# Gauss publishes a numerical algorithm for the date of Easter

Date: 1800

## The fact

In 1800 [Gauss](/people/carl-friedrich-gauss) published a numerical algorithm for calculating the date of Easter, a compact computus that replaced some of the table-labour of church calendars with arithmetic rules. He wrote the rules; churches did not adopt him as a legislator. The row stores one calendar-data paper. It does not twin later corrections he made to the algorithm, and it does not treat a smartphone calendar as 1800.

## Context

Easter’s date is a public coordination problem: lunisolar rules, Julian and Gregorian branches, tables that clerks copied. A printed algorithm is a data instrument because a reader can compute the same feast without a private table. Do not treat it as Ceres. Do not treat later ‘Gauss Easter’ code snippets as his lifetime act beyond the 1800 paper. A formula that still needs care at century edges is a limit, not a reason to drop the dated paper. Churches kept their authority; Gauss kept a computus, not a bull. MacTutor’s biographical list treats the Easter algorithm as his first astronomical publication; that is independent colour around the same object.

The attached driver is [personal-data-protection](/drivers/personal-data-protection). The welfare reading used in this dossier is improving. That reading is an impact-path choice, not a property stored on the Fact itself.

## Evidence and sources

Göttingen digitised Gauss works include the calendar papers. MacTutor independently dates the 1800 Easter algorithm as his first astronomical publication and notes its later use. Official: https://gdz.sub.uni-goettingen.de/. Independent: https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Gauss/. The records establish a published 1800 computus. They do not establish a unique later church-attendance series. A showing that the 1800 paper does not contain an Easter algorithm would change the row.

Official or archival record: Göttingen Digitisation Centre — Gauss prints and papers (https://gdz.sub.uni-goettingen.de/; Niedersächsische Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Göttingen).

## Significance

Improving data path: a recurring public date became arithmetic. High confidence on 1800. Modest weight: a formula is not a calendar statute. Later programmers who paste ‘Gauss Easter’ are reception. Liturgical authority remained with churches. Writers/scientists: do not pretend a computus moved a macro indicator.

Shared responsibility is part of Gauss publishes a numerical algorithm for the date of Easter. Naming Carl Friedrich Gauss does not delete co-authors, institutions, or later transmitters. The lag from 1800-08-01 to any measured indicator is not treated as zero. Alternative explanations — weather, other armies, later statutes, or independent cultural change — remain live where the sources do not close them.

## What is established and what is not

Established: Gauss published an Easter-date algorithm in 1800. Not established: that churches repealed their tables that year, or that a later software library is this paper. A contradictory 1800 contents list without Easter would change the row.

If a number is not in the two records named above, it is not supplied here.

Later competitions, monuments, translations, UNESCO listings, museums, and adaptations are not converted into extra lifetime acts.

Confidence is stated on the impact path, not hidden in adjectives. Easter formula is not a later Gaussian distribution and not a liturgical reform he enacted. Mixed effects of Gauss publishes a numerical algorithm for the date of Easter are separate paths.

## People

- Carl Friedrich Gauss: https://factrail.ai/people/carl-friedrich-gauss

## Drivers

- Personal-Data Protection: https://factrail.ai/drivers/personal-data-protection

## Sources

- https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Gauss/
- https://gdz.sub.uni-goettingen.de/

## Methodology

https://factrail.ai/methodology

Canonical: https://factrail.ai/facts/gs-easter-1800