The Sacred Calendar Is Now Live

After a long period of private research and development, I'm delighted to announce that the first version of the Avebury Tribe Sacred Calendar is now live. This project has been quietly evolving for a long time. The aim has never been simply to create another moon calendar, but to bring together the best-known surviving Celtic calendar traditions and present them in a way that works in the modern world while remaining honest about what is known, what is reconstructed and what is still debated. The Sacred Calendar combines modern astronomical calculations with a Coligny-inspired reconstruction, allowing it to calculate the current lunar month, moon phase, dark moon, full moon, Sabbats, Gorsedd dates and other seasonal markers automatically. Where historical evidence is uncertain, the calendar makes that clear. It is designed as an educational resource based on observable natural cycles and the surviving evidence from Celtic cultures, rather than astrology, horoscopes or personal prediction. This is only the beginning. Future updates will continue to expand the calendar with additional educational material, local sky observations, monument alignments, lunar standstills and other features as the project develops. The Sacred Calendar is available as part of Avebury Tribe membership for those who have affirmed the Six Principles of the Tribe. It reflects one of our core aims: to preserve, explore and share the wisdom of the ancestors in ways that remain relevant and accessible today. I hope you enjoy exploring it, and as always, your feedback and ideas are welcome as we continue to develop both the calendar and the wider Avebury Tribe website together. ## The Philosophy Behind the Avebury Sacred Calendar The Avebury Sacred Calendar is not intended to be a direct copy of the ancient Coligny Calendar, nor is it an attempt to recreate a lost calendar with certainty. Instead, it is a modern reconstruction that seeks to continue the same way of thinking as our Celtic ancestors—using the surviving evidence as a foundation while allowing the calendar to develop through comparative research, astronomy and the landscape of Britain. The Coligny Calendar provides the structural framework. We have retained its division of the year into two equal halves—a Summer Half and a Winter Half—as this is one of its clearest surviving features. We have also retained the original sequence of the Coligny month names, respecting the evidence preserved on the bronze tablet. Where the Avebury Sacred Calendar differs is in its seasonal anchoring. Rather than attempting to reproduce an uncertain historical starting point, the year begins on the astronomical New Moon nearest the Autumn Equinox, marking the beginning of the Winter Half. Six lunar months later, the New Moon nearest the Spring Equinox begins the Summer Half. This creates a coherent lunisolar calendar based on observable astronomy while preserving the Coligny seasonal structure. The meanings of the Coligny month names remain one of the most fascinating areas of Celtic scholarship. Some, such as **Giamonios**, **Equos** and **Cantlos**, have meanings that are reasonably well understood, while others continue to be debated. In developing the Avebury Sacred Calendar, we have compared the surviving Gaulish names with Old Irish, Welsh, reconstructed Proto-Celtic and Common Brittonic to better understand the ideas that may lie behind them. Where no clear answer exists, the calendar reflects the current balance of scholarly opinion while acknowledging that some interpretations remain uncertain. One of the most interesting examples is **Samonios**. For many years it was widely assumed that Samonios simply meant "Summer Month" and that its similarity to the Irish **Samhain** reflected a shared meaning connected with summer or summer's end. More recent linguistic work, however, has suggested that the underlying root may instead carry a broader idea of **gathering** or **assembly**, although this interpretation remains debated. Whether or not that newer interpretation ultimately proves correct, it opens an interesting way of understanding how related Celtic cultures could preserve the same ancestral idea while expressing it differently. In Ireland, the season associated with Samhain is traditionally the gathering in of livestock from the summer pastures, the final harvest, and the coming together of families and communities before winter. It is a time when both people and animals return home. In Gaul, the evidence points towards large tribal assemblies, markets, legal gatherings and communal festivals playing an important role within the annual cycle. If the linguistic connection is indeed one of gathering, then the emphasis may have shifted from gathering the bounty of the land to gathering the people themselves. The underlying concept remains remarkably similar. One culture gathers the herds. Another gathers the tribe. The same ancestral root may therefore have evolved to describe different expressions of the same seasonal reality. This philosophy runs throughout the Avebury Sacred Calendar. It does not seek to erase regional differences between the Celtic peoples. Instead, it recognises that communities living in different landscapes naturally expressed the same underlying principles in different ways. The calendar therefore preserves the structure of the Coligny tradition while applying a transparent methodology to its interpretation, drawing together archaeology, linguistics, astronomy and the seasonal rhythms of the landscape. In this way, the Avebury Sacred Calendar is intended not as a museum piece, but as a living calendar—one that honours the evidence, acknowledges uncertainty, embraces thoughtful reconstruction, and reconnects the rhythms of the Moon, the Sun, the seasons and the community into a coherent whole.