ABSTRACT
In search of the origins of Lent in the patristic era and its designation as the “Forty Days,” historians and liturgists have focused on the Lenten traditions associated with Demetrius under the assumption that they reflect historical developments.1 I have explored these traditions at length elsewhere;2 here, a summary of that analysis will provide grounding for a discussion of Demetrius’s role as a reformer of the observance of Lent and as the author of the complex Epact calculations.
