Victorius of Aquitaine, a countryman of
Prosper of Aquitaine and also working in Rome, produced in AD 457 an
Easter Cycle
The Easter cycle is the sequence of the seasons and days in the Christian liturgical year which are pegged to the date of Easter, either before or after it. In any given calendar year, the timing of events within the Easter cycle is dependent on ...
, which was based on the consular list provided by Prosper's Chronicle. This dependency caused scholars to think that Prosper had been working on his own Easter Annals for quite some time. In fact, Victorius published his work only two years after the final publication of Prosper's Chronicle.
Victorius finished his ''Cursus Paschalis'' in 457. From that date onward he left blank the column giving the names of the consuls, but his table continued until the year AD 559 or Anno Passionis 532 (in the year of the
Passion f_Jesus.html"_;"title="Jesus.html"_;"title="f_Jesus">f_Jesus">Jesus.html"_;"title="f_Jesus">f_Jesus532_—_Victorius_placed_the_Passion_in_AD_28),_hence_the_name_''Cursus_Paschalis_annorum_DXXXII''_(Easter_Table_up_to_the_year_532)._This_first_version_was_later_continued_by_other_authors,_who_filled_in_the_names_of_the_consuls_as_the_years_passed.
The_Victorian_system_of_the_Cursus_Paschalis_was_made_official_by_a_synod_in_Gaul_in_541_and_was_still_in_use_for_historical_work_in_England_by_743,_when_an_East_Anglian_king-list_was_created,_which_was_double-dated_with_Victorian_and_Dionysius_Exiguus#Anno_Domini.html" ;"title="Jesus.html" ;"title="Jesus.html" ;"title="f Jesus">f Jesus">Jesus.html" ;"title="f Jesus">f Jesus532 — Victorius placed the Passion in AD 28), hence the name ''Cursus Paschalis annorum DXXXII'' (Easter Table up to the year 532). This first version was later continued by other authors, who filled in the names of the consuls as the years passed.
The Victorian system of the Cursus Paschalis was made official by a synod in Gaul in 541 and was still in use for historical work in England by 743, when an East Anglian king-list was created, which was double-dated with Victorian and Dionysius_Exiguus#Anno_Domini">Dionysian (A.D.) eras. Also, it was used for a letter to Charlemagne in 773, and probably, in its continued form, a source for both Bede (who found here that Aetius was consul for the third time in 446) and the Historia Brittonum.
Victorius also wrote a 98-column
multiplication table which gave (in
Roman numerals
Roman numerals are a numeral system that originated in ancient Rome and remained the usual way of writing numbers throughout Europe well into the Late Middle Ages. Numbers are written with combinations of letters from the Latin alphabet, ...
) the product of every number from 2 to 50 times and the rows were "a list of numbers starting with one thousand, descending by hundreds to one hundred, then descending by tens to ten, then by ones to one, and then the fractions down to 1/144".
[Maher & Makowski 2001, p.383]
See also
*
Egyptian calendar
The ancient Egyptian calendar – a civil calendar – was a solar calendar with a 365-day year. The year consisted of three seasons of 120 days each, plus an intercalary month of five epagomenal days treated as outside of the year proper. Ea ...
*
Augustalis, whose 84-year cycle Victorius replaced
*
Dionysius Exiguus
Dionysius Exiguus (Latin for "Dionysius the Humble", Greek: Διονύσιος; – ) was a 6th-century Eastern Roman monk born in Scythia Minor. He was a member of a community of Scythian monks concentrated in Tomis (present day Constanța ...
, whose cycle replaced Victorius's
*
Easter controversy
The controversy over the correct date for Easter began in Early Christianity as early as the 2nd century AD. Discussion and disagreement over the best method of computing the date of Easter Sunday has been ongoing ever since and remain unresolved ...
& ''
computus
As a moveable feast, the date of Easter is determined in each year through a calculation known as (). Easter is celebrated on the first Sunday after the Paschal full moon, which is the first full moon on or after 21 March (a fixed approx ...
''
Notes
References
Victorii Aquitani ''Cursus Paschalis annorum DXXXII'' ed.
T. Mommsen
Christian Matthias Theodor Mommsen (; 30 November 1817 – 1 November 1903) was a German classical scholar, historian, jurist, journalist, politician and archaeologist. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest classicists of the 19th century ...
, in: ''Chronica Minora Saec.'' IV, V, VI, VII vol. 1, pp. 667–735 (table 686–735), (1892, repr. Berlin 1961). Navigate through pages of online edition via arrows adjacent to "Blättern". Each line or year of the table continues across two pages (even-odd). Consuls are corrupt, often one or more years early (compare
List of Roman consuls).
* David W. Maher and John F. Makowski. "Literary evidence for Roman arithmetic with fractions". ''Classical Philology'' 96/4 (October 2001) 376–399.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Victorius of Aquitaine
5th-century Latin writers