CALENDAR ART

by Angela Fisher

Discusses what various civilizations have done to measure time

61 pages, Hardcover

First published March 31, 1987

Reviews

[Sally · Rating 4 out of 5]

529.3 FIS

This belongs to that genre of books that only libraries buy. It's too narrow, and not by a well-known author or illustrator, so nobody's gonna buy it. But when you need something on a narrow topic that's well-written and illustrated, boy are you glad the library's got it!

This book covers more simply and comprehensively, with no bells and whistles, the various kinds of calendars used in the past than anything else I've encountered yet. It's just what I needed for the class I'm preparing for.

Probably the coolest thing is a chart in the front that allows you to look up the date of any day from 1850 to 2050. Very cool to math geeks like me.

[Yellowboxdriver · Rating 4 out of 5]

Everything about this book was great - the history, science, math, and art. However, the calendars were not presented chronologically; they were presented alphabetically. The Gregorian Calendar came before the Julian Calendar, which came before the Roman Calendar! I had to flip ahead to see the changes that were made to calendars that came earlier.

Calendars from all cultures were represented - from Aztec to World (designed in 1930 but never adopted.)

I have students who would really enjoy this book, and it has ties to 4th grade science (astronomy) standards.

[Pamela Powell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating look at calendars throughout history. Gives a good overview of the Gregorian Calendar but also gives a brief glimpse of calendars from the Aztec, Babylonian, Chinese, Egyptian, French Revolution, Hebrew, Islamic, Julian, Mayan, Roman, Stonehenge, and World cultures. The information on the World Calendar is a bit dated, but still intriguing.