''The Reckoning of Time'' ( la, De temporum ratione) is an

Anglo-Saxon The Anglo-Saxons were a Cultural identity, cultural group who inhabited England in the Early Middle Ages. They traced their origins to settlers who came to Britain from mainland Europe in the 5th century. However, the ethnogenesis of the Anglo- ...

era

treatise A treatise is a formal and systematic written discourse on some subject, generally longer and treating it in greater depth than an essay, and more concerned with investigating or exposing the principles of the subject and its conclusions."Treat ...

written in

Medieval Latin Medieval Latin was the form of Literary Latin used in Roman Catholic Western Europe during the Middle Ages. In this region it served as the primary written language, though local languages were also written to varying degrees. Latin functioned ...

by the

Northumbria la, Regnum Northanhymbrorum , conventional_long_name = Kingdom of Northumbria , common_name = Northumbria , status = State , status_text = Unified Anglian kingdom (before 876)North: Anglian kingdom (af ...

n monk

Bede Bede ( ; ang, Bǣda , ; 672/326 May 735), also known as Saint Bede, The Venerable Bede, and Bede the Venerable ( la, Beda Venerabilis), was an English monk at the monastery of St Peter and its companion monastery of St Paul in the Kingdom o ...

in 725. The treatise includes an introduction to the traditional ancient and medieval view of the cosmos, including an explanation of how the spherical Earth influenced the changing length of daylight, of how the seasonal motion of the Sun and

Moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width of ...

influenced the changing appearance of the

new moon In astronomy, the new moon is the first lunar phase, when the Moon and Sun have the same ecliptic longitude. At this phase, the lunar disk is not visible to the naked eye, except when it is silhouetted against the Sun during a solar eclipse. ...

at evening twilight, and a quantitative relation between the changes of the tides at a given place and the daily motion of the Moon. ''The Reckoning of Time'' describes the principal ancient calendars, including those of the

Hebrews The terms ''Hebrews'' (Hebrew: / , Modern: ' / ', Tiberian: ' / '; ISO 259-3: ' / ') and ''Hebrew people'' are mostly considered synonymous with the Semitic-speaking Israelites, especially in the pre-monarchic period when they were still no ...

, the

Egyptians Egyptians ( arz, المَصرِيُون, translit=al-Maṣriyyūn, ; arz, المَصرِيِين, translit=al-Maṣriyyīn, ; cop, ⲣⲉⲙⲛ̀ⲭⲏⲙⲓ, remenkhēmi) are an ethnic group native to the Nile, Nile Valley in Egypt. Egyptian ...

, the Romans, the

Greeks The Greeks or Hellenes (; el, Έλληνες, ''Éllines'' ) are an ethnic group and nation indigenous to the Eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea regions, namely Greece, Cyprus, Albania, Italy, Turkey, Egypt, and, to a lesser extent, oth ...

, and the

Anglo-Saxons The Anglo-Saxons were a Cultural identity, cultural group who inhabited England in the Early Middle Ages. They traced their origins to settlers who came to Britain from mainland Europe in the 5th century. However, the ethnogenesis of the Anglo- ...

.Wallis (2004:41-54;281–287 The focus of ' was calculation of the

date of Easter As a moveable feast, the date of Easter is determined in each year through a calculation known as (). Easter is celebrated on the first Sunday after the Paschal full moon, which is the first full moon on or after 21 March (a fixed approxi ...

, for which Bede described the method developed by

Dionysius Exiguus Dionysius Exiguus (Latin for "Dionysius the Humble", Greek: Διονύσιος; – ) was a 6th-century Eastern Roman monk born in Scythia Minor. He was a member of a community of Scythian monks concentrated in Tomis (present day Constanța, ...

. ' also gave instructions for calculating the date of the Easter

full moon The full moon is the lunar phase when the Moon appears fully illuminated from Earth's perspective. This occurs when Earth is located between the Sun and the Moon (when the ecliptic coordinate system, ecliptic longitudes of the Sun and Moon opp ...

, for calculating the motion of the Sun and Moon through the

zodiac The zodiac is a belt-shaped region of the sky that extends approximately 8° north or south (as measured in celestial latitude) of the ecliptic, the Sun path, apparent path of the Sun across the celestial sphere over the course of the year. ...

, and for many other calculations related to the calendar. Bede based his reasoning for the dates on the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''. Hebrew: ''Tān ...

. The functions of the universe and its purpose are generally referred to a scriptural foundation. According to the introduction by Faith Wallis in the 1999 English translated edition of ''The Reckoning of Time'', Bede aimed to write a Christian work that integrated the astronomical understanding of computing with a theological context of history. The book is also regarded by Bede to be a sequel to his works ''The Nature of Things'' and ''On Time''.

Sections

The work is divided into six sections:

Technical preparation (Chapters 1–4)

This section familiarizes the reader with terminology regarding measurements. In chapter 3 Bede defines a day as being 12 hours long. An hour consists of increments of ', ' and '. Each of which are small increments of time within the hour. The smallest increment of time is the atom.

The Julian calendar (Chapters 5–41)

Here, Bede gives an exhaustive overview of the date of the Earth's creation, the months, the weeks and the Moon. He argues that the first day did not, as it was generally believed, take place at the time of an equinox. According to the religious accounts of God's creation of the universe, light was created on the first day. It wasn't until the fourth day, however, that God created the stars and therefore there was no measurement of hours. Much of this section is devoted to the Moon. Bede goes into extensive detail about measuring the moon's cycles, the Moon's relationship to the Earth and Sun. Bede discusses the Moon's relationship to the tide and calculating '.

Anomalies of lunar reckoning (Chapters 42–43)

These two chapters pick up where the previous section left off on examining the irregularities of the Moon creating a leap year as well as why, according to Bede, the Moon appears older than it actually is.

The Paschal table (Chapters 44–65)

This section explores different year cycles that include varying numbers of months and days, determining the year cycle of Christ's incarnation, Easter, and other moon cycles.

The Major Chronicle (Chapter 66)

Bede gives an exhaustive description of the

Six Ages of the World The Six Ages of the World (Latin: ''sex aetates mundi''), also rarely Seven Ages of the World (Latin: ''septem aetates mundi''), is a Christian historical periodization first written about by Augustine of Hippo ''circa'' AD 400. It is based ...

. The "Major Chronicle" is the starting point for several later chronicles, such as the '' Chronicon universale usque ad annum 741'' and the ''

Chronicon Moissiacense The ''Chronicle of Moissac'' (also known as ''Chronicon Moissiacense'') is an anonymous compilation that was discovered in the abbey of Moissac, but is now thought to have been compiled in the Catalan monastery of Ripoll in the end of the tenth c ...

''. Bede details the First Age, from Adam to Noah, as being 1,656 years long according to the Hebrew Bible or 2,242 years according to the Septuagint. The Second Age, from Noah to Abraham, is 292 years or 272 years long based on Bede's evaluation of the Hebrew Bible and Septuagint respectively. The Third Age is said to be 942 years long according to both the Hebrew Bible and Septuagint spanning from Abraham to David. The Fourth age is from David until the Babylonian exile. This is 473 years according to the Hebrew Bible or 485 according to the Septuagint. The Fifth age is from the Babylonian exile to the advent of Christ. The Sixth age is the current age lasting from the advent of Christ until the end of days.

Prophecy (Chapters 67–71)

Finally, Bede goes on to discuss the end of the Sixth Age, the

Second Coming The Second Coming (sometimes called the Second Advent or the Parousia) is a Christian (as well as Islamic and Baha'i) belief that Jesus will return again after his ascension to heaven about two thousand years ago. The idea is based on messi ...

of Christ, the Antichrist, and

Judgement Day The Last Judgment, Final Judgment, Day of Reckoning, Day of Judgment, Judgment Day, Doomsday, Day of Resurrection or The Day of the Lord (; ar, یوم القيامة, translit=Yawm al-Qiyāmah or ar, یوم الدین, translit=Yawm ad-Dīn, ...

, and the Seventh and Eighth ages of the world to come.

Notes

References

* Jones, Charles W., ed. ''De temporum ratione'', in ''Bedae opera de temporibus'', Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Mediaeval Academy of America, 1943. * Jones, Charles W., ed. ''De temporum ratione'', in ''Bedae opera didascalia'' 2, Corpus Christianorum Series Latina, 123B, Turnhout: Brepols, 1997. * Wallis, Faith, trans.
Bede: The Reckoning of Time
', Liverpool: Liverpool Univ. Pr., 1999/2004. .

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Reckoning of Time, The Time in religion Easter date Calendars Works by Bede 8th-century Latin books 725 8th century in England