Merriam-Webster - How the Months Got Their Names lyrics

Welcome to Ask the Editor. I'm Kory Stamper, an Associate Editor at Merriam-Webster. Would you like to have your mind blown? Okay. October, our 10th month of the year, comes from the Latin word that means “eight.” I know, right? There are certain things you come to expect in life, like a month whose name means “eight” would be the eighth month of the year. Is there an explanation for this? There actually is. In 738 B.C., Romulus, who supposedly founded Rome, created a calendar that was 304 days long, consisted of 10 months, and started with the spring equinox. The first months were named to honor the gods: Martius for Mars, Maius for Maia (the mother of Mercury), and Junius for Juno. April, or Aprilis, broke that mold. It likely came from the Latin verb that means “to open.” The remaining six months were originally given ordinal names: Quintilis for the fifth month, and then, in ascending numerical order, Sextilis, September, October, November, and December. Then came a 61-day no man's land between the end of the Roman year and the beginning of the Roman year. The second king of Rome thought that void was stupid and filled the gap with Januarius, after the god Jan*s, and Februarius, after a Roman feast of spiritual cleansing. Quintilis and Sextilis were later changed to Julius and Augustus, to honor some Roman emperors, and voilà—there are all our months. Great, but why do we so call the 10th month of the year October? Because even though Julius Caesar decided in 46 B.C. to move the beginning of the year to January, the names were established at that point. Others have tinkered with the months' names over the centuries, but the names from the Julian calendar seem to have stuck. For more episodes of Ask the Editor, click on the “Video” tab at merriam-webster.com.