A system or method of calculating time, especially the ecclesiastical calculation for determining the date of Easter; sacred arithmetic.
Latin word meaning 'computation' or 'calculation' (from 'computare'). Used historically, especially in medieval religious contexts to refer to the complex rules for calculating the Christian calendar.
Computus was so complicated that Easter's date baffled even Church scholars—the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD couldn't definitively solve it. It took centuries of computists working with lunar and solar cycles before a consistent rule emerged in 1582, showing that sometimes human disagreement isn't about logic but about incompatible mathematical systems.
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