Numbers

The Twelve Months of the French Revolutionary Calendar

• Vendémiaire
• Brumaire
• Frimaire
• Nivôse
• Pluviôse
• Ventôse
• Germinal
• Floréal
• Prairial
• Messidor
• Thermidor
• Fructidor

How It's Used

“The regicides of the French National Convention were at heart romantics. In 1793, when they decided to design a Revolutionary Calendar, they appointed a poet, Fabre d'Eglantine, to rename the months after the seasons! Thus, Brumaire became 'the time of fog;' Thermidor, 'the time of heat.' The period from March 21 to April 19 was called Germinal, 'the time of budding.' But this was Year One of a new dawn and Germinal was also the time of the guillotine, Robespierre, and the Reign of Terror.”

“What would be the advantages and disadvantages if the week was longer than seven days?

“It has been tried. The French Revolutionary Calendar, introduced in 1794, had 12 months, each of three weeks of ten days called decades, five fete days at the end of the year and a Revolution Day every four years. As the previous calendar had a day of rest every seven days and the new one every ten days, the workers showed a lack of gratitude for the introduction of this rational system. Napoleon abolished it on January 1, 1804 (sic). [NOTE: The Revolutionary Calendar was abolished as of January 1, 1806.]”

“Other calendars have different ways of bringing order to the length of the solar year. Some, based also on the phases of the moon, have a bonus month every two or three years to ensure that the seasons stay broadly in the same place.

“Even the fearsome tidiness of the French revolutionary calendar, with its 12 months of three 10-day periods, had to accommodate the annual stray six hours or so. It did so by adding a sixth day once every four years to the handful of jours complementaires needed to reach 365, and calling it Revolutionary Day. But this was not enough to offset a serious flaw in the system: it gave workers time off only every 10th day instead of every seventh.”

“For one thing, the presence of God's Gardeners is central to the new work. This group believes fully in the connectedness of all things and tries to live a world burgeoning with life familiar and strange. The Gardeners are at once exhilarating, absurd and truth-telling. They have invented their own rituals and saints, as other revolutionaries have done: Witness the French revolutionary calendar and the Positivist saints' days. So we have Saint James Lovelock, Saint Rachel Carson, even Saint E. O. Wilson of Hymenoptera, Saint Dian Fossey and Saint Linnaeus of Botanical Nomenclature. Their leader, Adam One, is an evolutionist, a former scientist, one who believes in their mission as makers of God's ark against destruction.”

“In 1793 French revolutionaries renamed the months as Thermidor, Brumaire, Germinal and the like. The idea was soon parodied on this side of the Channel and last week the British calendar moved on from Slippy to Drippy (Wheezy and Sneezy are over, while Showery and Flowery are yet to come). The day the streets froze I donned climbing boots, strode forth and tumbled at once onto the glassy surface. It was little consolation to see a lady in high heels walk calmly across the fatal path.”

Also Known As (AKA)

The Twelve Months of the French Republican Calendar

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