In the medieval time did they have months?

Answer 1

AnswerYes/no. The Romans created the calendar that we have today, but it was lost in the middle ages. Time was in seasons and night and day. People measured time differently than we do. We have gotten down to a second to wait for something is too long. but then if something took a year to make that is what it took. Holidays added to the sense of time or events like floods, drought, wars, and other things were marked when they happened, but they didn't look at in days, weeks, or months. They really had no reason to worry about what month they were in. Could the crop be planted? Was it time to reap? Winter is coming so it is time to store more food. These sort of things were how time was measured. AnswerYes, there were months in the Middle Ages, and their order, their names, and the numbers of days they had, were the same as those of the Roman Empire. Many of the dates of the Middle Ages were recorded in exactly the same way we record dates today. For example, the Magna Carta was dated, "Given at Westminster on the eleventh day of February in the ninth year of our reign." There is a link below to a translation of the Magna Carta.

There were parts of the Roman calendar that were lost in the Middle Ages, but the months were not lost, and the lost parts were not recovered, for which we can be thankful. One of the lost parts was naming the year after the consuls of the year instead of using a number based on a single date. Years were numbered, but according to a fifteen year cycle used for tax reassessments, and these were named after the emperor of the time.

During the Middle Ages, the Julian calendar was used, and in terms of months, it was nearly identical to the calendar we use today. The dates of Church holidays were far too important to allow the calendar to be lost. One of the most important calculations done regularly during the period was the computus, which was the calculation of the calendar date of Easter. Also, during the Middle Ages the system we use based on anno domini, or the current era, was introduced. There is a link below to an article on computus.

One known problem of the Middle Ages is that the practices of starting the year on January 1 was not universal. In some places, at some times, the year was started on December 25, March 25, or some other date. By the end of the Middle Ages, January 1 was nearly universally used as the beginning of the year. There is a link below to a section of an article on the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle that deals with this problem.

Answer 2

That depends which country you happened to be, the precise time period and often your status in society. Europe was a huge collection of languages and dialects that evolved during the medieval period.

For example, let's take a Saxon peasant in a village in Kent, England during the 9th century. He spoke Old English and his names for the months were:

Æftera Jéola = January

Sol-mónaþ = February

Hréð-mónaþ = March

Eostur-mónaþ = April

Ærra Líða = May

Þrimilki-mónaþ = June

Æftera Líða = July

Weod-mónaþ = August

Hálig-mónaþ = September

Win-mónaþ = October

Blót-mónaþ = November

Ærra Jéola = December

Move forward 500 years to the 14th century and a peasant living in that same part of Kent would not be able to understand any of those terms; language had changed immensely. He now spoke Middle English and his names for the months were:

Januarie

Februarius

Marche

Averil

Maius

Jun

Julie

Augustus

Septembre

October

November

Decembre

A nobleman in that same area in the 12th century spoke Anglo-Norman French and used these names:

Janvier

Februare

March

Avril

Mai

Juin

Juil

Aust

Septembre

Octobre

Novembre

December

Languages, and therefore the names of Months, were completely different from any of these in Wales, Cornwall, Scotland, Ireland, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Flanders and other parts of Europe.