Calendar Description
The French Republican calendar was part of the reforms brought in after the French Revolution, the same reforms that lead to the metric system.
The calendar consists of 12 months of thirty days each and five (six in a leap year) additional days (Complémentaires) at the end of the year. The year change is the autumnal equinox as measured at the Paris Observatory which sets the first day of the first month, Vendémiaire.
Each month was divided into three 10 day periods called Décades and the days were named according to their position. The last day, Décadi, was a public holiday.
The use of Décades was discontinued in Apr 1802 (Gregorian) and the 7-day Week restored.
Formatting
The usual method of formatting the date is: day of month, the month name, the year. During the five or six day Complémentaires period, just the day's name and the year are given. The year is often written in Roman numerals.
Use Case
The calendar had a short life, the details below being the only recorded uses.
- France, 24 Nov 1793 to 31 Dec 1805 (Gregorian).
- Paris, May 1871 (Gregorian) during the "Paris Commune".
Definition
| Record | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| year | month | day | nmonth | nmday | cday | dday | wday |
| Month Names | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Number | Name | Number of Days | |
| Common | Leap | ||
| 1 | Vendémiaire | 30 | 30 |
| 2 | Brumaire | 30 | 30 |
| 3 | Frimaire | 30 | 30 |
| 4 | Nivôse | 30 | 30 |
| 5 | Pluviôse | 30 | 30 |
| 6 | Ventôse | 30 | 30 |
| 7 | Germinal | 30 | 30 |
| 8 | Floréal | 30 | 30 |
| 9 | Prairial | 30 | 30 |
| 10 | Messidor | 30 | 30 |
| 11 | Thermidor | 30 | 30 |
| 12 | Fructidor | 30 | 30 |
| 13 | Complémentaires | 5 | 6 |
| Décade Day Names | |
|---|---|
| Number | Name |
| 1 | Primidi |
| 2 | Duodi |
| 3 | Tridi |
| 4 | Quartidi |
| 5 | Quintidi |
| 6 | Sextidi |
| 7 | Septidi |
| 8 | Octidi |
| 9 | Nonidi |
| 10 | Décadi |
| Complémentaire Day Names | |
|---|---|
| Number | Name |
| 1 | Fête de la Vertu |
| 2 | Fête du Génie |
| 3 | Fête du Travail |
| 4 | Fête de l'Opinion |
| 5 | Fête des Récompenses |
| 6 | Fête de la Révolution |
The year length is 365 or 366 days long, averaging the tropical year of approximately 365.24219 days. Days start at midnight.
The Record consists of three regular Fields named year,
month, and day. There are five extended Fields:
nmonth and nmday for the named months and the named month days;
cday for the complémentaire days;
dday for the day within the décade
and wday for the 7-day week number (starting Monday).
During the complémentaire days, the nmonth, nmday and dday Fields are invalid.
Outside the complémentaire days the cday Field is invalid.
| fr | year | month | day |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | 1 |
| g | year | month | day |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1792 | 9 | 22 |
| jdn | day |
|---|---|
| 2375840 |
Script
| Default Script |
|---|
| lexicon frm { name "Month names"; fieldname month; lang en; pseudo Month, Mon; tokens { 1, "Vendémiaire", "Vend"; 2, "Brumaire", "Brum"; 3, "Frimaire", "Frim"; 4, "Nivôse", "Nivo"; 5, "Pluviôse", "Pluv"; 6, "Ventôse", "Vent"; 7, "Germinal", "Germ"; 8, "Floréal", "Flor"; 9, "Prairial", "Prai"; 10, "Messidor", "Mess"; 11, "Thermidor", "Ther"; 12, "Fructidor", "Fruc"; 13, "Complémentaires", "Comp"; } } lexicon frdd { name "Decade Day"; fieldname dday; lang en; pseudo DecDay, DDay; tokens { 1, "Primidi", "Prim"; 2, "Duodi", "Duo"; 3, "Tridi", "Tri"; 4, "Quartidi", "Quar"; 5, "Quintidi", "Quin"; 6, "Sextidi", "Sext"; 7, "Septidi", "Sept"; 8, "Octidi", "Oct"; 9, "Nonidi", "Non"; 10, "Décadi", "Dec"; } } lexicon frcomp { name "Complementary Days"; fieldname cday; lang en; pseudo CompDay, CDay; tokens { 1, "Fête de la Vertu", "Ver"; 2, "Fête du Génie", "Gen"; 3, "Fête du Travail", "Trav"; 4, "Fête de l'Opinion", "Opin"; 5, "Fête des Récompenses", "Rec"; 6, "Fête de la Révolution", "Rev"; } } grammar fr { optional nmonth, nmday, cday, dday, wday; lexicons frm, frcomp, frdd, w; alias field { Day, day; Month, month; Year, year; DecDay, dday; WDay, wday; NMonth, nmonth; NMDay, nmday; CompDay, cday; } alias pseudo { dd, Day; mm, Month; yyyy, Year; mm, NMonth; dd, NMDay; w, WDay; d, DecDay; c, CompDay; } alias unit { d, day; dec, decade; w, week; m, month; y, year; } format dmy, "(Day) |(Month:frm:a) |(Year)"; format "dmy+", "(Day) |(Month:frm) |(Year)"; format ymd, "(Year)|,(Month:frm:a)|,(Day)"; format cdmy { input "(Day) |(Month) |(Year)"; output "(CompDay:frcomp) |(NMDay) |(NMonth:frm) |(Year)"; rankout year, nmonth, nmday, cday; } format out { input "(Day) |(Month) |(Year)"; output "(CompDay:frcomp) |(NMDay) |(NMonth:frm) |an (Year::rn)"; rankout year, nmonth, nmday, cday; } format dcdmy { input "(Day) |(Month) |(Year)"; output "(DecDay:frdd) |(CompDay:frcomp) |(NMDay) |(NMonth:frm) |(Year)"; rankout year, nmonth, nmday, cday, dday; } format wcdmy { input "(Day) |(Month) |(Year)"; output "(WDay:w), |(CompDay:frcomp) |(NMDay) |(NMonth:frm) |(Year)"; rankout year, nmonth, nmday, cday, wday; } format "cdmy-" { input "(Day) |(Month) |(Year)"; output "(CompDay:frcomp:a) |(NMDay) |(NMonth:frm:a) |(Year)"; rankout year, nmonth, nmday, cday; } format "dcdmy-" { input "(Day) |(Month) |(Year)"; output "(DecDay:frdd:a) |(CompDay:frcomp:a) |(NMDay) |(NMonth:frm:a) |(Year)"; rankout year, nmonth, nmday, cday, dday; } format "wcdmy-" { input "(Day) |(Month) |(Year)"; output "(WDay:w:a), |(CompDay:frcomp:a) |(NMDay) |(NMonth:frm:a) |(Year)"; rankout year, nmonth, nmday, cday, wday; } pref cdmy; } scheme fr { name "French Republic"; base french; grammar fr; } |
The script also requires the 7-Day week lexicon "w".
