In ancient times, and even at the present day in lands which lie outside the path of the great leveller, civilisation, the months taken over with the Roman calendar are not numbered divisions of the year, the names of which are a matter of indifference, but are concretely conceived and named as seasons. They are, in fact, nothing but seasons, the number and duration of which are determined by the conventional calendar. The striving after concreteness which characterises not too highly civilised man leads to the abolition of the obscure and unintelligible Roman names of months, and the substitution of other names describing the season, or more rarely taken from some great festival falling within the month. Only the Hungarian months are entirely named after ecclesiastical festivals[984]. It is also found that the Latin names are as far as possible rendered intelligible by popular etymology.

These statements are well illustrated by the names given to the months by the Greek peasants of Macedonia. It is said of the latter that they measure time not so much by the conventional calendar as by the labours and the festivals characteristic of the different seasons. Seed-time, harvest and vintage, the feast of Saint George, the midsummer fires are some of the notable occasions in the life of the peasant, and these have impressed themselves upon the names of the months. The names are:—1, Γεννάρης, derived from γεννοῦν, also called μεγάλος or τρανὸς μῆνας in opposition to February, and Κλαδευτής on account of the pruning of the vines; 2, Φλεβά ρης, ‘Vein-sweller’, the veins (φλέβες) of the earth are swollen with water (cf. the English folk-name for this month, ‘February fill-dyke’), or μικρὸς μῆνας, κουτσοφλέβαρος; 3, Μάρτης, ὁ φουσκοδενδρίτης, ‘the tree-sweller’, Γδάρτης, ‘the flayer’, on account of the bitterly cold wind; 4, Ἀπρίλης, Ἁγιογεωργίτης, from the feast of Saint George on the 23rd; 5, Μάης; 6, Θεριστής, harvest month; 7, Ἁλωνιστής, Ἁλωνάρης, threshing-floor month; 8, Αὔγουστος; 9, Τρυγητής, vintage month, Σταυριώτης, from the Feast of the Exaltation of the Precious Cross, held on the 14th; 10, Ὀχτώβριος, Ἁγιοδημητριάτης, from the feast of Saint Demetrios on the 26th; 11, Σποριᾶς, sowing month, Ἀντρεάς, from the feast of Saint Andrew on the 30th; 12, Νικολαίτης, from the feast of Saint Nicholas on the 6th[985].

The Albanian names of months are similar:—1, T(osk) Ϳεννάρι, G(heg) Καλενδούρι, New Year month (Kalendae); 2, Σκουρτι, i. e. ‘short’; 3, T. Μαρσι, G. Φρουρι; 4, Πριλι; 5, Μαϳι; 6, Κορρίκου, harvest month; 7, T. (Ἀ)λονάρι, ‘threshing-floor month’ (a Greek loan-word), G. Κϳέρσουρι, probably ‘cherry month’; 8, Γόστι; 9, Βϳέστεα, autumn month, literally ‘bare month’, also βϳέστ’ επάρε, first autumn; 10, σε Μίτρε, month of Saint Demetrius, also βϳεστ’ ε δύτε, second autumn; 11, T. σε Μεχίλ, month of St. Michael, G. σε Μερί ε Στρούγες, month of the Virgin of Struga, also βϳεστ’ ε τρέτε, third autumn; 12, σε Νδερέ, month of St. Andrew[986].

The various Celtic series I omit[987], since they are very obscure and no new material is at my disposal; I shall only remark that they shew a mixture of distorted Latin and of native names, the latter being taken, at least in part, from the phenomena of the vegetation. The Basque names of months are:—1, New Year month or black month; 2, bull or wolf month; 3, tepid month; 4, weeding or fasting-bread month; 5, leaf month; 6, seed-time (sic!), bean or barley month; 7, harvest or wheat month; 8, month of drought; 9, fern or ear month; 10, gathering month; 11, sowing month or forest-clearing; 12, binding up of vegetation (?). They refer therefore throughout to the vegetation and to agriculture. For four months the Latin names are also in use[988].

I have purposely placed in the foreground these mingled series arising in modern times, since they shew how little the people can reconcile themselves to the unintelligible Latin names, and how the latter are crowded out by native names which by their relation to seasons, occupations, and festivals offer points of reference easy to remember. The months are nothing but seasons, the length and situation of which are regulated by the Julian calendar.

The Lithuanian and Lettish names of months refer exclusively to natural phenomena and the occupations of agriculture. The Lithuanian series is:—1, unexplained; 2, jackdaw month; 3, dove month; 4, birch month, or birch water-flowing; 5, cuckoo month; 6, fallow or sowing month; 7, linden month; 8, hot month or rye-cutting; 9, autumn month; 10, leaf-fall; 11, month of clods; 12, month of dryness (frost). The Lettish names are:—1, winter month; 2, snow or fasting-month; 3, dove or snow-crust month; 4, birch-sap month; 5, leaf month; 6, fallow or blossoming month; 7, hay or linden month; 8, rye month or dog (-days); 9, heath-blossom month; 10, autumn month; 11, frost month; 12, wolf month or Christmas[989].

Very similar but much more numerous and fluctuating are the names of months among the Slavonic peoples, collected by Miklosich along with the names of months of a number of other peoples. Yermoloff in his great work on the popular Russian calendar gives only a limited number of names, and these are rarely translated: with a few exceptions these names will be found in Miklosich. The latter writer has classified and discussed the names under their proper headings as follows:—(1) names taken from the vegetable kingdom, 18 in number; (2) from the animal kingdom, 9; (3) from natural phenomena in general, 17; (4) from periodically recurring actions, 10; (5) from customs and festivals, 25; in addition to which there are a few unexplained and three Latin names. Since it is my purpose to give an idea not only of the variety of the names but also of the fluctuating relationship with the Julian months, I arrange the material of Miklosich’s first four groups according to the months, omitting isolated and uncertain names. If the statement as to the corresponding Julian month in Miklosich is not clear, I add a mark of interrogation. I am also indebted to Prof. G. Kazarow of Sofia for detailed information as to the Bulgarian names of months, and for extracts from the Bulgarian work of Kovatschev on popular astronomy and meteorology; these sources are referred to respectively as Kaz. and Kov. An asterisk prefixed to the name of a month means that the same name is given to another month also; if prefixed to the abbreviation denoting the country, the asterisk shews that the name is given to two different months in that country. The names refer to:—1, January, *‘month of clods’, Czech, since the hard frost turns the earth into clods; ‘ice month’, Czech; *‘increasing of the day-light’, Old Bulg., Slovak, Croat.; ‘cold month’, Pol., Bulg.; *‘the Cutter’, Slovak, Bulg., Serb., which Miklosich rightly refers to the felling of trees, Yermoloff and others less well to the piercing cold; ‘the Great Cutter’, Bulg.; *‘kindling of the wheel’, *Bulg. (Kaz.)[990]. 2, February, ‘the Side-warmer’, Russ. (Yermoloff), latera calefaciens, i. e. the time when the cattle leave their stalls in order to warm themselves in the open (Miklosich); ‘the savage month’, Ruthen., Pol.; *‘the dry month’, *Slovak; ‘the snowy month’[991]; ‘wedding month’, Old Russ.[992]; *‘the Cutter’, Old Bulg., Croat.; ‘the Little Cutter’, Bulgarian. 3, March, *‘birch month’, Slovak, Ruthen., refers to the sap of the birch which now begins to flow; *‘grass month’, *Slovak; ‘time of deceitful weather’, Bulg.? Serb.? Old Bulg.; *‘the dry month’, Old Bulg., *Slovak, Croat.; ‘beginning of summer’ (lêtnik, Kaz.). 4, April, *‘birch month’ (in three different forms), *Old Bulg., Ruthen.; *‘blossoming month’, *Croat., Ruthen., Pol.; ‘oak month’, Czech, because the oak comes into leaf; *‘grass month’, *Slovak, *Croat., *Serb.; ‘the Liar’, or ‘the month that deceives the grass’, Bulg., (lǎžko, lǎži-trev, Kaz.); ‘the Fleecer’, ‘the Fleece-seller’, Bulg. (Kov., cf. Greek γδάρτης). 5, May, *‘blossoming month’, Slovak, *Croat., Czech, Bulg. (Kov.); *‘rose-blossoming month’, High Sorb.; *‘grass month’, Old Bulg., *Slovak, *Croat., Ruthen., Czech, Bulg.; ‘cornel month’, Sloven.; ‘maize-hoeing’, Bulg. (Kov.); *‘cherry month’, Bulg. (Kov.); *‘cochineal month’, Bulg. (červenijat, Kov.). 6, June, ‘bean-blossoming month’, Slovak; *‘cherry month’, Serb., *Bulg. (Kov., cf. the Albanian July); ‘month of ears’, Slovak; *‘linden month’, Slovak, Serb., since the linden blossoms then; *‘rose-blossoming month’, Low Sorb., Czech; ‘Mower’, Bulg. (Kov.); ‘hay-cutting’, Bulg. (Kaz.); *‘cochineal month’, Ruthen., Bulg., Czech, because the cochineals used for red dye are then collected; ‘grasshopper month’, Old Bulg.; ‘milk month’, Slovak; ‘fallow month’, Slovak, High Sorb. 7, July, *‘linden month’, Ruthen., Pol.; *‘cochineal month’, Old Bulg., Pol., Czech[993]; ‘the hot (month)’, Serb., Slovak, Bulg.; ‘hay month’, Ruthen., Bulg., Russ.; *‘cutting month’, Czech, refers to the hay-cutting; *‘harvest month’, Low Sorb.; ‘the Harvester’, Bulg. (Kaz.); *‘sickle month’, Old Bulg., Slovak, Serb., Bulg. (Kov.). 8, August, ‘month of ripeness’, Russ.; *‘sickle month’, Ruthen., Czech, Pol.; *‘cutting month’, in Moravia and among the Slovaks; ‘barley month’, Low Sorb.; *‘harvest month’, High Sorb., Bulg. (Kaz.); ‘threshing-floor month’, Bulg. (Kov., cf. Greek-Albanian Ἁλωνάρης); ‘fruit month’, Bulg. (Kov.); *‘gadfly month’, *Slovak, Ruthen.; ‘beginning of the lowing’ (i. e. the rutting of the deer, zarev), Old Bulg.; ‘time when people are carting’ (no doubt on account of the bringing in of the harvest), Slovak, Serb.; ‘dryer up of the rivers’, Bulg. (Kov.). 9, September, ‘sowing month’, Bulg. (Kov.); ‘month of gathering’, Bulg. (Kov.); *‘heath-plant month’, Old Bulg., Pol., Ruthen., (Czech, July or August); *‘time when the goats rut’, *Slovak; *‘gadfly month’, *Slovak; ‘the gloomy month’, Old Russ.[994]; *‘month of lowing’, ‘of rutting’, (záži) *Czech, (rujan, and kindred words) Old Bulg., Serb., Bulg., Old Russ., Czech (earlier); ‘gathering of the clusters’, Bulg.; ‘month of the (winter-)sowing’, Ruthen.; ‘old women’s summer’, Ruthen., Pol. (?); ‘autumn’, Russ., Slovak. 10, October, *‘leaf-fall’, Old Bulg., Serb., *Bulg. (Kaz.); ‘the yellow (month)’, Ruthen.; *‘time when the goat ruts’, *Slovak; *‘month of the lowing’ (řijen), Czech (present day); ‘time of flax-preparing’ (the name comes from a term for the waste products of the flax), Ruthen., Pol.; ‘vine month’, Slovak, Serb.; ‘gathering of the maize’, Bulg. (Kov.); ‘month of dirt’, Russ.; ‘the autumnal (month)’, Bulg. (Kaz.). 11, November, *‘leaf-fall’, Slovak, Ruthen., Czech, Pol., *Bulg. (Kov.); *‘time when the goat ruts’, *Slovak; *‘month of clods’, Old Bulg., Russ.; ‘threshing month’, Low Sorb. 12, December, ‘wolf month’, Czech, High Sorb. (rutting-time of the wolves); *‘month of clods’, Slovak, Croat., Ruthen. (?), Pol.; *‘increasing of the day-light’ (?), Serb., Russ.(?), Czech; ‘month of the snow-storm’, Ruthen.; ‘winter month’, Bulg. (Kov.); *‘kindling of the wheel’, *Bulg. (Kov., see above). More rarely the festivals give their names to the months. This is the case with Christmas, Candlemas, All Saints’ Day, the festival of the birth of the Virgin, and the feast of the Rosalia (= Whitsun), Slovak, Bulg. (Kaz.), and with 14 saints’ days, e. g. Martinzi, November, Bulg. (Kov.). With regard to Bulg. gorêštnik (= July) Kazarow writes to me: “gorêšt = ‘hot’; in July the people celebrate a fire-festival of three days’ duration, viz. the 15th, 16th, and 17th of July, gorêštnici”. Of the Latin names of months only three have been borrowed:—May (common), Slovak, Croat., Ruthen., Russ., Czech, Pol., Sorb.; more rarely April, Old Bulg., Sorb.; and March, Croat., Serb., Ruthen., Pol., High Sorb.

The great majority of the names refer to natural phenomena and country occupations. The variety of the series need not be specially pointed out, the numerous asterisks shew the fluctuation and variation of the nomenclature between two or even three months. Much is explained, as is indicated by the mention of the countries in which the names originate, by the extremely various climatic conditions prevailing in the countries occupied by the Slavs, and a further explanation of the variety is to be sought in the well-known phenomenon that when the seasons correspond only imperfectly with the months, the equalisation is carried out sometimes with one month, sometimes with another. It must be so, since among the same people the same name describes various months. Pairs of months are however rare: ‘the big’ and ‘the little’ sêčko (January and February), Bulg.; ‘the little grass-month’ (March) and the ‘big’ one (April or May), Slovak; the little and big ‘cochineal’ months (June and July), Czech, distinguished in the calendar of to-day as červen and červenec (diminutive), so that the names have changed places; and žătvar, ‘reaper’ (July) and žătvarskijat, ‘harvest-month’ (August), Bulgarian (Kazarow). Here also must be placed zarev and cognates, Old Bulg., Russ., Czech, which is inchoative and means ‘beginning of the lowing (the rutting)’, and rjujin and cognates, Old Bulg., Slovak, Serb., Old Russian, Czech, ‘the lowing’, i. e. the full rutting and therefore the second rutting-month. The character of all these names is only too obvious. Hence the fact that the word for month is very rarely added, though it appears in the translation. These names have proved so vigorous that in Czech and Polish they have ousted the Latin names (with the exception of May).

In the same way I give a summary of the German names of months, from the abundant compilations more particularly of Weinhold and Ebner. Here too I make no claim to completeness,—some names have been deliberately omitted—my purpose being only to give an idea of the variety and instability of the names. To this end I choose the forms which are most easily intelligible.

1, January:—bare month (the bare, naked month), *hard month, *winter month, ice month, *wolf month, threshing month, month of calves, ‘Great Horn’, *Volborn, Lasmaend, Laumonat (the last three unexplained). 2, February:—last winter month, wood month, fox month, ‘Little Horn’, Hornung, *Volborn, Rebmaend, Redmaend, Selle(maend), Sporkel, Sprokkelmaend. 3, March:—(first) ploughing month, drying month, *spring month, sowing month, pruning month, vernal month, spring. 4, April:—second ploughing month, *spring month, grass month, shepherds’ month, cuckoo month, the rough month (Rûmaend). 5, May:—ass month, month of joy, month of flowers, bean month. 6, June:—fallow month, *dog month, rose month, pasture month, Lusemaend (Luse probably = modern German Schildlaus, ‘cochineal’), summer month, fallow. 7, July:—(first) *Augst, hay month, *dog month; Heuet (hay-harvest), *Arne (harvest), *cutting (i. e. of the hay). 8, August:—(second) *Augst, harvest month, Arnemaend, cutting month, Kochmaend, month of fruit, Bîsmaend (when the cattle, tormented by the heat and the flies, run about (biset) the fields as if mad), *Arne, *cutting. 9, September:—second Augst, Augstin, cutting of oats, (*first) *autumn month, *sowing month, spelt month, barley month, boar month, *Fulmaend, Laeset, Hanfluchet, bean-harvest, first autumn, over-autumn, autumn sowing. 10, October:—(*first or *second) *autumn month, first winter month, *sowing month, *slaughtering month, *Folmaend, Aarzelmaend (since the year turns back), (second) autumn, *Laupreisi (leaf-fall). 11, November:—(*second or third) *autumn month, *winter month, Laubryszmaend, leaf month, month of rime, month of winds, month of dirt, *hard month, *slaughtering month, Smeermaend, *full month, *wolf month, acorn month, *Laupreisi. 12, December:—fourth autumn month, (second) *winter month, *hard month, *slaughtering month, month of bacon, *wolf month, hare month, second winter. There are also many names borrowed from feasts and saints’ days, such as (New) Year month and the synonymous Kalemaend = Calends month (January), Fassnachtmaend or Olle Wiwermaend (February), Klibelmaend (Conception of the Virgin, March), Holy Month or Christ Month. The Latin names March, April, May, and August have also become very popular; the last-named has for special reasons been included in the above list[995].

The history of the German names of months has been elucidated by Weinhold and for the Alemannic district by the work of Ebner, who bases his researches upon extensive information collected among the people. As early as the time of Charlemagne a German series of months had been created in order to bring the Julian months more closely home to the people, so that the list was based largely upon a popular foundation. The names are:—Wintarmânoth, Hornunc, Lenzinm., Ostarm., Wunnim., Brâchm., Hewim., Aranm., Witum., Windumem., Herbistm., Heilagm. This series attained great influence, but did not become universal; on the contrary it was subjected to alteration under the pressure of the agricultural terms. In spite of this early attempt at unity the German names for the months shew once more the variety and fluctuation with which the reader is now sufficiently familiar. A special interest attaches to the fact that the sources make it possible to follow how the names of months arise from the simple terms for the seasons. On this point Weinhold says, p. 2:—“In our sources the general statement in der erne (‘in the harvest’) preponderates over the month-name ernemanot (‘harvest-month’); im brâchet (‘in the fallow’), im höuwet (‘in the hay-harvest’) hold their own alongside of brâch- and höu-monat (‘fallow-, hay-month’), im wimmot (‘in the vintage’) persists, since windumemânot (‘vintage-month’) had long since died out. From the phrases in der sât, in dem snite (‘in the sowing’, ‘in the cutting’) are painfully evolved a sâtmân and a schnitmonat (‘sowing-, cutting-month’). We find autumn and winter as names of months, and also the non-German augst, divided into three; we can see the uncertainty with which laubbrost and laubrîse (‘sprouting and falling of the leaves’) contract into names of months.” Accordingly the above list shews that alongside the names compounded with ‘month’ the simple terms from seasons and occupations of the year are frequently found as names for the months. March = Lenz (spring), June = Brachet (fallow), July = Heuet (hay-harvest), August = Arne (harvest), September = Bonenarve, Hanfluchet, erst Herbst, Herbstsaat, Überherbst, Laeset (Lesezeit) (bean-harvest, hemp-gathering, first autumn, autumn-sowing, late autumn, harvest time), October = ander Herbst, Herbst, Laupreisi (second autumn, autumn, leaf-fall), December = ander Winter. Of great significance is the state of affairs found in the Alemannic sources of the 14th century[996]; side by side with the compound forms the simple often appear, but always as definite names of months. Towards the end of the century they then begin to have a loose connexion with the conception ‘month’, e. g. brachot der manod (‘fallow the month’). This shews the method by which these names have become names of months, and Ebner judges the process quite correctly when he says that the definite names of months were only secondarily evolved from the general time-indications. He adds:—“This observation can often be made in the sources, viz. that alongside of the month-name which exactly circumscribes a lunar period (sic!, must be ‘a Julian month’) a simple conception of time also appears. These simple terms, such as ‘autumn’ for September, also appear as general time-indications, especially in the old laws. They originally have this character, and they shew it even to-day. Little by little they become stereotyped into fixed names of months, and enter into association with the conception ‘month’. In this sense as definite names of months the simple terms live for a long time in the sources alongside of the full terms (those with ‘month’), but in the end lose their force as definite names of months; to-day they are in dialects general time-indications”[997]. There is therefore an attempt to render popular the unfamiliar Julian divisions of the year by giving them popularly intelligible names; Charlemagne by his series of months had already tried to systematise the process. The same phenomenon shews itself in the single fragment of a Gothic calendar which has come down to us, where November is equated to fruma jiuleis.

The fact that the people regarded the months as seasons, and did not clearly distinguish them from the latter as divisions of time with a definite number of days, has sympathetically affected those Latin names which became really popular. When we hear of a ‘first’ and a ‘second’ May, the name is evidently loosely regarded as a general term for the early summer. Augst comes to mean simply ‘harvest’[998]; hence July is called ‘the first Augst’ and August ‘the second Augst’, or the latter is named Augst and September is called Ander Augst, Augstin, or Haberaugst (oat-harvest).

This explanation is opposed by the statement of Tille that in primitive Germanic times there were sixty-day divisions[999] from which the pairs of months have arisen, and that the fluctuation in the names of months is due to the fact that these divisions of time began in the middle of the Julian month[1000]. The fluctuation in the names of months is shewn by the frequent asterisks in the above list, and the pairs of months are:—big and little Horn[1001], the first and second ploughing month, the first and second May, the first and second Augst, or Augst and Augstin or Haberaugst, and first and second autumn. Our researches ought to make a special refutation of Tille’s thesis unnecessary. Obviously the seasons never had a definite number of days before they became names of months; both phenomena find their explanation in the indeterminate length and position of the seasons upon which the scheme of the Julian months was superimposed. Accordingly, where the name of the month was taken from a longer season, the people counted three or four months with the same name. Thus October and November are called respectively third and last autumn month, December is fourth autumn month, February third or last winter month.

The German names of months were in great measure genuinely popular,—their very multiplicity, which has its roots in the life of the people, suffices to prove that—but they have had to give way to the Latin names in spite of the attempts made in modern times in the popular calendars, and especially under the influence of Romanticism, to establish them throughout. In our own day they persist in popular usage chiefly in Switzerland.

The Anglo-Saxon months are preserved in a well-known passage of Bede[1002]. I give each name with the explanation. 1, giuli; 2, solmonað: mensis placentarum, quas in eo diis suis offerebant; 3, hreðmonað: a dea illorum Hreða; 4, eosturm.: a dea illorum, quae Eostre vocabatur; 5, þrimilci: quod tribus vicibus in eo per diem pecora mulgebantur; 6, liða; 7, liða: blandus sive navigabilis; 8, weodm.: mensis zizaniorum (‘weeds’), quod ea tempestate maxime abundent; 9, halegm.: mensis sacrorum; 10, wintirfyllið: composito novo nonune hiemeplenilunium; 11, blotm.: mensis immolationum; 12, giuli: a conversione solis in auctum diei. Of the explanations of Bede some are obvious, others doubtful. For instance one would rather connect February with the word sol = ‘sun’, or perhaps with sol = ‘dirt’ (on account of the melting of the snow), since no word sol = ‘cake’ is known. The goddesses Hreða and Eostre, who formerly played a great part in mythological discussions, are now with reason suspected as being an explanation of Bede’s. Hreðmonað is ‘the rough month’[1003], hreðness is ‘roughness’, especially of the weather; the name is therefore equivalent to the second term for the same month, hlyda (see below). In the case of eostur one might think of some lost name of a season which, like giuli, was transferred to a Christian festival. For halegmonað and wintirfyllið see below; blotmonað is the slaughtering month; the explanation of giuli is fatally wrong.

A calendar in Bibl. Cottoniensis, assigned by Hickes to the year 1031, has the same names, but unfortunately, on account of damage caused by the great fire, nos. 1, 7, 9, and 12 are missing[1004]. The Menologium Poeticum[1005] does not translate all the names. The series is:—Januarius, Februarius or solmonað, Martius or hlyda, Aprelis monað, Maius, Junius or ærra liða, Julius monað, Augustus or weodmonað, September or haligmonað, October or winterfylleð, November or blotmonað, December or ærra jula. There are missing therefore, probably not by accident, eostermonað and the second month of each of the pairs. Finally I give the list compiled by Hickes:—1, æftera geola; 2, solmonað; 3, hlyda or hlydmonað (‘the loud, blustering month’, on account of the storms); 4, easterm.; 5, maiusm.; 6, serem., midsumorm., ærra liða, Juniusm.; 7, meðm., ædm. (hay-harvest month), æftera liða, Juliusm.; 8, weodm., Augustusm.; 9, haligm., harvæstm.; 10, se teoðam., haligm.; 11, blotm.; 12, midvinterm., ærre geola[1006]. Of these variants upon Bede’s list harvestm., hærfestm. occurs frequently and indeed is attested from the year 1000. In Robert of Gloucester (1297 A. D.) the word means August[1007]. The two others are doubtful: they appear in the first edition of Bosworth’s Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, which Weinhold used, but are absent in the second, doubtless because the sources are unknown. As far as I can see they come from Hickes, they are missing in Hampson’s Glossary. The Oxford Dictionary says, s. v. meadmonth: “an alleged O. E. name for July”. Of seremonth it gives a late example, where the word is equivalent to August[1008]. It is possible that Hickes used sources which have perished in the fire at the Bibliotheca Cottoniensis. The form searmonað, so far as I know, appears only in Bosworth, and is perhaps a normalising of the spelling. The name ‘dry month’ (mod. Eng. ‘sear’, ‘sere’) corresponds as badly as possible to June, and is not much more suitable for August. A satisfactory explanation would be given if, as Prof. Ekwall proposes to me, we assume that seremonað = sceremonað, s being often written for sc from the 12th century onwards; the name would then mean ‘sheep-shearing month’. Fluctuation in the names of months is seen here also: haligmonað means September or October, harvest-monað both August and September. So far the Anglo-Saxon months present the usual characteristics in the nomenclature, and in the fluctuation of the names. A point worthy of note is the agreement in name with the Gothic fruma jiuleis but difference in position: this is explained by the fact that jiuleis, giuli, jul is an old word for a shorter season.

Bede’s further statements as to the Anglo-Saxon year are very important and have been much disputed. He represents it as a lunisolar year with lunar months. It began on Dec. 25th; this night the heathens called modra nect, id est matrum noctem ob causam, ut suspicamur, ceremoniarum quas in ea pervigiles agebant (“that is the night of the mothers, because, as we suppose, of some ceremonies which they performed in the night”). In an ordinary year each season had three months, in leap-year the thirteenth month was intercalated in the summer, it was a third liða and a year of this kind was called annus thri-lidi. Further, the year was divided into two halves, winter and summer, of six months each, and winter began with the month wintirfyllið. Here and here alone have we an account of a heathen Germanic lunisolar year. A priori such an account contains nothing surprising. Tacitus, Germ. XI, had already stated that the Germans observed the lunar month. The question is whether they also named the months and arrived at a fixed series, whereby the empirical intercalation of a month would arise of itself. In the last centuries of heathen times they were certainly not at a lower stage of civilisation than many other peoples in various parts of the world among whom this form of year did arise, but the trustworthiness of the report is far from being established by this general consideration.

Bilfinger has subjected the account to severe criticism, and on internal evidence states it to be a construction of Bede’s[1009]. The account, he says, fluctuates between the solar and the lunar year; for instance Bede says in one place that the year begins on December 25th, and in another that winter begins with the lunar month wintirfyllið. But this is done in any description of a lunisolar year that does not choose expressions with pedantic accuracy. Even in modern scientific handbooks we read e. g. that the Attic year began with the summer solstice, which is an abbreviated and incorrect expression for ‘at the first new moon after the summer solstice’. The learned chronologist, Bede, has, according to Bilfinger, elaborated his system upon the following points of departure: the derivation of the word ‘month’ from ‘moon’, the phrase annus thri-lidi, which really means ‘a year so favourable that three sea-voyages can be made in it’, and the beginning of the year on Dec. 25th, which is assumed by Bilfinger to be the ecclesiastical beginning of the year on Christmas Day, at that time used in England. The Anglo-Saxon names of months, he concludes, are accordingly nothing more than native terms for the Julian months, and therefore first became names of months on the introduction of the Roman calendar. The criticism is acute, but is not without its weak points. Bede knew quite well that the Latin mensis is connected with μήν and properly means lunar month, and had a very good knowledge of matters chronological; why then should he claim lunar months for the Anglo-Saxons if to his knowledge only solar months existed among them? In regard to the explanation of thri-lidi we require to know from documents that two sea-voyages were usually made in summer, and what was the goal of these voyages that there should be only two of them. Such evidence is not forthcoming. And further, as Prof. Ekwall informs me, Bilfinger’s explanation is linguistically improbable. Such a formation would presuppose a word *līð, ‘journey’, and no such word exists; on the other hand þriliði, ‘with three liða’, is perfectly regular[1010]. Further ‘the holy month’, halegmonað, cannot be explained by Christian influence, since there is no great Christian festival in September: the origin must be sought in the heathen cult, but is obscure. It is not improbable that the festival of harvest was intended. However this carries the name back to pre-Christian times. Wintirfyllið means, according to Bede, ‘(first) full moon of the winter’. With this is connected Gothic fulliþ, translated by ‘full moon’[1011]. By this parallel the lunar character of this month is also proved. In opposition to Bilfinger’s theory it therefore appears that there are a couple of facts, arising out of the months themselves, which point to the heathen origin and lunar character of the months.

The difficulties lie elsewhere. The beginning of the year is according to Bede Dec. 25. But where a fixed series of twelve months exists, with a fixed intercalary month, it lies in the nature of things that the month which is doubled in the intercalation should be the beginning of the year, since this month is regulated by a fixed point or season of the year; the month in question is in this case liða, in summer. Now the beginning of the year in the sense mentioned above, p. 276, does not necessarily coincide with the beginning of the series of months. The beginning of the year in this case, however, is on Bede’s own testimony the beginning of winter, as among the Scandinavians. We are therefore driven to the conclusion that Bede erroneously substituted the ecclesiastical beginning of the year at the Christmas festival, and that the cause of his error was the fact that at this time the heathen Anglo-Saxons celebrated a Feast of the Mothers, which corresponded to the Scandinavian Yule festival celebrated at the same time of the year; whereas in reality the Anglo-Saxons, like most peoples, had no sharply defined beginning of the year.

Although, therefore, Bede’s account presents great difficulties, they are not diminished by the assumption that the scheme is a construction of his own. In my opinion there is no denying the trustworthiness of the account or the probability that the heathen Anglo-Saxons had arrived at a fixed series of months with empirical intercalation in the summer. But even if this was so, the case is isolated, and does not advance our knowledge of the form of the year among the other Germanic peoples. This only may be pointed out, that the Icelanders inserted their intercalary week in the summer just as the Anglo-Saxons, according to Bede, did with their intercalary month. But since the form of the year is so entirely different in each case, this agreement cannot be made to support further conclusions, any more than the two cases of agreement with the Gothic calendar.

The Icelandic months, in conformity with the peculiar arrangement of the year, do not coincide with the Julian, but begin either shortly before or in the middle of these. The series is:—1, þorri; 2, Goi; 3, Einmánaðr, because one month is left before the beginning of summer; 4, Gaukmánaðr (cuckoo month) or Sáðtið (seed-time) or Harpa (unexplained); 5, Eggtið or Stekktið or Skerpla (unexplained); 6, Sólmánaðr (sun month) or Selmánaðr (cowherd’s hut month); 7, Miðsummar, or Heyannir (hay-time); 8, Tvímánaðr, since two months are left to the beginning of winter, or Kornskurðmánaðr (barley-cutting month); 9, Haustmánaðr; 10, Gormánaðr (slaughtering month, gor is the refuse thrown away in the slaughtering); 11, Frermánaðr (frost-month) or Ylir (cognate with Yul); 12, Jólmánaðr (Yule-month) or Hrútmánaðr (ram month, on account of the pairing of the sheep) or Mörsugr (‘the fat-sucker’)[1012]. Some of these names are also used to describe seasons and have been explained above, p. 74. With the exception of þorri, Goi, and Einmánaðr, however, these months are not used in practical life, where the reckoning is performed in weeks. In modern times the Icelandic months have other names but keep the same position in the year:—1, Miðsvetrarm. (midwinter month); 2, Föstu(in)gangsm. (beginning of fasting); 3, Jafnðøgram. (month of the equinox); 4, Sumarm. (beginning of summer); 5, Farðagam. (because it is the legal time for moving); 6, Nottleysum. (the nightless month); 7, Stuttnættism. (month of the short nights) or Maðkam. (as in Denmark, month of worms); 8, Heyannam. (month of the hay-time); 9, Addrattam. (m. necessitatum apportandarum); 10, Slatrunarm. (slaughtering month), older Garðlagsm. (m. sæpium struendarum); 11, Riðtíðarm. (spawning month); 12, Skamdegism. (month of the short days) or Jólam[1013].

In Norway, according to Finn Magnusson[1014], January is sometimes called Thorre, February sometimes Thorre, now and again also Gjö, March sometimes Gjö, here and there also Krikla, June Gro (sprouting month); I shall return below, p. 302, to the explanation of the variation. Weinhold gives a complete list:—1, Torre; 2, Gjö; 3, Krikla or Kvine; 4 and 5, Voarmoanar; 6 and 7, Sumarmoanar; 8 and 9, Haustmoanar; 10 and 11, Vinterstid; 12, Jolemoane or Skammtid (time of the short days)[1015].

Of the Danish months the learned Olaus Worm in the 17th century gives two series[1016]. The months of the first series are lunar months, he says, and begin with the first new moon of the new year:—1, Diur Rey or Renden, on account of the pairing of the animals (at løbe i Rhed); 2, Thormaen; 3, Faremaen, on account of the journeys; 4, Maymaen; 5, Sommermaen; 6, Ormemaen (month of worms); 7, Hoemaen (hay month); 8, Kornmaen; 9, Fiskemaen; 10, Sædemaen (seed month); 11, Pølsemaen (sausage month); 12, Julemaen. The intercalary month is called Sildemaen, ‘the late month’. The Julian months are called:—1, Glugmanet; 2, Blidem. (the mild month); 3, Torm.; 4, Farem.; 5, Maym.; 6, Skærsommer; 7, Ormem.; 8, Høstm.; 9, Fiskem.; 10, Sædem.; 11, Slagtem.; 12, Christm. The northern Danes and the inhabitants of Skåne are said to call the first four months: 1, Glug, 2, Gøje, 3, Thor, 4, Blidel. Blidel was until our own time in popular use in southern Skåne, but it denoted February and in this position it appears in Hickes[1017]. The same series is found in Finn Magnusson[1018], but with certain variants:—1, Ism. (ice month); 2, Dyrem.; 4, Faarem. (sheep month); 6, Sommerm.; 7, Madkem.; 8, Høm.; 10, Ridem. (riding month); 11, Vinterm.; 12, Julem.[1019]. Feilberg in his well-known Dictionary of the popular speech of Jylland gives some characteristic modern popular names. Helmisse (‘holy mass’) really means All Souls’ Day, and then an old worn-out horse, whose last strength is exhausted in the autumn ploughing and who dies in consequence; hence September or October obtains the name helmissemåned. March is called kattemåned, from the pairing of the cats, or prangermåned (pranger = ‘dealer’), because most business is transacted then. These are evidently more in the nature of by-names, but it is precisely names of this sort that oust the Latin names, since they are intelligible.

In the Swedish almanac, until it was modernised in the year 1901, Swedish names stood beside the Latin. They ran:—Torsmånad, Göjem., Vårm. (spring month), Gräsm. (grass month), Blomsterm. (month of flowers), Sommarm., Höm. (hay month), Skördem. (harvest month), Höstm. (autumn month), Slaktm. (slaughtering month), Vinterm., Julm. It is true that these names were never used. The series has arisen from an older one which is first attested for the year 1538. In the latter three months have Latin names, Marsmånad, Aprilmånad, Majmånad, October is named Winmånad (vine-month), December Christmånad. These names shew that the series is of German origin; in Sweden vines are not cultivated, and December 24th is never called Christmas Eve but Yule Eve. The list agrees with one given by Weinhold, p. 8, which as early as the 15th century was common to all Germany, and the agreement is shewn also in this point that, as is often the case in German lists, the months 3, 4, and 5 retain their Latin names. When it is further remembered that Augst means ‘harvest’, the variations will be seen to consist only in the substitution of the old names Tor and Göje for Jenner and Hornung and the renaming of ‘the fallow month’ (Brachmonat) from midsummer, which is in Sweden a great popular festival. The more suitable Slakt- and Julmånad were substituted for Win- and Christmånad in 1608 by the almanac-maker Forsius: the three Latin names were first exchanged for Swedish in 1734 by the almanac-maker Hiorter[1020]. There is moreover one Swedish name which is still very popular and which falls outside the usual series, viz. rötmånaden (‘the rotten month’), so named because it falls in the most sultry time of the summer, when it is very difficult to keep meat and other food from going bad. It is fixed at the time in which the sun stands in Leo (July 22-Aug. 23; about July 13-Aug. 14, old style). Formerly it was known as ‘the Dog-days’,—a translation of dies caniculares—and the position varied considerably. The period descends from the period of the Etesian in the ancient Greek calendar, and it was not till the 17th century that it was generally equated to the time during which the sun stands in Leo[1021].

The Swedish list of months is therefore largely of foreign or learned origin. The only popular names are Tor and Göje, which also often occur without the addition of ‘month’. The Icelanders have made Thorri and Goi into mythological figures[1022]. In Sweden the people have personified these names. When it snows, Goja shakes her robe. Thor (= March), with the long beard, entices the children outside the wall, they say in the north of Skåne,—in the south the same thing is said of Bliel (Blidel = February)—and then Far Fäjeskinn (= April) comes and drives them in again. The latter month is conceived of as ‘Father Sweep-skin’: but it is possible that in far the month-name Fare-maaned (= April) appears. In Norway the names of the same three months—Thorre, Gjö, and Krikla—were the only ones in common use, and so in Iceland, þorri, Goi, and Einmánaðr. The beginning of these three months was hailed with popular celebrations both in Iceland and elsewhere in Scandinavia[1023]. And now attempts have been made to prove that these Norwegian months are old lunar months. In Aasen’s Norwegian Dictionary it is stated that the country people even to-day still count and name the moons, so that e. g. the moon which is in the heavens during the Yuletide-festival is termed the Yule moon if it continues until the end of the festival, the day of Epiphany: and if it does not last till the end of this period, then the next following moon is the Yule moon, i. e. the Yule moon is in reality the moon which is in the heavens on the day of Epiphany. The terms and the calculation of the following moons are regulated accordingly. Certainly the heathen Germans must have been acquainted with the lunar month, and the existence of the lunisolar calendar among the Anglo-Saxons is not to be denied, but in this case we must unreservedly agree with Bilfinger[1024] that this lunar reckoning is of Christian origin. Then in order to fix the date of the important movable festivals the most convenient practical means was to begin from the first new moon after the day of Epiphany, i. e. after the Yule moon. The old rule says:—“Count the moon which is in the sky on the day of Epiphany as long as it lasts, and then ten days onward from the new moon, and you have the terminus Septuagesimæ.” Hence is derived the Swedish peasant rule:—“The moon which is in the sky at the day of Epiphany shall be the Christmas moon, whether it be young or old.” After this follows the disting-moon[1025]. On account of the ecclesiastically prescribed period of Lent and the Easter festival it was absolutely necessary to be able to calculate this time, and the calculation was most simply performed in the fashion just described, although the phenomena of the heavens did not exactly agree with the rule of computation. The third of these moons was followed by the Easter festival. For this reason these three months have stamped themselves upon the minds of the people in all the Scandinavian countries. It is because they are lunar months, and not because they began, like the Icelandic months, in the middle of the Julian months, that the relationship of the first three Norwegian names of months to the Julian varies in the manner shewn above, p. 298. A further question, however, is the age of the names þorri (Tor) and Göje. Since in spite of many ingenious attempts these words remain etymologically unexplained, and moreover are not borrowed, the names must originate in an older period. What they meant before they received their present application we do not know, but there is nothing to shew that they are not old names of months. There is a possibility, certainly somewhat remote, that their use as names of months is pre-Christian, although the computation is Christian. There would be nothing surprising in this, if it were the case, since the Germans were acquainted with lunar months, and they had attained a much higher stage of civilisation than many peoples who were familiar with the lunisolar year as regulated by empirical intercalation.

A sure indication of an Old Swedish heathen reckoning in lunar months has been acutely pointed out by Beckman[1026] in the rule, attested from the time of the Reformation, for fixing the date of the fair at Uppsala known as the disting, which is a direct continuation of the great sacrificial festival at the heathen temple in Uppsala, the disablot. The rule, as has already been indicated (p. 302), says that the disting shall be held at the full of the moon following the Epiphany moon, and therefore exactly two months before the Easter full moon. This rule certainly goes back to ancient times and cannot arise from the Christian computation of Easter, since there would be no reason for arranging with reference to Easter the date of a fair so long before Easter and originating in heathen times[1027]. Rather is the explanation given in the words of Tacitus, that the Germans held their assemblies at new or full moon, which would also apply to the great sacrificial festival and the popular assembly of the Svear. This however presupposes that the insertion of the intercalary month was fixed in some way, so that no error might arise in regard to the moon of the disting. After Christianity was introduced, and with it the computation of the three moons before Easter, the computation of the disting-moon was also modified in accordance with these. A statement of Snorre[1028] however causes difficulty. Snorre says that the disablot was celebrated in Goe, but that after the introduction of Christianity the date of the fair was altered to Candlemas (Feb. 2). The latter statement contradicts the rule, and is ingeniously explained by Beckman. In the year 1219, when Snorre was staying in Sweden, the full moon of the disting fell on the first of February, and Snorre has generalised the single case. Goe, as has been seen above, is the name of the month, but the Göje new moon has been shewn to be the second after Epiphany, and therefore the moon following the disting-moon, which is identical with the Tor new moon. Herein lies an unexplained difficulty. It is to be presumed, however, that the arrangement of the heathen lunar months must have been different from that of the Christian Easter moons, and that this must have been the cause of the difference in the position of the moons. The heathen disting-moon, called Goe, did not entirely correspond either to the Christian þorre or to Goe: Snorre has made Goe equivalent to it, otherwise it has been made equivalent to þorre. The necessity of computing the Christian Easter has very often caused the new moons to fall after the period (Yule, Tor, Goe) from which they are named. On the contrary the disting-moon is the very moon in which the disting is held. This is certainly a survival of an older pre-Christian computation, which was later fitted into the Christian computation of the new moons before Easter, and was re-arranged accordingly.

In the other Scandinavian countries also the enumeration of the moons between Christmas and Easter was neglected after the Reformation had made the observation of the fast superfluous, or rather it was replaced by another: the New Year’s Day appears as the regulating point instead of Epiphany.

The Swedish almanacs of the 16th and 17th centuries give the new moons in words, the practice ceasing in the second half of the 17th century. In accordance with the custom of the ecclesiastical computation the new moon is (nearly always) named after the following month, that in which the moon ceases: Ny Göijemånat, the new moon of Göje, therefore falls in Torsmånad (January), and so on. Sometimes, doubtless inadvertently, the new moon is named after the month in which it falls, i. e. Ny Göijemånat falls in February. Now certain years receive 13 new moons, and therefore one intercalary moon, for which the computers give rules. But the almanac-makers never follow these rules. In two or three of the oldest almanacs[1029] the intercalary moon is certainly described as such[1030], but its position in the year does not correspond to the rule of the computers: in 1603 it is simply placed in the Julian month in which two new moons fall. Otherwise the difficulty is got over by leaving uncounted the intercalary moon or some of the new moons. Another way out is chosen by Herlicius, 1630 and 1641, and Thuronius of Åbo, 1660: Torsmånadsny, the new moon of January, is contrary to the rule placed in January; in the further enumeration the new moons run over into the month preceding that after which they are named, and the thirteenth and last new moon is again called Torsmånadsny, i. e. this is doubled and serves as an intercalary moon. Here, therefore, the insertion of the intercalary moon depends upon the position of the new moon in relation to the beginning of the year, i. e. to the first of January.

This method has become popular, and its popularity has been assisted by the fact that the people, through the use of the rune-staves recording the golden numbers, were accustomed to the calculation of the new moon. Above all the first moon of the year (nykung = ‘new king’) played a very important part. The men took off their hats and the women curtseyed when they saw it; from it were taken oracles for the new year. The question is whether a popular name was also given to the new moons. Apart from the almanacs, which use the names of months introduced into them, I find in Swedish only one example: Torretungel (tungel, dialect for ‘new moon’)[1031]. The Danish chronologist Worm gives both a lunar and a solar series of names of months[1032]. The names are for the most part equivalent or similar to those of the solar series, but in the first half of the year they occupy an earlier position, which fact certainly has something to do with the naming of the new moons according to the usual computation. Worm expressly states that these lunar months were still in use and began with the first new moon of the new year.

An account of connected lunar months among the East Finns has been translated and communicated to me by Professor Wiklund. The authority makes a man of the people speak as follows[1033]:—“The moon which is born while the winter day is still in his house (December 18–22), or after that, is the first heart- (middle-)moon. In this way the Christmas festival sometimes falls in the first heart-moon, and then we hope for a good harvest. But when the first heart-moon is born late, e. g. after Twelfth Day, there is no second heart-moon in this year, but there follow the foam-moon (so called because the snow looks like foam), the snow-crust moon, the melting moon, the sprouting moon, etc.... When we reckon the moons of the year, beginning with the first heart-moon, we sometimes get thirteen months in the year, although there are only twelve book-months.” At first sight it is very tempting to see in this account old Finnish moon-months regulated by the winter solstice, as e. g. among the Siberian peoples, which would be quite conceivable so far north. However this is not so. The heart-moon is in the given instance doubled, i. e. it is an intercalary moon. Now it is a familiar fact that the intercalary month, i. e. the first of the two months with the same name, gets in front of the regulating-point; it is therefore ‘forgotten’, and a second moon with the same name is inserted after it. We must therefore ask:—Within what limits, under the given conditions, will the moon fall which in ordinary years is the heart-moon, in leap-year the second heart-moon? The following tables give the answer: the limits begin at the two extremes of new moon on the first and on the twenty-ninth of January; we must of course reckon one day for the solstice, December 21, and not the whole ‘house’.

The regulating-point is therefore New Year’s Day: the heart-moon, and in leap-year the second heart-moon, begin with the first new moon after this. This rule however makes it impossible for the first heart-moon ever to begin before the winter solstice. It will be found that in regard to the position of the heart-month, and in leap-years of the first heart-month, this regulation leads to such a position of these months as is given in the account. The calendar is therefore not a native lunar one, but the already mentioned adaptation of the lunar reckoning in accordance with the new year of the Julian calendar[1034]. The Finns, who from the earliest times have owed their culture to the Scandinavians, have taken this process from them also, but in Finland it has not been driven out by the influences of later civilisation, just as in Norway, which long remained comparatively untouched by these influences, the Catholic lunar reckoning has been preserved.

The above-quoted source unfortunately does not preserve all the names of months. A similar but somewhat different complete list has been drawn up by Lönnrot in Karelia:—1, heart-month; 2, heart-month; 3, foam-month; 4, tree-felling month; 5, melting or sowing month; 6, summer month; 7, hay month; 8, pus month (cf. the Swedish ‘rotten month’, above, p. 300); 9, harvest month; 10, autumn month; 11, dung or dirt month; 12, month of clods; 13, Christmas month[1035]. Here too the heart-month appears doubled.

The Lapps also have taken their reckoning from the Scandinavians: of the reckoning in weeks we have spoken above. In Old Scandinavian times they borrowed the word mānō, Lapp manno (moon). The Lapp word means both ‘moon’ and ‘month’; only among the southern Lapps is there found a native word aske, ‘moon’, which one dictionary also uses as a term for ‘month’. Therefore at the time when the Lapps adopted the word manno for ‘moon’ and ‘month’, the month of the Scandinavians must have been a lunar month, and so also among the Lapps. In some authors the form mannod occurs, i. e. modern Swedish månad, ‘month’. The Lapp names of months were not collected until last century. They appear sometimes with, sometimes without, the addition ‘month’. They are:—1, new month, new year (month), new day (month), New Year’s Day month; 2, Göjem. (knowa, a loan-word therefore), rarely *‘swan month’; 3, *‘swan month’, because the swan comes in March, rarely marasm. (mars, loan-word), rarely *‘crow month’; 4, *‘crow month’, on account of the coming of these birds, rarely *‘snow-crust month’; 5, ‘(hard) *snow-crust month’, since the surface of the snow, which melts in the day-time in the bright sunshine, freezes at night into a hard crust, *‘month of calves’, ‘calf month’, when the reindeer bring forth their calves; 6, *‘month of calves’, *‘fir month’, since the sap rises in the firs, ‘flesh month’, ‘(mid)summer month’; 7, rarely *‘fir month’, *‘month when the reindeer has shed its hair’; 8, called *the same, also *‘month when the hair has grown thick again’; 9, has *the same name as 8, or *‘rutting month’ (the rutting-time covers the end of September and the beginning of October), or *‘month when the male reindeer are powerless’ (after the rutting); 10, has *the same name as 9, or else *‘rutting month’, or ‘autumn month’; 11, is also generally called *‘month when the male reindeer are powerless’, rarely *‘Advent month’; 12, *‘Advent month (passatis(m.), p. means the first Advent Sunday and the first week in Advent), ‘Yule month’[1036]. Qvigstad[1037] calls the twelfth week-month of the Lapps bâse-tæbme manno, ‘the month without a feast’, the thirteenth basse m. or juowla m.

The Lapps were also acquainted with the ‘rotten month’ (mieska manno, Swedish rötmånad)[1038]. A Lapp woman mentioned by Wiklund gave this month the position of the ninth in the series, and explained it as the month in which the grass begins to fade and rot. On the strength of this Wiklund assumes a thirteen-month year, but the statement is inconclusive, the ‘rotten month’ having certainly been placed erroneously as a separate month in the series. That this is so is supported not only by Qvigstad but also by Högström in his description of Lapland of the year 1746, in which he speaks of thirteen week-months of the Lapps. According to this authority the Lapps drew their rune-calendar on seven discs of reindeer-horn, but only one side of the seventh was written on, so that there were 13 sides of four weeks each, which they called a month, and so their reckoning was 13 months, he says. Wiklund has accepted this four-week month. It is quite possible that the Lapps called a period of four weeks a month: we also often do the same when an approximation will serve; but that the names of months mean periods of four weeks seems very questionable. It would be a quite isolated case: everywhere else the months are either the Julian or lunar months, with which last the Lapps were acquainted, at least in ancient times. The statement that on the basis of the reckoning by weeks a four-week month could have arisen is certainly not absolutely to be denied,—if this is so, it must be a secondary and late development—but the fluctuation of the names of months is no evidence for this. It is only the fluctuation found everywhere when names of seasons are transformed into names of months. Only the names of the first two months are quite fixed, and these are either essentially or literally loan-words: the Latin name even appears in one instance for March. There is consequently borrowing in the case of the three names which alone, as also among the Scandinavians, have become really popular. If the Lapps really had thirteen months, it might then be supposed that these, as in Denmark and Finland, were lunar months which began at the first new moon of the new year. But we find no trace of lunar months in Lapland in historical times. We must therefore content ourselves with the fact that the Lapp names of months shew the same fluctuation as is shewn by all names taken from natural objects or phenomena and applied to the months.

This brief survey of the popular months of the European peoples is instructive from the point of view of a comparison with the names of months among primitive peoples. Although the Julian months have a fixed position in the solar year, and do not fluctuate to and fro like the lunar months, yet the names of the months are unstable and fluctuating. This is due to the fact that in the desire for concrete observations the names of the seasons and of their occupations have been kept, and the seasons have neither fixed position nor duration: these names of months derived from natural phenomena and occupations have not therefore in themselves the precision which the chronological system demands. Such precision will only be introduced by an external factor, in the one case by the lunar months, in the other by the Julian months to which the names of the seasons are transferred.