EXCURSUS ON THE SUBSEQUENT HISTORY OF THE EASTER 

QUESTION.

(Hefele: Hist. of the Councils, Vol. I., pp.  et seqq.)

The differences in the way of fixing the period of Easter did not indeed 

disappear after the Council of Nicea. Alexandria and Rome could not 

agree, either because one of the two Churches neglected to make the 

calculation for Easter, or because the other considered it inaccurate. It 

is a fact, proved by the ancient Easter table of the Roman Church, that 

the cycle of eighty-four years continued to be used at Rome as before. 

Now this cycle differed in many ways from the Alexandrian, and did 

not always agree with it about the period for Easter--in fact(a), the 

Romans used quite another method from the Alexandrians; they 

calculated from the epact, and began from the feria prima of 

January.(b.) The Romans were mistaken in placing the full moon a 

little too soon; whilst the Alexandrians placed it a little too late.(c.) At 

Rome the equinox was supposed to fall on March 18th; whilst the 

Alexandrians placed it on March 21st.(d.) Finally, the Romans differed 

in this from the Greeks also; they did not celebrate Easter the next day 

when the full moon fell on the Saturday.

Even the year following the Council of Nicea--that is, in --as well 

as in the years , , , , , the Latins celebrated Easter on 

a different day from the Alexandrians. In order to put an end to this 

misunderstanding, the Synod of Sardica in , as we learn from the 

newly discovered festival letters of S. Athanasius, took up again the 

question of Easter, and brought the two parties(Alexandrians and 

Romans) to regulate, by means of mutual concessions, a common day 

for Easter for the next fifty years. This compromise, after a few years, 

was not observed. The troubles excited by the Arian heresy, and the 

division which it caused between the East and the West, prevented the 

decree of Sardica from being put into execution; therefore the Emperor 

Theodosius the Great, after the re-establishment of peace in the 

Church, found himself obliged to take fresh steps for obtaining a 

complete uniformity in the manner of celebrating Easter. In , the 

Romans having kept Easter on March 21st, the Alexandrians did not 

do so for five weeks later--that is to say, till April 25th--because with 

the Alexandrians the equinox was not till March 21st. The Emperor 

Theodosius the Great then asked Theophilus, Bishop of Alexandria for 

an explanation of the difference. The bishop responded to the 

Emperor's desire, and drew up a chronological table of the Easter 

festivals, based upon the principles acknowledged by the Church of 

Alexandria. Unfortunately, we now possess only the prologue of his 

work.

Upon an invitation from Rome, S. Ambrose also mentioned the period 

of this same Easter in , in his letter to the bishops of AEmilia, and 

he sides with the Alexandrian computation. Cyril of Alexandria 

abridged the paschal table of his uncle Theophilus, and fixed the time 

for the ninety-five following Easters--that is, from  to  after 

Christ. Besides this Cyril showed, in a letter to the Pope, what was 

defective in the Latin calculation; and this demonstration was taken up 

again, some time after, by order of the Emperor, by Paschasinus, 

Bishop of Lilybaeum and Proterius of Alexandria, in a letter written by 

them to Pope Leo I. In consequence of these communications, Pope 

Leo often gave the preference to the Alexandrian computation, instead 

of that of the Church of Rome. At the same time also was generally 

established, the opinion so little entertained by the ancient authorities 

of the Church--one might even say, so strongly in contradiction to their 

teaching--that Christ partook of the passover on the 14th Nisan, that he 

died on the 15th(not on the 14th, as the ancients considered), that he 

lay in the grave on the 16th, and rose again on the 17th. In the letter 

we have just mentioned, Proterius of Alexandria openly admitted all 

these different points.

Some years afterwards, in , Victor of Aquitane, by order of the 

Roman Archdeacon Hilary, endeavoured to make the Roman and the 

Alexandrian calculations agree together. It has been conjectured that 

subsequently Hilary, when Pope, brought Victor's calculation into use, 

in --that is, at the time when the cycle of eighty-four years came to 

an end. In the latter cycle the new moons were marked more 

accurately, and the chief differences existing between the Latin and 

Greek calculations disappeared; so that the Easter of the Latins 

generally coincided with that of Alexandria, or was only a very little 

removed from it. In cases when the  id   fell on a 

Saturday, Victor did not wish to decide whether Easter should be 

celebrated the next day, as the Alexandrians did, or should be 

postponed for a week. He indicates both dates in his table, and leaves 

the Pope to decide what was to be done in each separate case. Even 

after Victor's calculations, there still remained great differences in the 

manner of fixing the celebration of Easter; and it was Dionysius the 

Less who first completely overcame them, by giving to the Latins a 

paschal table having as its basis the cycle of nineteen years. This cycle 

perfectly corresponded to that of Alexandria, and thus established that 

harmony which had been so long sought in vain. He showed the 

advantages of his calculation so strongly, that it was admitted by 

Rome and by the whole of Italy; whilst almost the whole of Gaul 

remained faithful to Victor's canon, and Great Britain still held the 

'cycle of eighty-four years, a little improved by Sulpicius Severus. 

When the Heptarchy was evangelized by the Roman missionaries, the 

new converts accepted the calculation of Dionysius, whilst the ancient 

Churches of Wales held fast their old tradition. From this arose the 

well-known British dissensions about the celebration of Easter, which 

were transplanted by Columban into Gaul. In , the majority of the 

ancient British Churches accepted the cycle of nineteen years. It had 

before been introduced into Spain, immediately after the conversion of 

Reccared. Finally, under Charles the Great, the cycle of nineteen years 

triumphed over all opposition; and thus the whole of Christendom was 

united, for the Quartodecimans had gradually disappeared.()