The Mathews journal. (Mathews C.H. [Court House]) 1903-1937, 1910-01-27
HOW MONTHS
WERENAMED
P,osIc In Geneusl Have Small Idea of
Resi- Origlsr Jnlias Caesar Had
Hand In IT.

terminate the year? And July sounds
as II il might be Julia's month while
August surely has something to do
with hot" At least. that is what il
suggests to most people. AS for the
others, they are mostly names, like
John and Mary, given to distinguish
the children in the years family one
from another.
Some one comes forward with the
information that the suggestion of
Mary" is quite appropriate. since the
NTH month was named for the Virgin
Mary, and the following month, called
June, took it's title from John the
Baptist Indeed. if we should hearken
TO all the suggestions about the
months we might find similar origins
for all of them. Alas there is not SO
very much romance to be discovered
in those - names, when we trace
them back to their actual source in
the Roman calendar All of them
are derived directly from the Latin,
and most Of them were assigned to
the months that now claim them by
the great Julius Caesar. when he re-
Vised the hOdge-pOdge that had passed
as calendar up to his time.
The month we know as January
was, in the early Roman days, the
eleventh month of the year, and it fell
at the end Of the year according to
the English reckoning. as late as 1852.
when New Years Day was the 25th
Of March. So January has only
very recent title to its place as the
beginning" at least in England At
various times and in various lands. it
has been the first month ever since
Caesar arranged his scheme of
months. 1t was he-who selected the
name, JanuariuS mensis, or the month
OF Janus. because in that month the
feast Of Janus had long been cele-
brated. This Janus was one Of the
very earliest Of the Latin deities,
powerful god before the primitive
Latins imported an army of Greek gods
to displace their simpler divinities.
He was originally Dianus. and was the
same being to the Latins that Zeus
was to the Greeks Unfortunately for
him. when the more stylish and up
to-date gods arrived from Greece. he
was degraded step by step, first to
the position OF sun god, then door
keeper Of the heavens, and finally to
that OF undersecretary to Mars. the
god OF war.
As the deity OF the suns rising and
its setting. he was pictured as facing
east and west at the same time That
he might accomplish this seeming i'm
possibility he was given a face on the
back OF his head, with a crest of stiff
curls between the twofaces In this
guise he was just the right sort of
deity TO look after the beginnings and
ending of things, because he could
face the past and contemplate the flu
ture at the same time. 1t is not at
all probable that Caesar had this pic
ture Of the twO-faced deity in mind
when he gave the name TO the month
which he desired to have mark the
beginning of the year. He was fond
of the old order Of Latin gods and
customs. as opposed to the imported
Greek ideas, and he hOnored that old
order by placing the month sacred to
Janus at the top Of the new calendar.
That it did not remain permanently at
the top was not Caesars fault In
fact, there is almost nothing in the
world that has been shifted around as
much as has the, to us. rigidly fixed !
New Years Day. One half-baked /
biologist, who evidently did not know
that January had been tossed from the /
eleventh to the first place and back
again several times, worked out the
neatest little etymology for the word !
He derived it from the Latin "Janua,"
signifying "a door," because il was
the entrance of the year. This is
quite as fanciful as the etymology OF /
April, that is supposed TO come from
the Latin verb, aperio," which signi-
1es TO open," because in the month
of April the heavens are inclined to
open at the slightest provocation. This
derivation takes into account the purg-
ing or the earth by the rain. and so is
connected with our English word /
aperient, which is purgative.
However, this idea of the purgative
actually belongs to the month of Feb
ruary. which, in the early Roman cal
endar, was the last month of the year.
On the 10Th of that month occurred the
Feast OF Publication. a day sacred to
the old Etruscan deity, linus, who
was called Lupercus Februus, because
he was supposed to chase the wolves
away from the fiocks, or to purge the
pastures Of the shepherds deadly enc ]
my, the wolf The worship of linus
is older even than the story of Romu- !
JUS and Remus, with their wolf
mother, and in the early days in Etru- {
ria the least was accompanied by the S
onering OF human sacrifices to purge I
the people of their sins. In more f
civilized Rome the sacrifices consisted /
OF goats and dogs. II
1t was not until the middle of the d
eighteenth century that February t
found an abiding place as the second a
month OF the year. Up to that time r
1t had been tossed about a little more c
ruthlessly even than New-Years Day. ! {
AT one time 1t was the month pre- S
ceding January instead of the month
following it, and at several periods it {
has been the final month of the year. n
There is an old peasant superstition C
which dictates that blood purifiers S
should be taken during the month of v
February if one would have a healthy il
system and good complexion This v
idea is to be traced to a misunder- v
of the religious publication d
Dracticed in Rome on the 18th of this il
t,
The spring equinox, occurring on y
The 2lst of March, has again and again