If everybody in the world agreed to do so, what would you rename the twelve months?
Personally, I would go for naming them after the twelve largest moons in the solar system, since they were originally (and still are in many cultures) based on the lunar cycles, giving the months Ganymede, Titan, Callisto, etc.
What would you rename the months?
edit: Simply using the numbers is already a thing (see, for example, 2026-01-01. January is represented as month 1), and reordering the existing month names would be a real headache, as it would be difficult to tell whether you are reading a date using the old or new naming scheme.
It kind of annoys me that the months named for their position don't line up to that position anymore.
September - (7) 9th
October - (8) 10th
November - (9) 11th
December - (10) 12th
But if we have the option to make big changes I'd be interested in going for 13 months.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Fixed_Calendar
I'll second the IFC. My only addition would be that the Year Day and the Leap Day are mandatory holidays: fucking everything except critical utility infrastructure shift/on-call work (police, fire, power/water/sewage, etc) is closed. Employers must not require an employee to work consecutive Year or Leap Days.
Here, is this better?
Monember
Dicember
Triember
Tetrember
Pentamber
Hexamber
September
October
November
December
Undecember
Dodecember
Love it. Send me a calendar with firefighter pugs.
You know what... I've never seen this before, but I fully endorse this solution. This is mostly what we already have in place, but favoring consistency rather than flattering Roman emperors.
For those who didn't know,
Also, a few others are named after Roman gods. It's cool, but not super relevant to anyone today.
https://img.ifunny.co/images/f22d3b34b2c5c7c30cf3ac353fe831db3acd01c1ca9f0ab9369250ddc796687d_1.jpg
If you edit your comment to enclose the link in square brackets and an exclamation point at before the open bracket it will show the image. Like below:
![link]If you copy this, just remove the `, those are there to show it as code rather than trying to display an empty image, and replace the work link
Thanks! I’m not gonna edit it on my cell. If anyone wants to, go for it! I don’t own the image, I just thought it was relevant
My birthday would be on a Saturday forever. I'm fine with this.
0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11
0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, A, B
1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 5, 7, 8, 9, 11, 10, 12
1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 5, 7, 8, 9, 11, 10, 12, 13
This is the right answer. 13 months of 4 weeks and an extra day on the last month.
How does this line up with lunar cycles? Is the solar year closer to 12 or 13 months?
Edit: I decided to answer my own question. It turns out there are about 12.4 lunar cycles per solar year, so it does fall right between 12 and 13, meaning that (in my opinion) both 12 and 13 months seem like reasonable systems.
Unfortunately it also means there's no way to really sync the months with the year perfectly.
A side note on the solar year/lunar month not lining up... I know that planets in a star system tend to fall into resonant orbits, so you'll often see common ratios in planetary orbital periods, making occultations more common (when planets all line up). But I actually don't know how this relates to a planet's moons.
1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13
4, 4, 4, 4, 7
4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42
These ones are bad
I do not like this. No sir.
But then dates written like 2026-01-01 in the old format would be interpreted as being one month ahead! The reverse may also happen too. That sounds like a very bad idea
Well days of the month would need to be zero indexed as well
Oneuary, twouary, threeuary, fouruary, fiveuary, sixuary, sevenuary, eightuary, nineuary, tenuary, elevenuary, twelveuary
Oneember, Twoember, Threeember, Fourember, Fiveember, Sixember, Sevenember, Eightember, November (just to fuck with people), Tenember, Elevenember, Twelveember
I was thinking about tossing in one "Greg" just to keep things interesting
Also not a bad idea at all :)
If you do that in Latin, you get names like September, October, and December. Just make sure not to randomly insert two extra months, making sevenuary by the 9th month.
Monuary, Dotuary, Trituary, Quadtember, Quintober, Sextember, September, October, November, December, Undecember, Dodecember
The idea that July and August were added and shifted the months to be wrong is actually a misconception afaik. The months they replaced were already basically "fiveuary" and "sixuary".
The numbering got shifted off when they decided January should be the first month; it used to be March. February was the last month, which explains why leap days are added to February.
The Japanese got it right: Just number them. First month, second month etc.
Weird that they sold one off in the middle of the year to advertise a media streaming device/app though.
I mean, they also named the one before it after one of their favorite board games, so I think anything's fair game.
Same in Chinese
Now tell me about their 72 seasons.
April, August, December, Februrary, March, May, January, July, June, November, October, September
(i.e. the existing names but alphabetised)
(EDIT: J traditionally comes before M. Am idiot.)
i guess your alphabet is a little different to mine. But i can dig it.
Nope. I'm just old and stupid.
This would make things so much easier in Excel
This wouldn't be a good idea, as then people would easily mix up dates using the old names with your system (e.g. January would go from being the first month to being the seventh!)
I would second the motion to a 13 month calendar of all 28-day months (despite the fact you KNOW my birthday is going to end up on a forever Monday). The days of the week are named after scientists of seven different disciplines, the months after artists. There is a theme with the artists, so that 1/4 is musicians, 1/4 visual artists, 1/4 writers, 1/4 builders.
Whenever I see a street or city named after a politician or military officer, I always wish there were more things named after people that are actually useful for the world.
For reference, I was born on the 12th day of the month of Lady Gaga, of course an Einsteinday.
Sandra 2: Bega Boogaloo
You are queueing in a line. But You 31st, need to wait so long! So frightening, like Halloween.
I tried my best. You could probably do something with Me 25th as well.
They would turn into 13 months and each one would have 28 days. September to December would be placed 7th to 10th, then July and August at the end, followed by Hermes as the 13th.
No love for the French Republican Calendar months?
People who know their Latin roots might know what these months are named after, but here's a guide:
Today (2026-03-23 UTC) would be the 23rd of Germinal, 2026 CE.
Wait, I thought the French Republican Calendar had 10 months only?
1,2,3,4,5,7,8,9,10,11,12,13
Lousy Smarch weather.
Tim.
All of them are Tim.
I would just redo the entire thing based on the same idea of 13 28 day months with extra days as holidays in the theme of the International Fixed Calendar but rename all of the months and have the year start on one of the equinox instead of a week after a solstice like the Gregorian calendar.
No, I don't have suggestions for the names of the months, but naming them based on the solar cycle would be fun. Not sure how to make that work consistently for the northern and southern hemispheres, but if it was based on something like 'northern solstice/southern solstice and first equinox, second equinox for the months with those date and maybe waxing and waning could work.
Month, monthh, monthhh, monthhhh, monthhhhh, monthhhhhh, monthhhhhhh, monthhhhhhhh, monthhhhhhhhh, monthhhhhhhhh, monthhhhhhhhhhh, monthhhhhhhhhh
Your idea is great. But I would switch it to five months of 73 days each and name them Microbes, Plants, Fungi, Animals, and Robots.
Morning Star, Sun's Dawn, First Seed, Rain's Hand, Second Seed, Midyear, Sun's Height, Last Seed, Hearthfire, Frostfall, Sun's Dusk, Evening Star
Month 1, 2, etc. Same with the week days.
01001010 01100001 01101110 01110101 01100001 01110010 01111001
01000110 01100101 01100010 01110010 01110101 01100001 01110010 01111001
01001101 01100001 01110010 01100011 01101000
01000001 01110000 01110010 01101001 01101100
01001101 01100001 01111001
01001010 01110101 01101110 01100101
01001010 01110101 01101100 01111001
01000001 01110101 01100111 01110101 01110011 01110100
01010011 01100101 01110000 01110100 01100101 01101101 01100010 01100101 01110010
01001111 01100011 01110100 01101111 01100010 01100101 01110010
01001110 01101111 01110110 01100101 01101101 01100010 01100101 01110010
01000100 01100101 01100011 01100101 01101101 01100010 01100101 01110010
Another, Year, Passes, Us, By, And, We, All, Die, In, The, End.
Easy mnemonic to teach the month names to your kids!
I'd just use the names my native language uses tbh :3. They're named after natural phenomena related to what happens those months
That would really mess with the opposite hemisphere
They get the months reversed, fixed :3
Would be tough for the tropics too. Half the months are called 'dry' and the other half 'rain'
I eally like these names. But Despair needs an alternative name. Think of the poor people whose birthday is "Despair 1st".
Wind could also work.
Each month would be named after one of Elon Musk's children, but the names would be randomized every year (any future children are added to the rotation). Eventually this becomes impossible to keep up with and we just end up using numbers anyway, which is fine with me.
May, June, June, June, July, July, July, July, August, August, August, September
I don’t much care for winter.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
There would be only one month. It’s called “Year” and has 365 days.
Too bad for people who are monthly paid.
Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, Blitzen, Rudolph, Bob, Doofenmeister, and 'your name here'.
I'd pull out 'July' and 'August', move everything else up two spaces and put 'July' and 'August' at the end.
13 months of 28 days each. New Years is its own day outside of a month. Monday is first of each month. New Year's is not a day of the week. Leap year feb 29th is moved to May to be a nice weather day for most of the world. It too is a holiday, and not a day of the week.
Name this holiday, and bonus, the 13 months.
Keep the month names the same but name the 13th "Smarch".
I'd leave 'em alone because I find it hilarious how months and days are mostly named after out of vogue polytheist gods and long dead roman leaders with a few celestial bodies thrown in for good measure.
A christian wishing me a good Thors Day during Eosturmonath is fun.
I'd be glad that I was chosen. I'd leave them the way they are, there's enough shit going on right now, we don't need to ask for trouble.
I wanted each to be a pair with 6 months apart and for the solstices and equinoxes to each have an appropriate name
In which language, English? Though why would renaming them in English require the approval of everyone in the world?
I'd say you don't even need the approval of everyone living in an English-speaking country. It's not like the US and UK use all the same words, for example. I think it's fine for one English country to unilaterally rename them, no need for wider approval.
All the ppl suggesting numbers need to realize the months already have that nickname. U can literally just write the number on a check or triplicate government form and it will be understood
Beatrice Joseph Mitzie Globuule Inglebingle Jo 2 A pink giraffe Kimmy Bimmy Phlimmee Djongle Jessica
iniciary, seconduary, ternuary, foursh, fifsh, siksh, septembre, ocrobre, novembre, december, oncember, docember
I would remove names. Many languages don't have separate names and work just fine (Japanese, for instance)
* technically Japan has month names, but no one uses them at all in daily life. My wife can't even list them all right now, heh.
All 20 months named Febtober.
If we're doing this, can we go back to 13 months?
Undnary Decruary Nonsh Oct Senn Quint Quartust Tertiember Secomber Primcember