Keeping Time with the Romans

 

Modern societies rely on precise and standardized timing. Our schedules are synchronized to prevent chaos, ensure safety, and keep complex modern systems running efficiently. Without a shared timeline, daily operations, global markets, and digital networks would quickly fail. Power grids and telecommunications would crash and transportation hubs would become ensnarled. If stock markets didn’t have exact timing down to the microsecond, fraud could easily take place. Our ordered lives demand accurate synchronized devices that rely on electronic oscillation, digital counters, and atomic frequency.

While timekeeping in ancient Rome was still important, it was very different. Before digital and atomic clocks, there were physical gears and springs. But even these were beyond Roman technology. Romans measured time in ways that were much more closely connected to the rhythms of nature. The rising and setting of the sun and the changing of the seasons shaped how Romans perceived time much more than they do today.

Both the modern world and the Roman one divide the day into twenty-four hours. However, we divide those hours differently. Now, our hours are all equal in length and do not vary from day to day or season to season. The Roman day was divided into twelve hours of daylight and twelve of night, and each hour was a flexible unit rather than a consistent measure. During the summer, when the sun follows a higher arc in the sky and days are longer, the Romans had longer hours during the day and shorter hours at night. During the winter, when the sun rose later in the day and set earlier, the hours of day were compressed and nighttime hours lengthened. At Mediterranean latitude, one hour could be as short as 45 minutes in the middle of winter solstice, and 75 minutes during the height of summer.

A modern American’s day begins when the alarm clock goes off. This can be well before sunrise or close to noon. For Romans, sunrise marked the beginning of the day. The first hour of the day, or prima diei hora in Latin, started then.  The ante meridiem, or time before noon continued with hora secunda, hora tertia, and so on. We still use am to differentiate between hours before noon and those in the afternoon.

Roman mornings were busy. Most Romans and began work early to take full advantage of daylight. Most business transactions, legal proceedings, and political obligations occurred before noon. It was also the time when clients of elite patrons made their way to their patron’s house to pay their respects in what was called a salutatio. The clients offered a formal greeting and, in exchange, the patron would dispense advice, give instructions, or request assistance in civic or business matters. In many cases, he also distributed the sportula, a modest allowance that could take the form of cash or food.

 When the sun reached its highest point in the sky, it was Midday, or meridies, and six hours (sexta hora) after sunrise. This wording survives today in the Spanish word siesta, which literally means the sixth hour of the day. For some odd reason, the English term noon didn’t always signify the middle of the day. Until 1300, monks used the word noon to describe a period of prayer beginning at three in the afternoon, or the ninth hour.

The second half of the day was called the post meridiem, or after noon, which in English has become one word: afternoon. We still use the abbreviation pm to identify this period, although for us, pm continues until midnight, while the Romans ended their pm hours at sunset.

By meridies, especially during the long, hot days of summer, most business and civic duties were done. Afternoons were focused on leisure, social interaction, and personal affairs. Bathing was an important part of the afternoon, and a visit to the public baths was not just a time to get clean, but a time relaxing, exercising, and socializing.

Cena, the main meal of the day, was usually eaten in the late afternoon or early evening, after the day's work had come to an end.

The natural day (dies naturalis) ran from sunrise to sunset, which was called vespera in Latin.  Then night began, with the hour after sunset called the prima noctis hora, the first hour of the night. But although night was divided into twelve hours much as day was, most Romans did not keep track of hours. Instead, night was divided into four watches, or vigils. These were especially important for military and security purposes, as soldiers, guards, and night watchmen structured their duties according to these intervals. Vigilia prima was the first watch, or evening watch, and ran from sunset (vespera) to the third hour of the night (hora tertia noctis) at about 9:00 PM.  Vigilia secunda (Second Watch, or Midnight Watch) ran from 9:00 PM to midnight , and Vigilia tertia (Third Watch or Cock-crowing, gallicinium in Latin) ran from midnight to about 3:00 AM. The final watch of the night, Vigilia quarta, ended when the sun rose. All the watches were signaled by horns, bells, or trumpets.

Although they now follow a modern clock with fixed hours, the Catholic Church preserved many of the Latin names in their canonical hours.   Prime takes place at 6 am, terce at 9 am, sext at noon, and none at 3 pm, and vespers at 6 pm.

The Roman system followed a naturally flexible daily rhythm regulated by sunlight rather than mechanical clocks. Activities did not occur at a fixed, standardized times in the modern sense, but were organized around dawn, midday, and sunset. Even with 24 hours in a day, Romans did not manage time down to the minute. Rather than planning to meet at "9:30am sharp" as we might, Romans would plan to meet in the third hour.  Arriving a bit early or late was not considered bad form. It was just a normal part of the system. What feels like imprecision to a modern observer was, for a Roman, simply how life worked.