Calendar Description - Scheme fr
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.
See also the Wikipedia entry.
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
| Days in Month | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| 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 |
| Record - Default order | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| year | month | day | nmonth | nmday | cday | dday | wday |
| Record - Ranking order | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| year | nmonth | nmday | cday | dday | wday | month | day |
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 base Fields named year.
month and day.
There are 13 months in a year.
All the months contain 30 days except the 13th
which contains 5 days in a common year and 6 in a leap year.
To assist in formatting, the record contains 3 calculated fields:
nmonth, nmday and cday.
During the first 12 months, nmonth, and nmday
contain the same as month and day,
whilst cday holds the null value.
During the 13th month, nmonth and nmday contain the null values
and cday is the same as the day field.
Each full month is divided into 3 décades or 10 day weeks.
The calculated field dday provides the day of the décade.
The calendar was still in use when the 7 day week was re-introduced.
The optional field wday is included to provide the day of the week.
| fr | year | month | day |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | 1 |
| g | year | month | day |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1792 | 9 | 22 |
| jdn | day |
|---|---|
| 2375840 |
Formats
When this scheme was in use, the usual method of formatting was: day of month, the month name, the year. During the five or six day Complémentaires period, just the day's name and the year were given. The year was usually written in Roman numerals.
To simplify the format, particularly for automated systems, the Complémentaires period can be treated as a short month and the format is then always: day of month, month name, the year.
Two lexicons for the month names are provided, frnm which is just the 12 month names and frm which includes the Complémentaires month.
| Month Names - Lexicon frnm | ||
|---|---|---|
| Number | Name | Abrev. |
| 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 |
| Month Names - Lexicon frm | ||
|---|---|---|
| Number | Name | Abrev. |
| All enries in frnm plus:- | ||
| 13 | Complémentaires | Comp |
| Complémentaire Day Names - Lexicon frcomp | ||
|---|---|---|
| Number | Name | Abrev. |
| 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 |
| Décade Day Name - Lexicon frdd | ||
|---|---|---|
| Number | Name | Abrev. |
| 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 |
The day of the week may also be included in the format. The 10 day week was introduced as part of the calendar scheme. Later the 7 day week was re-introduced by popular demand.
The formats supplied with this scheme.
| Formats - Grammar fr | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Code | Rule | Pseudo | Example | Note | |
| dmy_a | text | Input: day month year Output: dd Mon yyyy | 5 Comp 232 1 Vend 233 | S | |
| dmy | text | Input: day month year Output: dd Month yyyy | 5 Complémentaires 232 1 Vendémiaire 233 | D, S | |
| ymd | text | Input: year month day Output: yyyy Month dd | 232 Complémentaires 5 233 Vendémiaire 1 | S | |
| cdmy | text | Input: cday nmday nmonth year Output: CompDay dd Month yyyy | Fête des Récompenses 232 1 Vendémiaire 233 | ||
| cdmy- | text | Input: cday nmday nmonth year Output: CDay dd Mon yyyy | Rec 232 1 Vend 233 | ||
| std | text | Input: cday nmday nmonth year Output: CompDay dd Month an yyyy[X] | Fête des Récompenses an CCXXXII 1 Vendémiaire an CCXXXIII | ||
| dcdmy | text | Input: dday cday nmday nmonth year Output: DecDay CompDay dd Month yyyy | Fête des Récompenses 232 Primidi 1 Vendémiaire 233 | ||
| dcdmy- | text | Input: dday cday nmday nmonth year Output: DDay CDay dd Mon yyyy | Rec 232 Prim 1 Vend 233 | ||
| wcdmy | text | Input: wday cday nmday nmonth year Output: Weekday, CompDay dd Month yyyy | Saturday, Fête des Récompenses 232 Sunday, 1 Vendémiaire 233 | ||
| wcdmy- | text | Input: wday cday nmday nmonth year Output: Wday, CDay dd Mon yyyy | Sat, Rec 232 Sun, 1 Vend 233 | ||
| gedcom | text | Input: day month year Output: dd MON yyyy | 5 COMP 232 1 VEND 233 | S | |
| def | text | Input: year month day nmonth nmday cday dday Output: yyyy mm dd mm dd c d | 232 13 5 5 233 1 1 1 1 1 | H | |
| u | unit | Input: 9y 9m 9d 9nm 9nd 9cd 9dd Output: 9y 9m 9d 9nm 9nd 9cd 9dd | 232y 13m 5d 5cd 233y 1m 1d 1nm 1nd 1dd | H | |
| Notes: D = Default, H = Hidden, S = Range shortcut supported. Example based on jdn# 2460575 and 2460576 | |||||
Script
| Script - Module hics:french_rep |
|---|
| lexicon frnm { name "Normal Month names"; fieldname nmonth; 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"; } } lexicon frm { name "Month names"; inherit frnm; fieldname month; tokens { 13, "Complémentaires", "Comp"; } } 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"; } } 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"; } } grammar fr { name "French Republic"; fields year month day; calculated nmonth nmday cday, dday; optional wday; rank year nmonth nmday; lexicons frm, frnm, frcomp, frdd, w; alias pseudo { dd day; mm month; yyyy year; mm nmonth; dd nmday; c cday; d dday; w wday; } alias unit { d day; m month; y year; nm nmonth; nd nmday; cd cday; dd dday; } // Record: year month day nmonth nmday cday dday wday function calc_to_def { if cday = null month = nmonth; day = nmday; dday = ( (day - 1) mod 10 ) + 1; else month = 13; day = cday; dday = null; endif result = this; } function def_to_calc { if month <> null if month < 13 nmonth = month; nmday = day; cday = null; dday = ( (day - 1) mod 10 ) + 1; else nmonth = null; nmday = null; cday = day; dday = null; endif endif result = this; } use { calculate def_to_calc; from:text calc_to_def; } format dmy_a { inout "{day} |{month:frm:a} |{year}"; rank year month day; use:in def_to_calc; } format dmy { inout "{day} |{month:frm} |{year}"; rank year month day; use:in def_to_calc; } format ymd { inout "{year}| {month:frm}| {day}"; rank year month day; use:in def_to_calc; } format cdmy "{cday:frcomp} |{nmday} |{nmonth:frnm} |{year}"; format "cdmy-" "{cday:frcomp:a} |{nmday} |{nmonth:frnm:a} |{year}"; format std "{cday:frcomp} |{nmday} |{nmonth:frnm} |an {year::rn}"; format dcdmy "{dday:frdd} |{cday:frcomp} |{nmday} |{nmonth:frnm} |{year}"; format "dcdmy-" "{dday:frdd:a} |{cday:frcomp:a} |{nmday} |{nmonth:frnm:a} |{year}"; format wcdmy "{wday:w}, |{cday:frcomp} |{nmday} |{nmonth:frnm} |{year}"; format "wcdmy-" "{wday:w:a}, |{cday:frcomp:a} |{nmday} |{nmonth:frnm:a} |{year}"; format gedcom { inout "{day} |{month:frm:a:u} |{year}"; rank year month day; use:in def_to_calc; } preferred dmy; } scheme fr { name "French Republic"; base french; grammar fr; } |
The script uses the lexicon "w" definition from the
jwn Julian Week Number scheme
for the optional field wday.
