Greek Months

This is a case of peering over my shoulder. I’m working with the Greek calendar at the moment. The problem is there is no Greek calendar, each city had its own calendar, and I can never remember the names of all the months, especially when months with the same name appear at different times in different calendars.

The list is not to be taken too seriously. I have doubts about some of these correlations. The standard assumption is that various calendars start at either a solstice or an equinox. Therefore every calendar can be portrayed as the equivalent of the Athenian calendar +n months. I don’t agree with that at the moment, but I need to prove it and this is a handy crib sheet to start from. The months are all on lunar calendars, so there’s certainly no neat correlation with modern months. The month of Hekatombaion in Athens could, I think start as early as mid-June and end as late as mid-August, though it would only be around thirty days in any one year.

The months that start the year are in bold.

Gregorian	Athens	Sparta	Delphi	Gela
June / August	Hekatombaion	Gakinthios / Hekatombeis	Apellaios	Panamos
July / September	Metageitnion	Heriaos	Boukatios	Dalios
August / October	Boedromion	Karneios	Boathoos	Thesmophorios
September / November	Pyanopsion	unknown	Heraios	Karneios
October / December	Maimakterion	unknown	Daidaphorios	Diosthios
November / January	Posideon	unknown	Poitropios	Theidaisios
December / February	Gamelion	Gerastios	Amalios	Peageitnios
January / March	Anthesterion	Artemitios	Bysios	Badromios
February / April	Elaphebolion	Laphrios or Lykeios	Theoxenios	Sminthios
March / May	Mounichion	Laphrios or Lykeios	Endouspoitropios	Artemitios
April / June	Thargelion	Phloiasios / Panamos	Heraklios	Agrianios
May / July	Skirophorion	Agrianios	Ilaios	Gaikinthios

The months come from Catherine Trümpy’s book on Greek calendars, which I highly recommend if you have an interest in Greek calendars and can read German.