Roman Numeral Date Tattoos

The Short Answer

Most Roman numeral date mistakes aren't bad numerals. The date is converted correctly and still shows the wrong day. III.VIII.MMI is March 8, 2001 in the US and 3 August 2001 in the UK. Both readings are valid, and nothing in the numerals says which one you meant.

Before anything is inked or engraved, check three things: the order, each numeral, and the year. The checker does all three: type the date exactly as it will be written.

1. The Order: Day First or Month First

The US writes month, day, year. The UK, most of Europe, Australia and much of the world write day, month, year. Both are correct in Roman numerals too, which is exactly the problem:

A date reads two ways whenever the day is 12 or lower and differs from the month. That's 132 days of the year, over a third. If the day is 13 or higher, only one order works, so there's no ambiguity.

Pick the order that the people who matter to you use. Tell your artist which order it is, in words, and check the stencil against it. If you and your partner grew up with different date orders, that is worth a conversation before a wedding-date tattoo, not after.

2. Each Numeral, Written the Standard Way

Modern Roman numerals follow one strict subtraction rule. Only I, X and C go in front of a larger symbol, and only in these six pairs: IV (4), IX (9), XL (40), XC (90), CD (400) and CM (900). Common slips:

You'll see IIII on clock faces. That's a clockmaking tradition, not the standard for dates. The checker flags every one of these and shows the standard form.

3. The Year

• Use the full year. Roman numerals have no zero, so a two-digit year of 00 can't be written at all. Years like '05 turn into a lone V that looks like part of the day or month. 2000 is MM and 2005 is MMV.
• Watch the long ones. Years ending in 8 tend to be the longest. 1988 is MCMLXXXVIII, 11 letters, and the longest date between 1900 and 2099 is XXVIII.VIII.MCMLXXXVIII at 23 characters. Compare XI.I.MMI at 8. Ask your artist whether the size you have in mind leaves the letters far enough apart to stay readable as the tattoo ages.
• Years since 2000 are short. 2019 is MMXIX, 2024 is MMXXIV and 2026 is MMXXVI. That's easy to get right, but also easy to mistype by one letter, so check the stencil letter by letter.

Separators and Lettering

Dots are the most common separator, and middle dots or bullets are popular for tattoos. Any consistent separator works. Separators are what make the three parts readable, so don't drop them to save space: IXXIVMCMXCIV is much harder to read than IX.XIV.MCMXCIV.

In ornate or very small lettering, I and the strokes of V and X can blur together, and XIV and XVI start to look alike. When you review the design, read it aloud one numeral at a time.

A 30-Second Check

1. Type the date into the checker exactly as it appears on the stencil, separators and all.
2. Confirm that the reading in your chosen order is the date you mean. The weekday is shown too, which makes it easy to confirm against a calendar or a memory ("it was a Saturday").
3. If it says Ambiguous, make sure you and the people who'll read it agree on the order.
4. If it shows a Fix, correct that numeral before going ahead.

To produce the date in the first place, use Date to Roman numerals. It lets you choose the order, separator and year style, and warns you when the date could be read the other way round.

A Note on History

The Romans themselves never wrote dates this way. They counted days relative to three fixed points in each month, the Kalends, Nones and Ides. Years were usually named after the consuls who held office that year. A date in Roman numerals is a modern style that borrows the numerals. There's no "authentic" order to follow, only the one your readers will understand.