Forms: 3–8 kalender, 4 kalunder, calundere, kalendeere, -dre, -dare, 4–5 kalendere, 4–8 calender, 5 calendere, kalander, 7 callander, 6– kalendar, 7– calendar. [a. AF. calender, = OF. calendier list, register:—L. calendārium account-book, f. calendæ, kalendæ calends, the day on which accounts were due; see CALENDS.]
1. The system according to which the beginning and length of successive civil years, and the subdivision of the year into its parts, is fixed; as the Babylonian, Jewish, Roman or Arabic calendar.
Julian Calendar, that introduced by Julius Caesar B.C. 46, in which the ordinary year has 365 days, and every fourth year is a leap year of 366 days, the months having the names, order and length still retained.
Gregorian Calendar, the modification of the preceding adapted to bring it into closer conformity with astronomical data and the natural course of the seasons, and to rectify the error already contracted by its use, introduced by Pope Gregory XIII. in A.D. 1582, and adopted in Great Britain in 1752. See STYLE.
c. 1205. Lay., 7219. He [Julius Caesar] makede þane kalender.
a. 1300. Cursor M., 24916. Þat moneth Þat man clepes … Decembre in þe kalunder.
1387. Trevisa, Higden (1865), I. 247. Som monþe in þe kalendere haþ but foure Nonas, and som haþ sixe.
1413. Lydg., Pylgr. Sowle, V. i. 73. The competister in the Craft of the Kalendar he cleped seculum the tyme of an honderd yeere.
1611. Bible, Pref., 2. When he [the first Romane Emperour] corrected the Calender, and ordered the yeere according to the course of the Sunne.
1831. Brewster, Newton (1855), II. xxiii. 311. When the public attention was called to the reformation of the Kalendar.
1854. Tomlinson, Arago’s Astron., 188. The Arabic calendar, which is that of the Mahometans, is exclusively based on the course of the moon.
1856. Emerson, Eng. Traits, x. Wealth, Wks. (Bohn), II. 70. Roger Bacon explained precession of the equinoxes, [and] the consequent necessity of the reform of the calendar.
1886. J. R. Thomson, Relig. Humanity, 20. The founder of the Church [Aug. Comte] drew up its calendar…. Each of the thirteen lunar months of the year is sacred to the memory of a great leader of humanity.
2. A table showing the division of a given year into its months and days, and referring the days of each month to the days of the week; often also including important astronomical data, and indicating ecclesiastical or other festivals, and other events belonging to individual days. Sometimes containing only facts and dates belonging to a particular profession or pursuit, as Gardener’s Calendar, Racing Calendar, etc. Also a series of tables, giving these facts more fully; an almanac.
c. 1340. Alisaunder, 623. If any wight … wilnes þem [þe twelue signes] knowe, Kairus to þe Kalender · & kenne yee may.
c. 1391. Chaucer, Astrol., I. § 11. The names of the halidayes in the kalender.
1481. Caxton, Myrr., II. xxxi. 126. This is xii tymes so moche & more ouer as the calender enseigneth.
1549. Bk. Com. Prayer, The Table and Kalendar expressing the order of the Psalms and Lessons.
1595. Shaks., John, III. i. 86. What hath this day deseru’d?… That it in golden letters should be set Among the high Tides in the Kalender?
1635. Austin, Medit., 207. Our Church keeps no Solemnitie, for his [John the Baptist’s] Death (though the Remembrance of it, be in her Calender).
1759. Miller, Gard. Dict., Pref. The Gardeners Kalendar which was inserted in the former editions of this book.
1824. W. Irving, T. Trav., II. 38. Greatness … of a kind not to be settled by reference to the court calendar.
1846. J. Baxter, Libr. Pract. Agric., II. 423. Appendix, Agricultural Calendar.
1879. Print. Trades Jrnl., XXVIII. 11. Almanacks and calendars in great variety.
b. A contrivance for reckoning days, months, etc.
1719. De Foe, Crusoe, I. 74. Every seventh Notch was as long again as the rest, and every first Day of the Month as long again as that long one, and thus I kept my Kalender.
1768. Sterne, Sent. Journ., Captive (1778), II. 31. A little calendar of small sticks … notch’d all over with the dismal days and nights he [a captive] had passed there.
1863. T. Wright, in Macm. Mag., Jan., 173. The Roman calendar of marble … presented the more prominent attributes of the modern almanac.
† 3. fig. A guide, directory: an example, model.
c. 1385. Chaucer, L. G. W., 542. Thou … woste well that kalender ys she To any woman that wull louer be.
c. 1400. Epiph. (Turnb., 1843), 115. Lete hem afore be to yow a Kalendere.
1413. St. Trials Hen. V. (R.). Images … introduced … by the permission of the church, to be as a calendar to the laity and the ignorant.
1426. Audelay, Poems, 27.
1602. Shaks., Ham., V. ii. 114. He is the card or calendar of gentry.
4. A list or register of any kind. (In the general sense, now only fig.)
a. 1400[?]. Morte Arth., 2641. Kydd in his kalander a knyghte of his chambyre.
1479. Office Mayor Bristol, in Eng. Gilds, 429. To be called and named the Maire of Bristowe is Register, or ellis the Maire is Kalender.
1589. Puttenham, Eng. Poesie (Arb.), 141. He shoulde haue alwaies a little calender of them apart to vse readily.
1633. G. Herbert, Temple, Ch. Militant, 243. When Italie … shall … all her calender of sinnes fulfill.
1664. H. More, Myst. Iniq., 207. The last time in Daniel’s Kalendar of his Four Kingdoms.
1689. Myst. Iniq., 16. Registred in the Kalender with those that stood precluded the King’s Favour.
1857. H. Reed, Lect. Brit. Poets, iii. 81. The calendar which opens so nobly with the name of Chaucer, closes worthily in our day with that of Wordsworth.
b. esp. A list of canonized saints, or the like. (Now usually treated as a form of sense 2, the days dedicated to the memory of the saints being usually registered in the ‘calendar’ or almanac.)
1601. Holland, Pliny, II. 346. When they receiued Æsculapius as a cannonized god into their Kalender.
1631. Gouge, God’s Arrows, III. § 45. 266. Such as the Holy Ghost registreth in the Kalender of true Saints.
1781. Gibbon, Decl. & F., II. xxxiii. 254. The calendar of martyrs received … a considerable augmentation.
1832. W. Irving, Alhambra, II. 256. Peace offerings to every saint in the Kalendar.
c. A list of prisoners for trial at the assizes.
[1591. Declar. Gt. Troubles, in Harl. Misc. (1809), II. 214. To call those inquisitions, with their answeres to be put into writing … to keepe in a maner of a register or kalender.]
1764. R. Sanders (title), The Newgate Calendar.
1768. Blackstone, Comm., IV. 376. The usage is, for the judge to sign the calendar, or list of all the prisoners’ names.
1823. Lamb, Last Ess., To Shade of Elliston. Rhadamanthus … tries the lighter causes … leaving to his two brothers the heavy calendars.
1856. Emerson, Eng. Traits, iv. Race, Wks. (Bohn), II. 28. The crimes recorded in their calendars.
d. spec. A list or register of documents arranged chronologically with a short summary of the contents of each, so as to serve as an index to the documents of a given period.
[1467. Ordin. Worcester, in Eng. Gilds, 370. The Kalender of the articles and acts afore specified.]
1830. (Rolls Series) (title), Calendars of the Proceedings in Chancery in the reign of Queen Elizabeth.
1856. (title) Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series of the Reign of Edward VI.
† 5. fig. A record. Obs.
1601. Shaks., All’s Well, I. iii. 4. The Kalender of my past endeuours.
1649. Selden, Laws Eng., I. lvii. (1739), 105. His meritorious Holy War could never wipe it out of the Calendar of story.
a. 1718. Penn, Tracts, Wks. 1726, I. 589. Once they were as Calendars, for weak People to read some Mystical Glory by.
† b. An outward sign, index. Obs.
1590. Lodge, Euphues Gold. Leg. (1887), 13. Nor are the dimples in the face the calendars of truth.
† 6. One who has charge of records or historical documents. Occurring in the name of an ancient guild in Bristol. Obs.
1479. Office Mayor Bristol, in Eng. Gilds, 417. The … prestis of the hous of the Kalenders of Bristowe.
c. 1600[?]. MS., ibid. 287. The rites and liberties of the Kalenders, of the fraternitie of the church of All Saincts in Bristow, who were a brotherhood consisting of clergy and laymen, and kept the ancient recordes and mynaments, not onely of the towne, but also of other societes in other remote places.
7. attrib. and Comb., as calendar-day, -holiday, -saint; calendar-clock, a clock that indicates the days of the week or month; calendar-court, a court of justice held on a day appointed in the calendar; calendar month, one of the twelve months into which the year is divided according to the calendar; also the space of time from any day of any such month to the corresponding day of the next, as opposed to a lunar month of four weeks.
1884. F. J. Britten, Watch & Clockm., 38. [A] *Calendar Clock [or a] Calendar Watch … [are] a clock or watch that denotes the progress of the calendar.
1865. Morning Star, 26 May. The court was not a *calendar court.
1875. Poste, Gaius, I. (ed. 2), 101. A *calendar day consisted of 24 hours measured from midnight to midnight.
1847. Emerson, Repres. Men, iv. Montaigne, Wks. (Bohn), I. 346. I mean to … celebrate the calendar-day of our Saint Michael de Montaigne.
1713. ‘Philopatrius,’ Refl. Sacheverell’s Thanksgiv.-Day, 8. I … consulted my Almanack, and found it was no *Calendar Holiday.
1788. J. Powell, Devises (1827), II. 255. Within six *calendar months after his decease.
1869. Freeman, Norm. Conq. (1876), II. x. 507. This whole revolution … took up less than one kalendar month.
1679. Establ. Test., 40. The Catalogue of their *Calender Saints.
