How was December named?

Answer 1

Early Christian church leaders integrated their celebrations with existing celebrations by other religions.
This was done to help make the Christian religion the main belief system, slowly over a period of time ignoring and taking over the dates of their festivities.
Many Christians are of the belief that Christmas Day is/was Christ's birthday. There is no evidence for this.
However Christmas day is the day that Christians celebrate the birth of Christ.

The dates of Christmas and Easter were the subject of continued argument 1500 years ago. No one really knows.

Answer 2

Our calendar is the Gregorian Calendar, which is a slight modification of the Julian Calendar, the calendar which was introduced in Rome by Julius Caesar in 45 B.C. The names of the months we use are derived from the Latin names of the Roman calendar. The Roman year started in March. Therefore December was the tenth month - December comes from decem, the Latin for ten.

For the same reason,

• the Sept in September comes from septem, the Latin for 7
• the Oct in Ocotber comes from octo, the Latin for 8
• and the Nov in November comes from novem, the Latin for 9

There were other months which were named after their position in the Roman calendar: quintilis (which meant fifth month, menses quintilis ) and sextilis (which meant sixth month, menses sextilis). The name quintilis was changed to Iulius (today's July) in honour of Julius Caesar by Mark Antony. The name sextilis was changed to and Augustus (today's August) in honour of the emperor Augustus by the senate in 8 B.C.

The Other months were not named after their position in the calendar. The Romans conjectured that Ianuarius (January) was named after the god Janus. Februarius (February) was derived from februum (purgation, purging, purification). In this month the feralia was held. This was a festival of purification from the spirits of the dead (manes). Martius (March) was named after the god Martius (Mars), Aprilis (April) was derived from the verb aperire (to open) because it marked the opening of spring. The Romans did not know what Maius (May) and Iunius (June) were derived from. In a poem Ovid said that Maius was derived from the goddess Maiestas, the goddess Maia or the word majores (elders). In the same poem Ovid had two goddesses dispute over the name Maius: Juno and Juventas.

The "Winter" season consisted of 61 days which were not included in any month in the first Roman Calendar, the Calendar of Romulus (Rome's founder and first king) which had only ten months. Soon after this Numa Pompilius, the second king, reformed the calendar (the calendar of Numa) and added January and February as winter months

Answer 3

Originally, when the modern calendar was invented, March was the first month of the year. This made December the tenth month of the year, deci coming from the latin for ten. This also explains November, October and September. July is named after Julius Caesar, and August after his successor Augustus. An interesting side note about this is that the number of days in each month originally alternated between 31 and 30, but when Augustus took the throne, he wanted his month to have as many days as Julius' month. So he took it from the end of the year, February. Since February was originally the last month, this is also why we adjust it for leap years, and not a different month. I'm not sure as to why the order of the months changed though.