Sunday: A Proposed Plan For An Invariable Calendar

[bystander]

A Proposed Plan For An Invariable Calendar
Sunday Magazine | 26 June 2010

I've always liked this idea.

A PROPOSED PLAN FOR AN INVARIABLE CALENDAR:
Prof. L. A. Grosclaude Offers an Interesting Suggestion
to Solve the Troubles of the Present Division of Days
(Credit: New York Times Sunday Magazine | 26 June 1910)

By 1910, most of the world had adopted the Gregorian calendar that we use today, although several major nations still had not (including China, Russia, Greece, Turkey, and others). An international meeting was held in London to consider the possibility of a new calendar. It was meant to solve the problem of not easily knowing what day of the week a particular date falls on. Several proposals were put forth:

• Prof. Grosclaude proposed that the quarters should be composed of ninety-one days each, as this number is divisible by seven, each quarter being thus composed of thirteen weeks exactly. The two first months of each quarter would have each thirty days and the third one thirty-one. This gives us in all for the year 364 days.
  
  Prof. Grosclaude, however, proposed to intercalate between Dec. 31 and Jan. 1 a day to be called New Year’s Day, and for leap years he would place another day between June 31 and July 1, which he would call “Leap Day.”
  
  Concerning the subdivision of the year into smaller unities various views had been put forward, according to the manner in which the number 364 could be decomposed.
  
  Some had proposed thirteen months of four weeks; others would have preferred fifty-two weeks without reference to months. Prof. Grosclaude proposed, as indicated, four quarters of thirteen weeks each, as he believed that the other suggestions would cause even more inconvenience than those of the old calendar, introducing a “complete disarray of our habits,” and in the former case would necessitate new names for the months and would bring many complications into commercial calculations.

I kind of like Grosclaude’s idea. But it’s weird to think of New Year’s Day and Leap Day as being distinct from days of the week. That is, you wouldn’t say Leap Day falls on a Monday, but rather that it comes between Sunday and Monday.

See also: World Calendar

[neufer]

This is related to the old idea that
a deck of cards represented a year:

4 suits of 13 cards each = 4 seasons of 13 weeks each

Total # of dots in each suit = 91 (days)
= 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 + 6 + 7 + 8 + 9 + 10 + 11 + 12 + 13

Total # of dots in all four suit = 364 (days)
[with the Joker providing the extra "intercalary" day?].
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Alternatively, there is the Celtic Tree Calendar:
13 numbered cards of 4 suits each = 13 months of 4 weeks each

<<Celtic Lunar Astrology is essentially a Druid Zodiac. The Druids were a sect of Celtic priests who inhabited the British Isles around 1000 B.C. The Druids used a lunar calendar consisting of 13 months, each being 28 days long, plus one intercalary day. The Druid religion was based mainly upon an awareness of natural and supernatural energies. These energies were identified with spirits or dryads who dwelt within the ancient trees. Druids believed that trees were given spirits and attributes from the Sun, which was perceived as a symbol of the Supreme Being. Thus, trees were considered living entities, possessed with Infinite Knowledge and Wisdom...symbolically representative of the Cycle of Life, Death and Renewal.

The Celts envisioned the entire Universe in the form of a tree, whose roots grew deep into the ground and whose branches reached high into the Heavens. In time, the Celtic people eventually designated a tree to each Moon Phase in their calendar in accordance with its magical properties. Therefore, the Celtic Zodiac is based upon the cycle of the Moon, with the year divided into the 13 lunar months established by the Druid religion.

The Druids believed that the human race originally descended from trees, each tree being endowed with its own particular mystical qualities. They encoded these mysteries in a secret shamanic alphabet known as the Ogham...the origin of which is ascribed to Ogma, the Celtic God of Poetry and Eloquence. It is said that Ogma (son of the Dagda) created the Ogham for the learned and wise to use for inscription. Originally intended to be read from the bottom upwards (or occasionally carved from right to left), Ogham (also often written as "ogam") is pronounced as "AHG-m" or simply as "OH-em." It served as an alphabet for one of the ancient Celtic languages and may have originally been adapted from a form of sign language. The current understanding is that the names of the twenty major letters are also the names of twenty trees which were sacred to the Druids. The Ogham may still be seen carved into stone monuments of the Druid Era and is thought to have been a means for the Druids to leave secret messages for one another. The Ogham is sometimes referred to as "Crane Knowledge," due to the fact that Cranes form letters with their legs as they fly. On the whole, the Celtic society was based upon equality and balance between the male and female...the female Druidesses being symbolized by the Dryads who lived in the sacred trees.

Each Celtic Tree/Zodiac Sign corresponds to a given tree, a letter of the Ogham alphabet, a Guardian Animal, a Celtic God and other items such as gemstones.>>

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The dating of the Celtic Tree Calendar--as devised by Robert Graves and subsequently used by many--is as follows:

• 
  * Beth (Birch) December 24 to January 20
  * Luis (Rowan) January 21 to February 17
  * Nion (Ash) February 18 to March 17
  * Fearn (Alder) March 18 to April 14
  * Saille (Willow) April 15 to May 12
  * Uath (Hawthorn) May 13 to June 9
  * Duir (Oak) June 10 to July 7
  * Tinne (Holly) July 8 to August 4
  * Coll (Hazel) August 5 to September 1
  * Muin (Vine) September 2 to September 29
  * Gort (Ivy) September 30 to October 27
  * Ngetal (Reed) October 28 to November 24
  * Ruis (Elder) November 25 to December 22
  
  * December 23 is not ruled by any tree for it is the traditional day
  of the proverbial "Year and a Day" in the earliest courts of law.

[bystander]

Alternatively, there is the Celtic Tree Calendar:
13 numbered cards of 4 suits each = 13 months of 4 weeks each

• I don't like the 13 month idea at all.
  
  4 quarters (seasons, if you wish).
  91 days (13 weeks) in each quarter,
  divided into 3 months (30, 30, 31).
  Every quarter begins on Monday.
  
  This idea just makes too much sense.
  That is why it will never be adopted.