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John Cowan wrote:
> > > Julius Caesar was assassinated on <date gDate="-43-03-13">the ides of March,
> > > 710 A.U.C.</date>
> > I am as unhappy as Simon with your use of attribute here, but even more with the
> > (double: year and day, both) inaccuracy of its value.
>
> Izzatso? The man said "Kai su, teknon?" and died on March 15, 44 B.C.E. according
> to the Julian calendar, the one in effect at the time, which by my calculations was
> March 13 by the proleptic Gregorian calendar, which is what XSD mandates. The
> mapping from signed Gregorian to C.E./B.C.E style maps 1 B.C.E. to the year 0, and
> so on backward.
>
> As for the A.U.C., one subtracts a B.C.E. date from 754 to compute it.
>
> (Those who prefer may read A.D. for C.E., and B.C. for B.C.E. in this posting.)
I believe that you have just perfectly illustrated the problem. The Roman calendar (ab
urbe condita) counts *forward* from (take your pick) the traditional date of the
foundation of Rome, or from the first day of January 709 AUC, when Caesar's reformed
calendar took effect. By the very meaning of (the forward-counting) AUC you cannot map
a Roman date which was on the fifteenth day of the third month in the (by definition
of the Julian calendar) 710th year to a (essentially backward-looking) gDate that
computes to March 13th and claim, as your markup effectively does, that they are the
same thing. Your element content, in the units in which you state it, is emphatically
not what your attribute notation claims that it is.
Respectfully,
Walter Perry
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