calendar for the fourth centuryBCEand later. In the period of the twelve
prytanies (during the third and second centuriesBCE), they argue that the
prytanic terms would have been proportionally shorter. Furthermore, to
accommodate for variations in the length of the lunar year, they assume that
in any of these periods, one day could be either added to or suppressed from
the last prytany. Finally, they assume that in an intercalated (13-month) year,
the prytanic terms would have been adjusted proportionally, i.e. 39 and 38
days (in the period when there were ten prytanies).
This reconstruction of the prytanic calendar in the fourth centuryBCEand
later, somewhat hypothetical, unwittingly implies that the decision whether or
not to intercalate the year could never have been made later than thefirst
prytany, otherwise it would not have been known whether thisfirst prytanic
term should be of 36 or 39 days, and the whole system would have been
disrupted.^78 Whether intercalations were set so well in advance—five months
before Poseideon, the month that was normally intercalary—remains to be
confirmed.^79 It is also debatable whether Aristotle’s brief (and incomplete)
description of the prytanic calendar should be taken as reliable and accurate,
and as reality rather than mere theory.
In thefifth centuryBCE, epigraphic evidence suggests that the structure of
the prytanic calendar was different. Pritchett and Neugebauer (1947) put
forward the theory, again hypothetical, that in this earlier period the prytanic
calendar was completely independent of the lunar, festival calendar, and
consisted of a schematic, 366-day year divided into ten terms of 37 and 36
days (variants of this theory have a 365-day year).^80 This theory assumes that
similarly to Aristotle’s model, the prytanic calendar in this earlier period was
regular, schematic, andfixed. It also implies the introduction and use of a solar
calendar infifth-century Athens (since 366 or 365 days are very close to a solar
year),^81 which would have been unique and quite unusual in the context of
ancient Greece. This theory remains, however, largely conjectural.
Meritt (1961) and his followers, in opposition to Pritchett and Neugebauer,
reject Aristotle’s model as a schematic simplification of a calendar that was, in
practice, considerably morefluid. They interpret the epigraphic evidence,
more particularly double-dated inscriptions where the dates appear not to
match, on the contrary assumption that the festival calendar was regular
(Meritt’s view of the festival calendar has been discussed above), whereas the
(^78) This point appears not to have been noted by Pritchett, but it is by Hannah (2005) 45.
(^79) Evidence that the decision to intercalate was taken already in the previous year is in the
5th-c.‘First fruits’decree (above, n. 22). But for a possible example of a mid-year decision to
intercalate causing disruption to the prytanic calendar (in 307/6BCE), see Rhodes (1972) 226,
citing Meritt (1961) 176–8.
(^80) The change to the prytanic calendar would have been made in 407BCE: see also Samuel
(1972) 62 81 – 3, Hannah (2005) 44–5.
As correctly pointed out by Hannah (2005) 42, 44.
48 Calendars in Antiquity