The Day That Didn't Exist

Imagine waking up on the morning of 5 October 1582, putting the kettle on, and discovering that the day had been cancelled. Not postponed or moved.  Cancelled.  Because in parts of Europe, 5 October 1582 simply didn't exist.

By the sixteenth century, the old Julian calendar had drifted out of step with the seasons. It was only a tiny error each year, but after 1,500 years, tiny errors become rather less tiny.  So Pope Gregory XIII introduced a new calendar.  He simply removed ten days.  In countries adopting the change, Thursday 4 October was followed immediately by Friday 15 October.

Gone were the 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th, 12th, 13th and 14th.  Ten days had vanished from the calendar.

But not here in Britain.  We Brits didn’t accept the Pope’s authority to cancel ten days.  In 1582 it was just Spain, Portugal and parts of Italy.   When Britain finally changed by Act of Parliament  in 1752, we had fallen even further behind. Eleven days had to be removed, so Wednesday 2 September was followed by Thursday 14 September.

But back to 1582.  The people affected hadn't actually lost ten days of their lives. Time carried on perfectly normally. It was the number printed on the calendar that changed.  (Now I’ve written that I’m thinking they probably didn’t have printed calendars.)

So spare a thought for 5 October.  A perfectly respectable date.  And yet, in some countries, it never got its turn.