The 6th century antiquarian John the Lydian has left us three works, all of great interest for the light they shed on Roman customs. Most interesting of these, to me at least, is De mensibus — On the Roman months. This is in 4 books, and the fourth book walks us through the year, detailing the festivals and annual events. But it has never been translated into English.
This morning I’ve emailed a friend and commissioned him to translate September, and perhaps October. He’s already done March, some time back, and part of December. September, October and November are all short, and it will be nice to have them in English.
UPDATE: The March portion was announced here.
Sounds like it would be good published as a an icalendar file (so it could be integrated with popular calendar applications), or maybe as a programmed rss feed delivered in real time over the year.
Now that’s quite an interesting idea. I hadn’t thought about that, but it certainly could, since in the main it consists of entries per day. I will consider it.
That is so exciting!