Why Do Months Have Strange Names: Improve Your English & Find Out! Ep 799
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Hi there, and welcome to this podcast from Adept English. Let's have a look today at something that you learn in your first English lessons, the months of the year, the calendar, in other words. But let's make it more interesting. Where do the names of the months come from? What's their history?

And what's the history of our calendar? That's C-A-L-E-N-D-A-R. In many languages and countries where the same calendar is used, the names of the months are similar to what they are in English.

And in some countries of the world, completely different calendars are used. So this is a classic English lesson from Adept English. We cover the basics like the months of the year, but with their history and some interesting twists to keep you listening. Let's investigate the calendar today. If you listen to this podcast, not only will your English improve, but I guarantee you'll learn some interesting facts that you didn't know. ♪

Hello, I'm Hilary and you're listening to Adept English. We will help you to speak English fluently. All you have to do is listen. So start listening now and find out how it works.

If you can tell that your English is improving because you're listening to the podcast, then think about our subscription service. It costs very little to sign up. You can do that through Spotify or Apple Podcasts for iPhone users, but you can listen on a number of platforms. You get eight subscription episodes per month and they're on a wonderful variety of topics. Just last Friday, the Puzzle

of early memory. Why don't we remember anything about the time when we were babies? These topics and many more are just waiting for you to sign up for our subscription service. Details are, of course, on our website, adeptenglish.com. So today, the calendar that we use in the UK, in English-speaking countries...

in Europe and much of the rest of the world. First of all, this basic English learning is best done, like many things, by reciting, by repeating. You probably learn the days of the week this way as well. So the months of the year in English are, say them with me, January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September,

September, October, November and December. You probably know those, but it's worth repeating them if you don't. So, this calendar is used in most places in the world, at least as a civil or official calendar.

even if other calendars are used as well. Strictly speaking, it's called the Gregorian calendar. And this is because the most recent changes to it were made in the 16th century in the time of

Pope Gregory XIII. So we're talking about a time when the Catholic Church decided such things. Before the Gregorian calendar, it was the Julian calendar, called after Julius Caesar, and it was very similar.

But in the time of Pope Gregory XIII, in the 1500s, it had been noticed that the Julian calendar was getting a bit out of step, a bit out of sync with the years. The days and the ways of counting years were not quite aligned, not agreeing with the planets and the day lengths.

So a change was made around leap years. That's L-E-A-P. Most of us are aware of leap years because we add an extra day. We have a 29th of February once every four years. That's a leap year.

But the new rule, which was cleverly set in 1582, making the new Gregorian calendar was as follows. Every year that divides exactly by four is a leap year, except for the years that divide exactly by 100, which are not leap years, unless those years divide also by 400. So that meant that the years 1700,

1800, 1900 were not leap years, but the year 2000 was a leap year because it divided evenly by 400. Gosh, much more complicated than I'd thought, but well done to those 16th century astronomers for working that out.

And what they arrived at still works today, of course. So that was the most recent change, creating the Gregorian calendar. But before that, the Julian calendar was in widespread use. And this is still what our calendar today is based upon.

It's where our months get their names from. So coming from the same place, of course, the city of Rome in Italy, but from a very different regime, that of the Roman Empire. That's what determined the Julian calendar. So what happened to create the Julian calendar? Well, before this, the Roman calendar did not

have 365 or 366 days in a year. They had, in fact, a variable number of days. And as you might imagine, this wasn't working. Things were getting out of step, out of sync. So the big change that Julius Caesar made to create the Julian calendar was

was to standardise the length of the year to 365 or 366 days. This helped the calendar line up better with planetary movements. That was clever then. A solar calendar or a

calendar based on the movement of the sun. And this was all on the advice of a Greek astronomer called Sosigenes, who told Julius Caesar that the Egyptians had it right with 365 or 366 days in a year. And the Julian calendar came into force on the 1st of January, 45 BC.

or 45 BCE, if you want to be politically correct. So the Julian calendar was better and more accurate than what went before. And of course, as I said, there was a slight discrepancy which was corrected

by the Gregorian calendar in 1582. One of the things which puzzled me when I was learning European languages at school, why does the ninth month, September, sound like the seventh month with the S-E-P-T at the start? If you know the numbers in Latin or Latin languages, then O-C-T, as in the start of October, sounds like the eighth month.

NOV as in the start of November, the ninth month, and DEC as in the start of December. Well, that sounds like the 10th month, even though it's the 12th. Well, the answer is that way before Julius Caesar, the Roman calendar started in March, which makes the seventh month, September, a

etc. And apparently it was King Numa Pompilius who added two months around 700 BC, Januarius or January and Februarius or February. That's why the month names don't agree with their numbers or their word origins. Another change much later, the fifth month was called

Quintilis, and this was named Julius or July in 44 BC in honour of Julius Caesar. That's when his birthday was. And August, originally called Sextilis or the sixth month, was renamed Sextilis

Augustus or August in 8 BC in honour of Augustus Caesar because the month of August was when he rose to power. So it took many centuries and much understanding of astronomy to arrive at our modern Gregorian calendar, which does now actually work and keeps us aligned with the sun and the moon and the seasons.

What about the names of the months, though? Well, as I've described, the months towards the end of the year, September, October, November, December, mean literally the 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th months, even though they aren't. And the original names for July and August, Quintilis and Sextilis, meant the 5th and 6th months. But what about the first six months of the year? How did they get their names?

Well, January, as I said, was added by King Numa Pompilius in 700 BC and Yudas,

And Januarius is called after the Roman god Janus, J-A-N-U-S in English. The god Janus was the Roman god of doorways and has two heads, one looking backwards, one looking forwards. And this fits well with our modern idea of January being the start of the year when we both look backwards and look forwards to the new year.

February is called after the Roman festival of purification, Februa, during which people were ritually washed. March is called after the Roman god of war, Mars. And April, Aprilis in Latin, well, its name is a little more uncertain, but it's probably called after the Latin verb apurire.

meaning to open, and related to the opening of flowers and buds in April. May, Maius, M-A-I-U-S in Latin, is called after Maya, a Roman earth goddess associated with fertility and growth. Lots of that happens in spring, in May, so that makes sense. And June,

Well, it's always good to appease the wife of the king of the gods, Jupiter. So Juno gave her name to the month of June.

And there are so many other calendars of the world. A bit of a list here: There's the Hindu calendar, the Buddhist calendar, the Islamic calendar, the Hebrew calendar or Jewish calendar, the Persian calendar, the Chinese calendar, the Baha'i calendar, the Tamil calendar, the Coptic calendar, the Ethiopian calendar,

and the Mayan calendar. So the Gregorian calendar is far from the only one. Many countries of the world use their own traditional calendar alongside the Gregorian calendar as the civil or official calendar. For example, North Korea has its own North Korean calendar. Taiwan uses the Mingguo calendar and Japan uses a Japanese calendar.

Thailand has its own Thai solar calendar, this one with names which relate to what we would recognise as the signs of the zodiac. For example, April is the month of the ram, like Aries. May is the month of the bull, like Taurus. And June is the month of the pear.

pair, like the twins Gemini. That's recognisable to most of us then. Another fascinating fact, in India before 1955, there were some 30 different calendars in use, reflecting the different religions, cultures and languages in India. The Indian National Calendar was adopted in 1957, again with months

named after what we would recognise as zodiac signs, but this time with the names in the Sanskrit language. This is known as the Sakar or Shakar calendar.

In Iran and Afghanistan, they don't use the Gregorian calendar, but instead share the solar Hijri calendar for administrative and religious purposes. Similarly, Nepal uses the Vikram Samvat calendar and Ethiopia uses its own Ethiopian calendar. Israel uses the Hebrew calendar as well as the Gregorian one, and Bangladesh uses the Bangla calendar.

There are so many different calendars around the world. It makes me want to research and understand more. I'm sure in all of this, there must be at least one fact that you've learned that's new. Let us know what you learned in this podcast, as well as doing your normal English language practice. Enough for now. Have a lovely day. Speak to you again soon. Goodbye.