History: Ides of March
Gordon Jackson recalls that today is the Ides of March:Today's date brought to mind a March 15 some years ago when I was teaching French and reminded my students of the anniversary of Julius Caesar's demise. . As Caesar was making his way to the Senate, someone slipped him a note warning him of the plot. Caesar already had a handful of notes and added the new one to them, intending to read it later. RH: As far as Caesar knew, the Ides were just another day.The soothsayer's warning to Julius Caesar, "Beware the Ides of March," has imbued that date with a sense of foreboding. But in Roman times the expression "Ides of March" was simply the standard way of saying "March 15." The term Ides comes from the earliest Roman calendar, whose inventor had a penchant for complexity. The Roman calendar organized its months around three days, each of which served as a reference point for counting the other days:
- Kalends (1st day of the month) Nones (the 7th day in March, May, July, and October; the 5th in the other months)
- Ides (the 15th day in March, May, July, and October; the 13th in the other months)
The remaining, unnamed days of the month were identified by counting backwards from the Kalends, Nones, or the Ides. For example, March 3 would be V Nones,5 days before the Nones (the Roman method of counting days was inclusive; in other words, the Nones would be counted as one of the 5 days).
Ronald Hilton 2005
last updated:
April 16, 2005