On what date (based on Tolkien's own explanations of how the Shire-dates relate to our modern reckoning in Appendix D of The Lord of the Rings) would the birthdays of Bilbo and Frodo fall on our modern, Gregorian calendar? Would it be:
A. 22 September
B. 14 September
C. 2 October
D. 12 September
E. Other (give your own date)
Feel free to explain your reasoning!
D: 12 of September
Hobbit Day is the Gregorian calendar date of Frodo's and Bilbo's birthday.
However, The Shire Reckoning calendar is 10 days ahead and two weekdays behind (Right now; but that will change with The Shire holidays)
https://psarando.github.io/shire-reckoning/
Works for me, September 12 is my birthday, so I share it with Bilbo and Frodo. No wonder I'm a fan of Tolkien's books!
@eldariontkd Cool!
December 12 on our calendar is actually my personal best guess based on Mid-year's Day being as near as possible to the summer solstice (in the Northern Hemisphere). It is not, however, the date we arrive at if we use Tolkien's actual conversion where the Gregorian New Year's Day falls on 9 Afteryule.
A. 22 September. Because that is what it is in the books.
Hint: "It appears, however, that Mid-year's Day was intended to correspond as nearly as possible to the summer solstice." - The Lord of the Rings, Appendix D (The Calendars).
The summer solstice is on June 20 or 21 these days.
Yes. And as a default I generalize it as June 21. Bilbo and Frodo's shared birthday on the Shire Calendar falls exactly 83 days after the Hobbits' Mid-year's Day (84 days on leap years; their leap day is added to the Lithedays).
The Julian Calendar is a little different, but I haven't heard anything about Tolkien going into that much detail in that respect.
Julian calendar? What calendar is that?
@ShireofMiddleEarth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julian_calendar
@ShireofMiddleEarth The U.S. military uses a version of the Julian Calendar. It counts off the days from 001 to 365 (366 in leap years) without dividing them into months. The classical Julian Calendar was a Roman precursor to the modern Gregorian Calendar.
[spoiler]Test[/spoiler]
Apparently not, at least by my usual method.
The answer is: B. 14 September.
J.R.R. Tolkien wrote: "It appears...that Mid-year's Day was intended to correspond as nearly as possible to the summer solstice. In that case, the Shire dates were actually in advance of ours by some ten days, and our New Year's Day corresponded more or less to the Shire's January 9."*
Placing our January 1 on the Shire-date of January 9 puts Bilbo and Frodo's birthdays of September 22 on our own September 14.
* The Lord of the Rings, Appendix D (The Calendars).
EDIT: I wonder if I waited long enough before posting the solution? I feel like maybe I should have waited for the end of the week.
That's confusing :)
Wouldn't that mean you would align Mid-year's day with the solstice
Earlier this year our January 1st landed on the 11th, which is pretty close.
@ShireofMiddleEarth Yeah, I know; Tolkien's two statements are almost contradictory. What saves them is the ambiguity of his language with such terms as "by some" and "more or less".
If we do align the Hobbits' Mid-year Day more closely with the summer solstice (say, with June 21) then Bilbo's birthday ends up falling on September 12 on our calendar.
I will post the correct answer after the end of Hobbit Day (local time). Does anyone else have an answer?
Is there a way to hide spoilers on this site?