
himself and other scholars, has reconstructed a list of Athenian archons in the
third centuryBCEon the basis of epigraphic sources which he dates and
arranges in chronological sequence on the a prioriassumption that the
Metonic, 19-year cycle must have been followed. It therefore goes without
saying that his archon list cannot serve as proof of a Metonic cycle, as such
an argument would be completely circular. But although Osborne treats
the Metonic cycle as a given premise,^62 he also argues that‘in the periods
286 – 266 and 228–200 [recte210] where the archon list is largely secure, the
Metonic cycles are faithfully observed, leaving a heavy onus of proof on those
who would deny their continuation in the intervening period’.^63 Yet as can be
seen in Table 1.2, even in these two periods the sequence of years is incom-
plete, and cannot therefore determine with certainty that the Metonic cycle
was followed without deviations.What happened in the unattested years
within these two periods, and all the more so in intervening period (between
266 and 228), remains simply unknown.
Nevertheless, it may be noted that the periods 286–266, 228–211 (in
Osborne) and 125– 95 BCE(in Müller)—or at least the years that are attested
within these periods—replicate the same pattern of intercalation. This may be
taken as a reasonable indication of cyclicity, even ifconsistentadherence to
such a cycle is undermined by the deviation from this cycle attested in 126/5
BCE(in Müller’s table), and as argued above, nothing prevents similar devia-
tions from having occurred in other years. It may also be noted that even with
the‘deviant’intercalation of 126/5, there is no evidence in these tables of gross
irregularities such as consecutive intercalated years or excessively long runs of
ordinary years. This may justify the broad conclusion that intercalation was at
least well regulated at Athens, even if not necessarily cyclical. This possibly ties
in with my earlier suggestion that in the Hellenistic period—which the studies
of Osborne and Müller relate to—the regularity of the Athenian calendar (and
possibly also of other Greek calendars) increased.
But the most important conclusion to emerge from these tables is how little
we know about intercalation at Athens. This stands in contrast with Babylo-
nian intercalations, of which we have complete and continuous sequences, and
the dating of which is in most cases backed up by astronomical evidence (as we
shall see in Chapter 2). It is important to stress, besides, that the dating of the
Athenian epigraphic sources (and of the archons mentioned therein) adopted
by Müller and Osborne in these tables is far from straightforward, and often
dependent on debatable inferences. An unbiased assessment, on the basis of
(^62) ‘The Metonic cycle ought to provide an independent framework for the location of
archons’(i.e. on a chronological scale) (Osborne 2008: 87).
(^63) Osborne (2009) 84; the year‘ 200 ’is probably an error for‘ 210 ’, beyond which his data, in
Osborne (2008), do not extend.
42 Calendars in Antiquity