calends

American  

[kal-uhndz] / ˈkæl əndz /

Or kalends

noun

(usually used with a plural verb)

1. the first day of the month in the ancient Roman calendar, from which the days of the preceding month were counted backward to the ides.

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calends British  

/ ˈkælɪndz /

plural noun

1. the first day of each month in the ancient Roman calendar

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Etymology

Origin of calends

1325–75; Middle English kalendes, alteration (with native plural suffix) of Latin kalendae, perhaps equivalent to cal- (base of calāre to proclaim) + -end- formative suffix (perhaps for *-and- ) + -ae plural ending

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

calends

On the night of the calends themselves he would have been the master of Præneste, that rich and inaccessible strong-hold, by a nocturnal escalade!

From The Roman Traitor, Vol. 1 by Henry William Herbert

These two days, days of solemn festivity in the calends of the Church, have been duly kept, and the population looks cheerful as it swarms through the streets.

From At Home And Abroad Or, Things And Thoughts In America and Europe by Arthur B. Fuller

They sought the authorisation of the King and towards the calends of December, 1499, they left port.

From De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2) The Eight Decades of Peter Martyr D'Anghera by Francis Augustus MacNutt

The calends were invariably fixed to the first day of each month; the nones came on the 5th or 7th, and the ides the 13th or 15th.

From Astronomical Myths Based on Flammarions's History of the Heavens by John F. Blake

In the ancient Roman calendar the first day of every month was invariably called the calends.

From Our Calendar by George Nichols Packer