<story><title>Julius Caesar&apos;s Year of Confusion</title><url>https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20240227-how-julius-caesar-made-the-longest-year-in-history-and-brought-us-leap-years</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>jjtheblunt</author><text>What&amp;#x27;s &amp;quot;weird&amp;quot; is i think we were taught in school that July and August were added by the Caesars (with their names), causing the 2 month shift you mention.  Now i wonder where that idea came from, after this neat article.</text></item><item><author>jihadjihad</author><text>Nobody ever explained in school that the reason the numbers in the names of September, October, November, and December (7, 8, 9, 10) don&amp;#x27;t match up to their actual month number (9, 10, 11, 12) is because the Roman calendar began in March, not January. If you start from March, they line up perfectly. It also explains why the seemingly arbitrary choice of storing the extra leap day in February makes sense--just tack it onto the end!</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>perihelions</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s weird our calendar is named after actual people. The 1st French Republic briefly reversed this, but their solution didn&amp;#x27;t have staying power,&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;French_Republican_calendar#Months&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;French_Republican_calendar#Mon...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;I wish everyone on HN a happy &amp;quot;Windy&amp;quot;! :)&lt;p&gt;edit: Oh a cool fact in this tangent: the astronomer who discovered Planet 7 &lt;i&gt;attempted&lt;/i&gt; to name it after a human—his patron, the British monarch George III. That would be an entertaining alternate history if it had gone that way!&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Uranus#Name&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Uranus#Name&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>Julius Caesar&apos;s Year of Confusion</title><url>https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20240227-how-julius-caesar-made-the-longest-year-in-history-and-brought-us-leap-years</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>jjtheblunt</author><text>What&amp;#x27;s &amp;quot;weird&amp;quot; is i think we were taught in school that July and August were added by the Caesars (with their names), causing the 2 month shift you mention.  Now i wonder where that idea came from, after this neat article.</text></item><item><author>jihadjihad</author><text>Nobody ever explained in school that the reason the numbers in the names of September, October, November, and December (7, 8, 9, 10) don&amp;#x27;t match up to their actual month number (9, 10, 11, 12) is because the Roman calendar began in March, not January. If you start from March, they line up perfectly. It also explains why the seemingly arbitrary choice of storing the extra leap day in February makes sense--just tack it onto the end!</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>erehweb</author><text>Also of interest - the Senate offered to rename November for Tiberius, but he declined, saying &amp;quot;What will you do if you have 13 Caesars?&amp;quot; (Cited from: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.cointalk.com&amp;#x2F;threads&amp;#x2F;welcome-to-tiberius%E2%80%99month.349424&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.cointalk.com&amp;#x2F;threads&amp;#x2F;welcome-to-tiberius%E2%80%9...&lt;/a&gt;)</text></comment>