indiction
/ɪnˈdɪkʃ(ə)n
/noun historical
1A fiscal period of fifteen years used as a means of dating events and transactions in the Roman Empire and in the papal and some royal courts. The system was instituted by the Emperor Constantine in ad 313 and was used in some places until the 16th century.The protocol consisted of an invocation, which was both symbolic and verbal, and was chronologically dated: the year, the month and the day, and the indiction....
- As a cross-check and source of additional information, many manuscripts give the year according to the year of the indiction.
- There are also special treatments of the distinct systems used in Egypt's different regions and the introduction of the indiction system.
1.1A particular year in an indiction period.This letter is supposed to have been written in the third Indiction (a.d. 5923); the law complained of having been issued in the previous year....
- The date is thus changed to April 7, 335, at the end of the eighth indiction, when Julius Constantius and Rufius Albinus were consuls.
- Theophylaktos gives a false date for the adoption of Tiberius, naming December in the ninth indiction - that is, 575.
Origin
From Latin indictio(n-), from the verb indicere (see indict).