It’s January, the first month of the year, ruled by the god Janus, who looks both ways. But a week ago it was December, the…tenth month of the year? What the heck was up with Roman calendars? Join Em and Dr. Jesse to explore why this otherwise competent civilization just fell apart when it came to tracking what day it was.

Jörg Rüpke, The Roman Calendar from Numa to Constantine: Time, History, and the Fasti, Wiley-Blackwell, 2011.

1/ Rome’s famous AVC (or AUC today), the abbreviation for Ab urbe condita (from the founding of the city), i.e. 753 BCE.

2/ For example, archeology uses “BP” or “Before Present.” Geology and astronomy and similar tend to use variations on “millions of years ago“.

3/ Calends! Nones! Ides!

4/ December is such a mess! For more on December not being the 10th month of the year (maybe ever!)–and/or the possibility of competing new years (one beginning in January and one in March), see Rüpke (p. 6).

5/ Fasti Antiates Maiores, created 60s or 50s BCE (Rüpke, p. 6), from before the Julian reforms in 46 BCE. January is the first month. Here is the original and here is the reconstruction.

6/ Annus confusionis ultimus! (46 BCE) See Rüpke, p. 112.

7/ Gregorian calendar!

8/ England finally officially adopts the Gregorian calendar in 1750. (This was adopted for the whole British Empire, including the colonies in America.)

When is Hanukkah this year? When is Lupercalia, or Easter, or Midsummer’s Eve? When is your birthday? Figuring out when big events happen is incredibly important, and humans have been doing it for a long time. But while we can see some similarities in the process of calendar evolution, many civilizations had very different ways of conceptualizing and measuring time. Join Em and Dr. Jesse for a discussion of non-Roman calendars!

0/ Check out the Nerd and Tie podcast network! Official announcement here.

1/ A lot of Mayans live in Yucatán in Mexico. Between 1847–1933, the Mayan fought a long and bloody war against the government of Mexico, and for a while controlled an independent state. Eventually they won the right to break up some of the haciendas, making it a fairly successful indigenous land movement. Now in Yucatán, a lot of the land is collectively owned/managed by the Maya.

2/ St Patrick will be coming up in the future! His episode has been recorded.

3/ Sir Capricorn’s name turns out to be Sesame. He is amazing!

4/ Gobekli Tepe (settled roughly 9500 BCE)

5/ Wurdi Youang (Australia)

6/ Warren Field (Scotland)

7/ Hawaii

8/ Yoruba calendar

9/ Babylonian calendar (from the 2nd millennium BCE). See Lis Brack-Bernsen’s “The 360-Day Year in Mesopotamia”

The early astronomical text known as MUL.APIN (from 1000 BCE).

10/ Ancient Egyptian calendar! And some fun artifacts from the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

11/ Mayan calendar! Very intriguing.

Here is the film 2012 which posits many incorrect things, not just about the Mayan calendar.

Starting in the middle ages, a rumor spread of a female pope, elected because of her incredible learning, who went undiscovered until she gave birth to a child. At which point, everyone lost their minds. Join Em and Dr. Jesse to learn about the veracity of this tale and the wacky test it (allegedly) engendered. (Ha.)

Our sources:
Thomas F.X. Noble, “Why Pope Joan?” Catholic Historical Review 99.2 (April 2013) 219–238.

Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners: A History of Popes. Yale University Press, 2002.

1/ Jean de Mailly, 13th century Dominican chronicler in Metz, makes the first extant mention of Pope Joan in his Chronicle “Diocese of Metz” (Chronica universalis Mettensis) in 1255.

Etienne de Bourbon (also Dominican) adds to Mailly’s account a few years later in On the Seven Gifts of the Spirit.

Dominican Martinus Polonus (Martin Strebsky) writes down the version we all know between 1265–1277 in Chronicle of the Roman Popes and Emperors

2/ “A means of adding verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative.” From The Mikado by Gilbert and Sullivan.

3/ The description of this (definitely fake) ritual is in Duffy, Saints and Sinners, 156–7.

4/ Ember Days

5/ The Straight Dope was an alternative weekly column (in Madison it ran in the Isthmus, I think; also in the Chicago Reader) where readers could ask questions of a guy (gender nondenominational) who was essentially a reference librarian. The nom de plume was Cecil Adams. The column ran 1973–2018. The Pope Joan column is archived here: https://www.straightdope.com/21341608/was-there-once-a-female-pope

6/ Since we recorded this, The Onion has had a renaissance. If you subscribe, you can even get a print version! https://theonion.com/

Avignon! A city where there is a bridge, and a song about the bridge. And, once, the pope lived there. Why? Let’s talk about this weird century.

1/ Avignon: it has a bridge! And a song about the bridge: “Sur le pont d’Avignon.” The bridge is medieval; the song dates from the fifteenth century: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sur_le_Pont_d%27Avignon

2/ Boniface VIII (Pope 24 December 1294–11 October 1303). He was…something. Definitely check out Dante’s thoughts!

3/ Dr. Jesse: we can all recognize that in the past there have been different times when a third party has interfered in an election…

Em: …

Em: oh my god, we recorded this in April 2024. She was talking about the 2000 election. [A lot has happened in a year. Now it could also be the NYC mayoral race!–Jesse]

4/ The episode on Catherine of Siena is number 6.

Jesse and I went to Siena at one point! I don’t remember if we saw her head. I’m guessing we did? We also saw a horse race, which means we were there on August 16, 2003? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palio_di_Siena [That was a great Palio! There were many, many false starts, and then someone fell (or was pushed/tripped) off their horse during the race, and the neighborhood whose rider fell (or was sabotaged) definitely thought he was sabotaged, and they all stormed the track toward the neighborhood they thought pushed him, and we were standing in between the two groups. –Jesse]

5/ Episode Summary!

Avignon Papacy:

Seven popes resided at Avignon instead of Rome

• Pope Clement V: 1305–1314 (curia moved to Avignon, 9 March 1309)
• Pope John XXII: 1316–1334
• Pope Benedict XII: 1334–1342
• Pope Clement VI: 1342–1352
• Pope Innocent VI: 1352–1362
• Pope Urban V: 1362–1370 (in Rome 1367–1370; returned to Avignon 1370)
• Pope Gregory XI: 1370–1378 (left Avignon to return to Rome on 13 September 1376, returned in January 1377)

WESTERN SCHISM:

*Voluntarily resigns to end schism

Antipope John XXIII* (1410–1415)

*Submitted to Martin V in Florence in 1418 and died shortly thereafter. The Medici built him a huge tomb.

Let’s talk about a few good antipopes. What’s that about, anyway? If they meet, do they both annihilate? How do they sometimes switch places? Join Em and Dr. Jesse as they go over some of the more interesting antipopes of the 11th and 12th centuries.

1/ The board game is Kremlin.

2/ Gregory VII (born c1015, namesake of the reform movement, pope 1073–1085). Gregorian reform!

3/ Investiture Controversy. The big one is roughly 1076–1122, but there are a bunch of investiture struggles.

4/ Henry IV (1050–1106; king of Germany from 1054, of Italy and Burgundy from 1056, and Holy Roman Emperor from 1084)

5/ Antipope Clement III (born c1029, Antipope 1080–1100)

6/ Antipope Theodoric (or Sylvester III, but there was an earlier Sylvester III, who was considered an antipope by Theodoric but is not currently listed as one by the Vatican).

7/ Concordat of London 1107 between Henry I of England and Pope Paschal II

8/ Holy Emperor Henry V (born early 1080s-1125; Holy Roman Emperor 1111–1125)

9/ Henry V appoints Antipope Gregory VIII (Antipope 1118–1121, dies 1137)

10/ Concordat of Worms 1122

11/ Pope Innocent II (Pope 1130–1143) is elected by a minority

Antipope Alacletus II (1130–1138) is elected by a majority

12/ Lateran II convened in 1139 by Innocent II

Antipope Victor IV (not to be confused with a later Antipope Victor IV) submits to Innocent II

13/ St Bernard dogs get their name from their original breeding place in Switzerland, which is named for St Bernard of Menthon, not Bernard of Clairvaux!

14/ Lateran III 1179

15/ Ubi Periculum 1274, issued by Pope Gregory X during the Second Council of Lyon, establishes the papal conclave

16/ Actually, Francis was chosen pretty quickly! It just seemed long in our crazy media climate.

17/ Pope Clement V (born c. 1264; Pope 1305–1314) and the Avignon Papacy (1309–1376/7)

18/ Pope Celestine V: the previous pope who resigned! He was pope for a few months in 1294.

19/ Pope Boniface VIII (born c.1230; Pope 1294–1303), famously hated by Dante.

When did the conclave system get started and why? Following on the heels (uh, vaguely) of our emergency popecast, Em and Dr. Jesse discuss history of papal elections and how the Church got to where it is.

Saints and Sinners: A History of the Popes, by Eamon Duffy. 4th ed. Yale University Press, 2015.

1/ We recorded this in February 2024; Benedict died on the 31st of December, 2022. He was 95. JPII lived to 84 (d. 2005) and Francis was 88. [Benedict XVI was the former head of the Dicastery or Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the formerly known as the Congregation of the Inquisition. –Jesse]

Celestine V (c.1210/15–1296; pope July 5–December 13 1294)

Gregory XII (c1327–1417; pope 1406–1415, resigns to end schism)

Pope John XXIII (1881–1963, pope 1958–1963) called the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965).

Pisan Antipope John XXIII (d.1419; pope 1410–1415)

2/ I’m sure some of this background on the various popes and especially Francis is a repeat from last episode. If you took good notes and don’t need a reminder, I’m sorry.

3/ “Eventually they get found liable for their sayings.” I have no idea what politician that was a dig at. I’m pretty sure that the “mayors of major cities who get more say than the governor” is probably a reference to the mayor of NYC vs the NY governor?

4/ For more on the Ottonian Dynasty!

5/ You can actually still become a married male priest in the Holy Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church by: first becoming a pastor in another denomination, getting married there (and a certain amount of time elapsing), and then converting to Catholicism and applying to become a priest. (This requires your wife’s consent, apparently. In case you were wondering if women ever got asked to consent to anything in Christianity. There is one thing.)

You can also become a priest if you’re a widower.

6/ Gregory VII (c1015–1085; pope 1073–1085)

Peter Damian (c1007–1072)

Lateran Council of 769

7/ Pope Paul I (pope 757–767)

Antipope Constantine II (pope 767–769)

Antipope Philip (pope only one day, July 31, 768)

Pope Stephen III (c720–772; pope 768–772)

Pope Adrian I (pope 772–795)

8/ Stephen IX (c1020–1058; pope 1057–1058)

Antipope Benedict X (pope 1058–1059)

Pope Nicholas II (c. 990/95–1061; pope 1058/9–1061)

Pope Francis, beloved of medievalists, died on April 21, 2025, so we’re here with all you might care to know about the forthcoming conclave (now a film starring Ralph Finnes), the history of conclaves, and why medievalists loved Francis so much, anyway.

1/ Benedict went to Mater Ecclesiae Monastery, I think. It’s in the neighborhood.

2/ Jesse and I decided to try and do any extra notes attached to NEXT episode, so y’all are stuck with only my ramblings down here this time.

3/ Sorry about the sound quality. I messed something up during the recording process. Also I’ve never sat still in my life, apparently. What a way to find out.

4/ Books and films in this episode:

Conclave (2024)
The Name of the Rose, by Umberto Eco (1980)
The Key to the Name of the Rose: including translations of all non-English passages, by Adele J. Haft, Jane G. White, and Robert H. White (1987)
The Shoes of the Fisherman (1968)

5/ I asked Jesse for clarification about what is meant by someone getting to be pope with a minority of votes. Basically the minority vote-getter (Innocent II) went off and set up as pope anyway, and eventually everyone came around to his way of thinking and made the majority vote-getter (Anacletus II) an antipope. We’ll have a whole episode on antipopes in a couple of weeks when we discuss this in more detail, so keep an eye out.

6/ Hey, Chuck! Sorry. Be less of a fuddy-duddy.

7/ The official job description as posted to LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/vaticano_after-receiving-several-messages-of-interest-activity-7322589152439418880-dmNA