A royal family deposed, the eradication of royal and religious references, people power, a Queen who almost escaped to America, the start of the Napoleonic era – the French Revolution was a period of terror and of turmoil, of civil war and neighbour versus neighbour. It also led to new legal and social reforms, the unification of France and a metric system. And, it led to a new calendar structure. Janine Marsh investigates...
The French Republican Calendar
At the beginning of the year a friend who lives in the far south of France emailed me a picture of a calendar left as a gift in his post box by the mayor who had in fact given one out to everyone in the very small village. Nothing odd about that you might think. But – it was a reproduction of a French Republican Calendar and it bears little resemblance to today’s calendars.
The French Republic was established in 1792, three years after the start of the French Revolution. The members of the new Republican Government didn’t just deal with wiping out the royal family and as many nobles as they could, it was also about establishing a new order of equality and unity.
You were no longer Monsieur or Madame, but Citoyen or Citoyenne. Regional divisions were reorganised. And the traditional Gregorian calendar with its seven day week and Saints Days and Christian festivals was eliminated.
Instead a secular calendar was established – and it had a ten day week: primidi (first day), duodi (second day), tridi (third day), quartidi (fourth day etc.), quintidi, sextidi, septidi, octidi, nonidi and décadi.
Months were three weeks long. The end of the year was Fructidor which had 5 supplementary days to make the total add up to 365 days (as per the old calendar).
The French Republican Calendar