Mensis Aprilis
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

''Aprilis'' or ''mensis Aprilis'' (
April April is the fourth month of the year in the Gregorian and Julian calendars. It is the first of four months to have a length of 30 days, and the second of five months to have a length of less than 31 days. April is commonly associated with ...
) was the second month of the ancient
Roman calendar The Roman calendar was the calendar used by the Roman Kingdom and Roman Republic. The term often includes the Julian calendar established by the reforms of the Roman dictator, dictator Julius Caesar and Roman emperor, emperor Augustus in the ...
, following ''
Martius Martius may refer to: * Martius (month) the month of March on the ancient Roman calendar * Campus Martius, the "Field of Mars" in ancient Rome * Telo Martius, an ancient name for Toulon, France People * Carl Friedrich Philipp von Martius (1794–1 ...
'' ( March) and preceding ''
Maius ''Maius'' or ''mensis Maius'' (May) was the third month of the ancient Roman calendar, following ''Aprilis'' (April) and preceding ''Iunius'' (June). On the oldest Roman calendar that had begun with March, it was the third of ten months in the year ...
'' (
May May is the fifth month of the year in the Julian and Gregorian calendars and is the third of seven months to have a length of 31 days. May is a month of spring in the Northern Hemisphere, and autumn in the Southern Hemisphere. Therefore, May ...
). On the oldest Roman calendar that had begun with March, ''Aprilis'' was the second of ten months in the year. April had 29 days on calendars of the Roman Republic, with a day added to the month during the reform in the mid-40s BC that produced the Julian calendar. April was marked by a series of festivals devoted to aspects of rural life, since it was a busy month for farmers. As Rome became more urbanized, the significance of some ceremonies expanded, notably the
Parilia upright=1.5, ''Festa di Pales, o L'estate'' (1783), a reimagining of the Festival of Pales by Joseph-Benoît Suvée The Parilia is an ancient Roman festival of rural character performed annually on 21 April, aimed at cleansing both sheep and sh ...
, an archaic
pastoral A pastoral lifestyle is that of shepherds herding livestock around open areas of land according to seasons and the changing availability of water and pasture. It lends its name to a genre of literature, art, and music (pastorale) that depicts ...
festival celebrated as the "birthday" ''( dies natalis)'' or founding day of Rome. The month was generally preoccupied with deities who were female or ambiguous in gender, opening with the Feast of Venus on the Kalends.


Name of the month

The Romans thought that the name ''Aprilis'' derived from ''aperio, aperire, apertus'', a verb meaning "to open". The ''
Fasti Praenestini In ancient Rome, the ''fasti'' (Latin plural) were chronological or calendar-based lists, or other diachronic records or plans of official and religiously sanctioned events. After Rome's decline, the word ''fasti'' continued to be used for simil ...
'' offered the expanded explanation that "fruits and flowers and animals and seas and lands do open". Some
antiquarians An antiquarian or antiquary () is an aficionado or student of antiquities or things of the past. More specifically, the term is used for those who study history with particular attention to ancient artifacts, archaeological and historic si ...
, as well as Ovid in his poem on the Roman calendar, provide an alternate derivation from ''Aphrodite'', the Greek counterpart of Venus whose festival began the month. ''Apru'' might be derived from the conjectured
Etruscan __NOTOC__ Etruscan may refer to: Ancient civilization *The Etruscan language, an extinct language in ancient Italy *Something derived from or related to the Etruscan civilization **Etruscan architecture **Etruscan art **Etruscan cities **Etruscan ...
form of the name, which would be ''Aprodita'', but among the Etruscans, the month was called ''Cabreas''. Some modern linguists derive ''Aprilis'' from Etruscan ''Ampile'' or ''Amphile'', based on a medieval gloss, conjecturing an origin in the Thessalian month name ''Aphrios''. An Indo-European origin has also been proposed, related to Sanskrit ''áparah'' and Latin ''alter'', "the other of two", referring to its original position as the second month of the year. Varro and Cincius both reject the connection of the name to ''Aphrodite'', and the common Roman derivation from ''aperio'' may be the correct one. In the latter years of Nero's reign, the
Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...
briefly renamed April ''Neronius'' in his honor.


In the agricultural year

The farmers' almanacs ''( menologia rustica)'' concur that Venus—in
Roman religion Religion in ancient Rome consisted of varying imperial and provincial religious practices, which were followed both by the people of Rome as well as those who were brought under its rule. The Romans thought of themselves as highly religious, ...
a goddess of gardens—was the tutelary deity of April, and that sheep were to be purified ''(oves lustrantur)''. In his agricultural treatise, Varro enumerates duties such as weeding crops, breaking ground, cutting willows, fencing meadows, and planting and pruning olives. The second half of April brought a series of festivals pertaining to farm life: * April 15:
Fordicidia In ancient Roman religion, the Fordicidia was a festival of fertility, held on the Ides of April (April 15), that pertained to farming and animal husbandry. It involved the sacrifice of a pregnant cow to Tellus, the ancient Roman goddess of the E ...
, a festival of agricultural fertility and
animal husbandry Animal husbandry is the branch of agriculture concerned with animals that are raised for meat, fibre, milk, or other products. It includes day-to-day care, selective breeding, and the raising of livestock. Husbandry has a long history, starti ...
; * 21:
Parilia upright=1.5, ''Festa di Pales, o L'estate'' (1783), a reimagining of the Festival of Pales by Joseph-Benoît Suvée The Parilia is an ancient Roman festival of rural character performed annually on 21 April, aimed at cleansing both sheep and sh ...
, a feast of shepherds; * 23: Vinalia, one of two wine festivals (the other was held August 19) in the religious year; * 25:
Robigalia The Robigalia was a festival in ancient Roman religion held April 25, named for the god Robigus. Its main ritual was a dog sacrifice to protect grain fields from disease. Games (''ludi'') in the form of "major and minor" races were held. The Robi ...
to protect crops from blight. Of these, the Fordicidia and Robigalia are likely to have been of greatest antiquity. William Warde Fowler, whose early 20th-century work on Roman festivals remains a standard reference, asserted that the Fordicidia was "beyond doubt one of the oldest sacrificial rites in Roman religion." The latter part of April was consumed by games ''( ludi)'' in honor of
Ceres Ceres most commonly refers to: * Ceres (dwarf planet), the largest asteroid * Ceres (mythology), the Roman goddess of agriculture Ceres may also refer to: Places Brazil * Ceres, Goiás, Brazil * Ceres Microregion, in north-central Goiás st ...
, the grain goddess thought to have power over growth and the life cycle. The end of the month brought the beginning of the games of Flora, goddess of blooming plants and listed by Varro as one of the twelve principal
agricultural deities Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people to ...
.


Dates

The Romans did not number days of a month sequentially from the 1st through the last day. Instead, they counted back from the three fixed points of the month: the
Nones Nones may refer to: * ''Nones'' (Auden), a 1951 book of poems by W. H. Auden * ''Nones'' (Berio), a 1954 orchestral composition by Luciano Berio *Nones (calendar), or ''Nonae'', days of the Roman Calendar *None (liturgy), the ninth hour of the trad ...
(5th or 7th), the Ides (13th or 15th), and the Kalends (1st) of the following month. The Nones of April was the 5th, and the Ides the 13th. The last day of April was the ''pridie Kalendas Maias,'' "day before the Kalends of May". Roman counting was inclusive; April 9 was ''ante diem V Idūs Aprilis'', "the 5th day before the Ides of April," usually abbreviated ''a.d. V Id. Apr.'' (or with the ''a.d.'' omitted altogether); April 23 was ''IX Kal. Mai.'', "the 9th day before the Kalends of May," on the Julian calendar ''(VIII Kal. Mai.'' on the pre-Julian calendar). On the calendar of the Roman Republic and early Principate, each day was marked with a letter to denote its religiously lawful status. In April, these were: * F for '' dies fasti'', days when it was legal to initiate action in the courts of civil law; * C, for ''dies comitalis,'' a day on which the Roman people could hold assemblies ''( comitia)'', elections, and certain kinds of judicial proceedings; * N for ''
dies nefasti The Roman calendar was the calendar used by the Roman Kingdom and Roman Republic. The term often includes the Julian calendar established by the reforms of the dictator Julius Caesar and emperor Augustus in the late 1stcenturyBC and sometimes ...
'', when these political activities and the administration of justice were prohibited; * NP, the meaning of which remains elusive, but which marked '' feriae'', public holidays; By the late 2nd century AD, extant calendars no longer show days marked with these letters, probably in part as a result of calendar reforms undertaken by Marcus Aurelius. Days were also marked with
nundinal letters The nundinae (), sometimes anglicized to nundines,. were the market days of the ancient Roman calendar, forming a kind of weekend including, for a certain period, rest from work for the ruling class ( patricians). The nundinal cycle, market ...
in cycles of ''A B C D E F G H'', to mark the "market week" (these are omitted in the table below). A '' dies natalis'' was an anniversary such as a temple founding or rededication, sometimes thought of as the "birthday" of a deity. During the Imperial period, some of the traditional festivals localized at Rome became less important, and the birthdays and anniversaries of the emperor and his family gained prominence as Roman holidays. On the calendar of military religious observances known as the ''
Feriale Duranum The ''Feriale Duranum'' is a calendar of religious observances for a Roman military garrison at Dura-Europos on the Euphrates, Roman Syria, under the reign of Severus Alexander (224–235 AD). History and description The small papyrus roll w ...
'', sacrifices pertaining to Imperial cult outnumber the older festivals. After the mid-1st century AD, a number of dates are added to calendars for spectacles and games ''( ludi)'' held in honor of various deities in the venue called a " circus" ''(ludi circenses)''. Festivals marked in large letters on extant ''fasti'', represented by festival names in all capital letters on the table, are thought to have been the most ancient holidays, becoming part of the calendar before 509 BC.Scullard, ''Festivals and Ceremonies of the Roman Republic'', p. 41. Unless otherwise noted, the dating and observances on the following table are from
H.H. Scullard Howard Hayes Scullard (9 February 1903 – 31 March 1983) was a British historian specialising in ancient history, notable for editing the ''Oxford Classical Dictionary'' and for his many published works. Scullard's father was Herbert Hayes S ...
, ''Festivals and Ceremonies of the Roman Republic'' (Cornell University Press, 1981), pp. 96–115. After the Ides, dates for the Julian calendar are given; the pre-Julian date for festivals, when April had one less day, are noted parenthetically.


References

{{italic title April Months of the Roman calendar