The Coptic Calendar of Martyrs
The purpose of this page is to clear up a few questions that some might have
regarding the calendar system that the Coptic Orthodox Church follows.
To learn about the historic origins of the Coptic
Calendar please read the article below tracing the Coptic Calendar to the
We have put up a program that calculates the date of
all major Coptic holidays including the Orthodox Easter
for any year after 1902 A.D. and also calculates a few other Church Holidays.
Also on this page you will find some very useful links regarding the controversy
of the use of different calendar systems.
The Coptic Orthodox Church uses the Old Calendarist approach in determining
the dates of Easter and the other Church Occasions that are dependent on the
date of Easter. If you are interested in studying more about the Coptic Calendar
and the difference between this Calendar and the Western or New Calendars, follow
this link to other relevant resources.
The Coptic calendar has 13 months, 12 of 30 days each and an intercalary
month at the end of the year of 5 or 6 days depending whether the year is a
leap year or not. The year starts on 11 September in the Gregorian Calendar
or on the 12th in the year before (Gregorian) Leap Years. The Coptic Leap Year follows the same
rules as the Gregorian so that the extra month always has 6 days in the year
before a Gregorian
Leap Year. The names of the months and their starting dates are as follows:
Download Coptic Font to view Coptic
Some Historic Aspects on its Origin:
The Feast of Neyrouz marks the first day of the Coptic Calendar
known as the Year of the Martyrs "ANO MARTYRUM, A.M." Its celebration falls
on the 1st day of the month named Tut, the first month of the Coptic year, which
usually coincides with the 11th day of September.
The Coptic calendar, the oldest in history, originated three millennia before
Christ. The exact date of its origin is unknown. It is believed that Imhotep,
the supreme official of King Djoser C.2670 BC. had a great impact on the construction
of the calendar.
Historically, ancient Egyptians initially used a civil calendar based on a solar
year that consisted of 365 days only, without making any adjustment for the
additional quarter of a day each year. However, in the mean time, they knew
an astronomical calendar which is based on an astronomical concept namely the
heliacal rising of a bright star called Sirius "Canis Major, the Dog Star" at
the dawn of the eastern horizon. The day on which the heliacal rising of Sirius
occurs marks the first day of the year. Sirius or Spdt in ancient Egyptian is
characterized by high luminosity and is a member of the constellation Canis
Major. It lies about 8.6 light years from earth. The first day coincides with
the arrival of the highest point of river Nile flood at Memphis, south west
of Cairo, the capital of Egypt during the early dynastic period of the old kingdom.
Discrepancies in year length underwent complex calculations considering stellar,
solar and lunar cycles. Ancient Egyptians realized that the helical rising of
the star Sirius, or Sothis, coincides with the new year's day of the civil calendar
precisely every 1460 years. A cycle that is known as the Sothic cycle. A record
exists by the 3rd century A.D. grammarian Censorinus that in A.D. 139 the first
day of the Egyptian Civil Year coincided with the helical rising of Sirius,
marking the end of a Sothic cycle. This phenomenon was celebrated by issuing
coins on the back of which appears the Greek inscription A ION, indicating an
end of an Era. Egypt then was under the Roman Rule of Emperor Antoninus Pius.
The notion of eternal time was personified and deified. A relief of the deity
Aion was found in Oxyrhnichus , present day el-Bahnasa in middle Egypt. This
notion, found its way into Persian Mithraism and into Gnosticism.
Similar sightings were recorded in the 7th year of the reign
of King Senuse'rt the third (1878-1841 B.C.) of the third Dynasty. The dating
of the event was the 16th day of the 4th month of the 2nd season. Discrepancies
between the yearly Stellar cycle and Solar cycle were realized along the course
of centuries or millennia. The difference is very slight, however, along the
course of time it became visible and chaotic. The following ancient Egyptian
interesting stories i illustrate the resulting effect of the widening gap. A
record from an inscription from the reign of King Amenemhet the 3rd (1842-1797
B.C.) describes a visit of his treasurer Harurre to Serabit elKhadem, in Sinai,
to extract turquoise ore in the third month of what was, according to the civil
calendar, winter. The fact was, according to the inscription, the weather was
that of high summer. Harurre describes how he and his men suffered badly from
the mountains that brand the skin with the intense heat. The civil calendar,
then, was out of phase with Solar cycles by about seven months. A papyrus of
the Ramesside period describes in the 13th century B.C. "Winter is come in Summer,
the months are reversed, the hours in confusion".
It should be noted that ancient Egyptian Civil Calendar relates to regal years
of each king and their Dynasties. By counting forwards and backwards the chronological
order was then related to three helical risings of the star Sirus mentioned
above. By the year 664 B.C., the beginning of the 26th Dynasty (Saite Period)
Egyptian chronology became more accurate. However, in spite of the stories mentioned
above, the subdivision of the year into three seasons based on the regular River
Nile flood and agricultural activities namely, inundation of the river Nile
"Acht", sowing "Bert" and harvesting "Shemmo", remained accurately observed
along the millennia. This subdivision possibly occurred during the Ramesside
period of the 19th Dynasty.
The Coptic Year is the extension of the ancient Egyptian civil year retaining
its subdivision into the three seasons, four months each. This subdivision is
maintained in the Coptic Calendar. The three seasons are commemorated by special
prayers in the Coptic Divine Liturgy.
Deacon Dr. Medhat R. Wassef
of St. Mark Coptic Church, Jersey City, NJ
Coptic Holidays and Easter Calculations:
The following is a program that will calculate the Date of the Coptic Orthodox
Easter in addition to all major fasts and feasts of the Coptic Church for the
Please enter a year (Between 1902 and 2037):