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''Aprilis'' or ''mensis Aprilis'' ("April") was the fourth month of the ancient Roman calendar, following ''Martius'' (March) and preceding ''Maius'' ("May"). On the oldest Roman calendar that had begun with March, ''Aprilis'' was the second of ten months in the year. April had 29 days on calendars of the Roman Republic, with a day added to the month during the reform in the mid-40s BC that produced the Julian calendar. April was marked by a series of festivals devoted to aspects of rural life, since it was a busy month for farmers.〔H.H. Scullard, ''Festivals and Ceremonies of the Roman Republic'' (Cornell University Press, 1981), p. 96.〕 As Rome became more urbanized, the significance of some ceremonies expanded, notably the Parilia, an archaic pastoral festival celebrated as the "birthday" ''(dies natalis)'' or founding day of Rome. The month was generally preoccupied with deities who were female or ambiguous in gender, opening with the Feast of Venus on the Kalends.〔William Warde Fowler, ''The Roman Festivals of the Period of the Republic'' (London, 1908), pp. 66–67.〕 ==Name of the month== The Romans thought that the name ''Aprilis'' derived from ''aperio, aperire, apertus'', a verb meaning "to open". The ''Fasti Praenestini'' offered the expanded explanation that "fruits and flowers and animals and seas and lands do open". Some antiquarians, as well as Ovid in his poem on the Roman calendar, provide an alternate derivation from ''Aphrodite'', the Greek counterpart of Venus whose festival began the month. ''Apru'' might be derived from the conjectured Etruscan form of the name, which would be ''Aprodita'', but among the Etruscans, the month was called ''Cabreas''.〔Scullard, ''Festivals and Ceremonies of the Roman Republic'', p. 96.〕 Some modern linguists derive ''Aprilis'' from Etruscan ''Ampile'' or ''Amphile'', based on a medieval gloss, conjecturing an origin in the Thessalian month name ''Aphrios''. An Indo-European origin has also been proposed, related to Sanskrit ''áparah'' and Latin ''alter'', "the other of two", referring to its original position as the second month of the year.〔Interpretations summarized by Gary Forsythe, ''Time in Roman Religion: One Thousand Years of Religious History'' (Routledge, 2012), p. 10.〕 Varro and Cincius both reject the connection of the name to ''Aphrodite'', and the common Roman derivation from ''aperio'' may be the correct one.〔Scullard, ''Festivals and Ceremonies of the Roman Republic'', p. 96; Forsythe, ''Time in Roman Religion,'' p. 10.〕 In the latter years of Nero's reign, the Senate briefly renamed April ''Neronius'' in his honor.〔Tacitus 15.74 and 16.12; Forsythe, ''Time in Roman Religion,'' p. 39.〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Aprilis」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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