48. Indictions
THE RECKONING OF TIME
48. INDICTIONS
The second row [ordo] of the 19-year cycle contains the indictions, which always retrace their own footsteps in a cycle of 15 years. We have learned that these [indictions] were established by the ancient diligence of the Romans in order to guard against error which might perhaps arise concerning chronology. /434/ When, for example, a certain emperor lays down his life or his kingdom in the middle of the year, it might come about that one historian would assign that year to the time of that king, because he reigned during part of it, while another historian would consider that it ought rather to be assigned to his successor, in that he also ruled during part of it. Lest an error be introduced into the chronology through discrepancy of this type, [the Romans] decreed the indictions, by which scribes and even the common people might readily preserve the integral £ow of time. They wished as well that there might be 15 [indictions] for the sake of ease of calculation, so that by a simple number, easy to multiply, the status of past time might more advantageously be reduced to memory. However, some think that because formerly, in Republican times, the city of Rome used to be puri¢ed after the census was ¢nished in the ¢fth year, indictions were created to indicate the third puri¢cation and census. Indictions begin on the 8th kalends of October [24 September] and end on the same day.
49. FORMULA FOR FINDING THE INDICTION
By means of this formula, you will ¢nd what the indiction is for any year you wish to compute. Take the years from the Incarnation /435/ of our
Lord, however many they may be: for instance, the present year 725.
Always add 3, because according to Dionysius our Lord was born in the fourth indiction; this makes 728. Divide this by 15: 15 times 40 is 600, 15 times 8 are 120, and there are 8 left over. It is the eighth indiction. If nothing is left over, it is the 15th indiction.35
50. LUNAR EPACTS
The third column [linea] of the aforementioned cycle contains the lunar epacts, which every year habitually exceed the course of the Sun by 11
35 Dionysius Exiguus, Argumenta titulorum paschalium 2 (75). Note that this formula, as well as those in chs. 52 and 54, indicates that the year of composition of The Reckoning of Time was 725.
TRANSLATION
days. Hence [these days] are called by the Greek word ''epacts'', that is, ''additions'', for as we said, they are accumulated by the addition of 11 days every year; or else they are appropriately called ''epacts'', that is
''additions'', because in order to discover the age of the Moon on the kalends [of the] twelve [months], they are added together throughout the year, as we taught [above].36
In fact, each day throughout the entire circle of the revolving year has its 11 lunar ''additions''. For example, if as I write today the Moon is ¢ve days old, on this same day one year from now the Moon /436/ will be 16 days old; after two years, 27 days old; after three years, 8 days old; nor does it revert to what it is now until the cycle of 19 years is ¢nished. But the epacts noted in the 19-year cycle speci¢cally stand for the age of the Moon on the 11th kalends of April [22 March], the beginning of the Paschal feast. The [epacts] always observe this rule in connection with [the Moon's] course: whenever they are less than the number 16, they announce the Paschal lunation, but whenever they are more, they direct us to look for Easter in the next lunation. This is because the fullness of the Paschal Moon ought not to precede the equinox, but rather should follow it, as was ordained in the beginning of Creation when the Sun
¢rst rose at the beginning of the day, holding to the spring equinox, and the Moon therefore rose at the beginning of the night, occupying the sector of the autumn equinox.37
Hence it is plain that they make a great mistake who decide that the 36 uel certe quia ad inueniendas quotae sint lunas kalendarum XII per totum adiciuntur annum, ut supra docuimus . . . (435.5^7). Bede's reference to a previous discussion clearly shows that he is referring to the formula explained in ch. 20 for ¢nding the age of the Moon on the kalends of each of the twelve months of the year ^ a formula which uses annual epacts and monthly lunar regulars. Some medieval MSS corrected the ¢gure XII to XI, thus transforming it into a date: the 11th kalends [of April], or 22 March, i.e. the day from which the epacts are counted, and which Bede names a few lines later. Curiously, it also confused Jones (BOT 385), who likewise thought that Bede was referring to a date, but who accepted the reading kalendarum XII, i.e. 21 March. In Jones' view, this date re- £ects Bede's idea that the beginning of the tropical year is the starting-point of all astronomical calculation. Bede does allude to this ''natural calculation'' from time to time in The Reckoning of Time, and it is a major theme in the Letter to Wicthed, where it helps to explain why ps.-Anatolius places the equinox on 22 March. But Bede deliberately left the awkward issue of Anatolius' equinox out of The Reckoning of Time as it would have only served to confuse his students. Moreover, Jones' theory ignores the clause ut supra docuimus.
37 Cf. ch. 6 and ch. 43.