Indiction

Indiction (Latin indictio, a declaring) is a term which designates "a chronological system, including a circle of fifteen years:

(1) the Caesarean, used long in France and Germany, beginning on Sept. 24;

(2) the Constantinopolitan, used in the East from the time of Anastasius, and beginning Sept. 1; and

⇒Bible concordance for INDICTMENTS.

(3) the Papal, reckoned from Jan. 1,313. The Council of Antioch, 341, first gives a documentary date, the 14th indiction. The computation prevailed in Syria in the fifth century, and is mentioned by Ambrose as existing at Rome. It is, however, asserted that in the West, the East, and Egypt, with the exception of Africa, the indictions, until the 16th century, were reckoned from Sept. 1, 312, and that they commenced in Egypt in the time of Constantine." — Walcott, Sacred Archaeology, p. 327; see also Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 2, 141. SEE CYCLE.