Beware the Ides of March. You can check this blog’s entry of March 15, 2017 for more information on Kalends, Nones and Ides. But why should you “beware the Ides of March?” Well, if you’ve never read Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, there’s really no reason to fear the Ides. Back in Shakespeare’s day, the months of January and February didn’t exist — they were just referred to as “winter.” So March was the first month of the year. Using the Roman calendar, the midpoint of every month was known as the Ides. The Ides of March fell on March 15, that correlated with the first full moon of the year (winter didn’t count.)
Supposedly, in 44 BC, a seer told Julius Caesar that his downfall would come no later than the Ides of March. Caesar ignored him, and attended a senate meeting at the Theatre of Pompey, and was murdered — by as many as 60 conspirators.
So all the drama about the Ides of March is attributable to Caesar — before he got himself killed, the Ides of March was just a date. Ides isn’t anything — just a name given to a single day that falls in the middle of the month, and March isn’t alone… every month has its ides. The ides only got a sinister reputation after Shakespeare used the word in his play. But for some reason, this day has gained notoriety for being a day on which bad things happen — like the abdication of his throne by Czar Nicholas II in 1917 and the German occupation of Czechoslovakia in 1939. When I was younger, March 15 was also tax day. But on the bright side, it was seen as the first day of spring on the Roman calendar. Spring is good enough reason to celebrate for me… beware if you must, but I think I’ll celebrate.
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