a number assigned to each year, to assist in fixing the dates of the movable church festivals. The epact for any year corresponds to the number of days elapsing between the date of the last new moon of the previous year and the first of January of the year whose epact is sought. The dates of the succeeding new moons are found by adding 29 and 30 alternately, but these dates often differ considerably from those of the actual or astronomical new moons. Having determined the "golden number" (See METONIC CYCLE) of any year between 1900 and 2199, the epact may be easily found in the following table: GOLDEN NUMBER EPACT GOLDEN NUMBER EPACT 1 29 11 19 2 10 12 30 3 21 13 11 4 2 14 22 5 13 15 3 6 24 16 14 7 5 17 25 8 16 18 6 9 27 19 17 10 8 For the years between 1700 and 1899 the epacts for each golden number except 12 were one more than the number given in the table above; for the golden number 12, the epact was 1. See METONIC CYCLE.