So again the long colophon or epilogue to the “Cordyale” tells us that the book “was deliuered to me William Caxton by my saide noble lorde Ryuiers on the day of purificacion of our blissid lady, fallyng the tewsday the secund day of the moneth of feuerer. In the yere of our lord M. cccc. lxxviij for to be enprinted.… Whiche werke present I begann the morn after the saide Purification of our blissid Lady, whiche was the daye of Seint Blase Bisshop and Martir, And finisshed on the euen of thannunciacion of our said blissid Lady, fallyng on the Wednesday the xxiiij. daye of Marche in the xix yere of Kyng Edwarde the fourthe.”

Earlier bibliographers got very confused over this book and made absurd mistakes as to the time which Caxton took to print it. But Mr. Blades had no difficulty in showing that the different dates follow closely on each other. Caxton received the book on February 2d, began printing it on February 3d, and finished it on March 24th, all in the same year 1479. We have a double method of proving this, by the two week-days mentioned and by the regnal year, which covered the period March 4, 1479, to March 3, 1480. The only March 24th in this twelvemonth was that in 1479, and in 1479 March 24th, as Caxton says, fell on a Wednesday. In 1479, moreover, February 2d fell on a Tuesday, in 1478 on a Sunday. It is thus clear that the Tuesday, February 2, 1478, of the colophon must be an old-style date, answering to 1479 of our reckoning.

The occasional mention of the day both of the week and the month in German colophons offers us, in the absence of regnal years, almost the only proof we can obtain that German printers began their year either at Christmas or on January 1st,—I am not prepared to say which. Thus the colophon of an edition of the “De remediis utriusque fortunae” of Adrianus Carthusiensis reads:

Explicit liber de remediis fortuitorum casuum nouiter compilatus et impressus Colonie per Arnoldum therhoernen, finitus Anno domini Mºccccºlxxiº die veneris octaua mensis Februarii. Deo Gracias.

Ends the book of the remedies of casual haps, lately compiled and printed at Cologne by Arnold therhoernen. Finished in the year of the Lord 1471, on Friday, February 8th. Thanks be to God.

In 1471 February 8th fell on a Friday, in 1472 on a Saturday. Therefore it is clear that in therhoernen’s reckoning January and February were the first months of the year, as they are with us.

Before inquiring as to what printers reckoned the year as beginning at Easter, we must give the following table:

EASTER DAY, 1470-1521

1470April 22
1471April 14
1472March 29
1473April 18
1474April 10
1475March 26
1476April 14
1477April 6
1478March 22
1479April 11
1480April 2
1481April 22
1482April 7
1483March 30
1484April 18
1485April 3
1486March 26
1487April 15
1488April 6
1489April 19
1490April 11
1491April 3
1492April 22
1493April 7
1494March 30
1495April 19
1496April 3
1497March 26
1498April 15
1499March 31
1500April 19
1501April 11
1502March 27
1503April 16
1504April 7
1505March 23
1506April 12
1507April 4
1508April 23
1509April 8
1510March 31
1511April 20
1512April 11
1513March 27
1514April 16
1515April 8
1516March 23
1517April 12
1518April 4
1519April 24
1520April 8
1521March 31