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 ANCE WITH THE PROVISIONS 
 OF THE GIFT 
 
Cornell University Library 
 QB 16.P73 
 
 Ancient calendars and constellations, 
 
 3 1924 012 305 789 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/cletails/cu31924012305789 
 
ANCIENT CALENDARS 
 AND CONSTELLATIONS 
 
ANCIENT CALENDARS 
 AND CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 By the Hon. EMMELINE M. PLUNKET 
 
 WITH ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 LONDON 
 JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W. 
 
 1903 
 
 a 
 
PREFACE 
 
 The Papers here collected and reprinted, with 
 some alterations, were not originally written as a 
 series ; but they do, in fact, form one, inasmuch 
 as" the opinions put forward in each Paper were 
 arrived at, one after the other, simply by following 
 one leading clue. 
 
 This clue was furnished by a consideration of 
 statements made by Professor Sayce in an article 
 contributed by him in 1874 to the Transactions 
 of the Society of Biblical Archeology. 
 
 At page 1 50 he thus wrote : — 
 
 " The standard astrological work of the 
 Babylonians and Assyrians was one consisting of 
 seventy tablets, drawn up for the Library of Sargon, 
 king of Agane, in the i6th century b.c." 
 
viii PREFACE 
 
 And again at page 237 : — 
 
 "The Accadian Calendar was arranged so as 
 to suit the order of the Zodiacal signs ; and Nisan, 
 the first month, answered to the first Zodiacal 
 sign. Now the sun still entered the first point of 
 Aries at the vernal equinox in the time of Hip- 
 parkhus, and it would have done so since 2540 
 B.C. From that epoch backwards to 4698 B.C. 
 Taurus, the second sign of the Accadian Zodiac, 
 and the second month of the Accadian year, 
 would have introduced the spring. The precession 
 of the equinoxes thus enables us to fix the extreme 
 limit of the antiquity of the ancient Babylonian 
 Calendar, and of the origin of the Zodiacal signs 
 in that country." 
 
 Not many years after this sentence had been 
 penned, archaeologists, as the result of much 
 evidence, came to the firm conviction that the 
 date of Sargon of Agane was far earlier than 
 had been at first supposed ; and it was placed by 
 them, not "in the i6th century B.C.," but at the 
 high date of 3800 B.C. 
 
 It was in endeavouring to account for the choice 
 
PREFACE ix 
 
 by Accadian astronomers of Nisan as first month 
 of the year, and of Aries as first constellation of 
 the Zodiac, at a date when that month and con- 
 stellation could not have "introduced the spring," 
 that a possible solution of the difficulty presented 
 itself to my mind — namely, the supposition that 
 the Accadian calendar had been originated when 
 the winter solstice, not the spring equinox, 
 coincided with the sun's entry into the con- 
 stellation Aries. This coincidence took place, as 
 astronomy teaches us, at the date, in round numbers, 
 of 6000 B.C. 
 
 In the first Paper here reprinted this supposition 
 was put forward ; and in the course of following, as 
 above stated, the clue afforded by it, the various 
 subjects discussed in successive Papers claimed 
 always more insistently my attention, as by degrees 
 detached pieces of information concerning the 
 calendars of ancient nations came to hand, and 
 fitted themselves, like the pieces of a dissected 
 map, into one simple chronological scheme. 
 
X PREFACE 
 
 The study of calendars marked by Zodiacal 
 constellations necessitates an acquaintance with 
 the position of those constellations as they were 
 to be observed through the many ages during 
 which they held the important office of presiding 
 over the year and its changing seasons. Such 
 acquaintanceship would have involved very careful 
 and accurate calculations were it not that, by the 
 help of a precessional globe, it was possible by easy 
 mechanical adjustment to see, without the trouble 
 of thinking them out, what were the changes pro- 
 duced in the scenery of nightly skies, millennium 
 after millennium, by the slow apparent revolution 
 of the "Poles of heaven" through the constella- 
 tions — a revolution referred to by English 
 astronomers as "the precession of the equinoxes," 
 and more graphically and epigrammatically by 
 French astronomers as "le mouvement des 
 fixes." 
 
 In the second part of this book diagrams have 
 been given, made from a precessional globe, and 
 
PREFACE xi 
 
 in the explanatory notes which accompany the 
 Plates attention has been directed, not only to the 
 chronological problems which may be discussed 
 with great advantage, as I believe, by the help 
 of such a globe, but also to various astronomical 
 explanations of ancient myths which occurred to 
 me in the course of studying the position of 
 Zodiacal and extra-Zodiacal constellations at 
 different ages of the world's history. 
 
 I can only read Classic and Oriental myths 
 in translations, and I feel very sure that if any 
 of the astronomic explanations here suggested for 
 ancient legends should prove to be the right 
 ones, scholars versed in the original languages 
 in which these legends were written, if they supple- 
 ment their linguistic knowledge by astronomic 
 considerations, will be able quickly and with ease 
 to develop the suggested explanations much further 
 than it has been possible for me to do ; and ex- 
 planations of other astronomic myths — astronomic, 
 that is, and not merely solar myths — will doubtless 
 
xii PREFACE 
 
 come to their minds as they follow similar lines 
 of enquiry. 
 
 The steps by which travellers arrive at a far- 
 reaching view are often very steep and arduous. 
 I fear that many readers of this book will find the 
 separate Papers in it dull and technical in them- 
 selves ; but if they be considered only as steep 
 and roughly-cut steps leading up to vantage points 
 of chronological and historical observation, I 
 believe that the ruggedness of the path will soon 
 be forgotten in the absorbing interest of the results 
 to be obtained by following it. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PART I 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I. THE ACCADIAN CALENDAR ... I 
 
 II. THE CON.STELLATION ARIES . . 24 
 
 III. GU, ELEVENTH CONSTELLATION OF THE ZODI.\C . 44 
 
 IV. THE MEDIAN CALENDAR AND THE CONSTELLATION 
 
 TAURUS ... -56 
 
 V. ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA . . . .88 
 
 VI. NOTES. — AHURA MAZDA, ETC. . . . -149 
 
 VII. ANCIENT INDIAN ASTRONOMY . . . .162 
 
 VIIl. THE CHINESE CALENDAR, WITH SOME REMARKS WITH 
 
 REFERENCE TO THAT OF THE CHALDEANS 1 85 
 
 PART II 
 
 PLATES XV., XVI., XVII., AND XVIII. . -215 
 
 PLATES XIX., XX. 226 
 
 PLATE XXI. . . 230 
 
 PLATE XXII. .... 239 
 
 PLATE XXIII. . • 245 
 
 PLATE XXIV. . . 248 
 
 INDEX ■ 257 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 PLATE I. 
 
 To face page 13 
 
 PLATE II. . 
 
 }* 
 
 
 36 
 
 PLATE III. ..... 
 
 )» 
 
 
 40 
 
 PLATE IV. . ... 
 
 » 
 
 
 64 
 
 PLATE V. . 
 
 n 
 
 
 70 
 
 PLATE VI. 
 
 »» 
 
 
 74 
 
 PLATE VII. . 
 
 »i 
 
 
 79 
 
 PLATE VIII. 
 
 »' 
 
 
 80 
 
 PLATE IX. . 
 
 II 
 
 
 118 
 
 PLATE X. . 
 
 11 
 
 
 121 
 
 PLATE XI. . . 
 
 If 
 
 
 124 
 
 PLATE XII. ... 
 
 11 
 
 
 142 
 
 PLATE XIII. 
 
 )i 
 
 
 174 
 
 PLATE XIV. 
 
 II 
 
 
 198 
 
 THE TtWt DRESSED . . . . 
 
 
 Page 
 
 219 
 
 PORTION OF CEILING AT BVbAn EL MOLOUK 
 
 To fact 
 
 page 
 
 233 
 
 BULL APIS ...... 
 
 . 
 
 Page 
 
 233 
 
xvi LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 OUTLINES OF TWO CARVED SLATES DRAWN FROM 
 PLATES I. AND IIL IN T/ie Proceedings of the 
 Society of Biblical Archceology FOR MAY 1900 . Page 237 
 
 THE CONSTELLATION PEGASUS ... „ 250 
 
 PLATE XV. . . .At End 
 
 PLATE XVI. 
 
 PLATE XVII. 
 
 PLATE XVIII. 
 
 PLATE XIX. 
 
 PLATE XX. . 
 
 PLATE XXI. 
 
 PLATE XXII. 
 
 PLATE XXIII. 
 
 PLATE XXIV. 
 
ANCIENT CALENDARS AND 
 CONSTELLATIONS 
 
 PART I 
 I 
 
 THE ACCADIAN CALENDAR 
 
 [Reprinted from the Proceedings of the Society of Biblical 
 Archceology, January 1892] 
 
 Epping and Strassmaier, in their book Astrono- 
 misches mis Babylon, have lately translated three 
 small documents, originally inscribed on clay tablets 
 in the second century B.C. From these tablets, we 
 learn that the Babylonians of the above date pos- 
 sessed a very advanced knowledge of the science 
 of astronomy. Into the question of the extent of 
 that knowledge we need not here enter further 
 
2 THE ACCADIAN CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 than to say that it enabled the Babylonian as- 
 tronomers to draw up almanacs for the ensuing 
 year ; almanacs in which the eclipses of the sun 
 and moon, and the times of the new and full moon, 
 were accurately noted, as also the positions of the 
 planets throughout the year. These positions 
 were indicated by the nearness of the planet in 
 question to some star in the vicinity of the ecliptic, 
 and the ecliptic was portioned off into twelve 
 groups, coinciding very closely in position and 
 extent with the twelve divisions of the Zodiac 
 as we now know them. 
 
 As to the calendar or mode of reckoning 
 the year, we find that the order and names of 
 the twelve months were as follows : Nisannu (or 
 Nisan), Airu, Simannu, Duzu, Abu, Ululu, Tischritu, 
 Arah-samna, Kislimu, Tebitu, Sabatu, Adaru. 
 
 Of these months Ululu and Adaru could be 
 doubled as Ululu Sami (the second Elul), and 
 Adaru Arki (the last Adar). The Babylonian 
 years were soli-lunar : that is to say, the year 
 of twelve lunar months, containing three hundred 
 and fifty-four days, was bound to the solar 
 year of three hundred and sixty-five days by 
 
PART I.] CALENDAR 200 B.C. 3 
 
 intercalating, as occasion required, a thirteenth 
 month. 
 
 Out of every eleven years there were seven 
 with twelve months, and four with thirteen months. 
 The first day of the year being, like some of our 
 church festivals, dependent on the time of the 
 new moon, was "moveable" [schwankende). The 
 year, according to the tablets before Epping and 
 Strassmaier, " began with Nisan, hence in the 
 spring."^ 
 
 This is a sketch of the Babylonian calendar 
 in the second century B.C., as drawn from the 
 work of the two learned Germans above- 
 named. 
 
 Now we find in the British Museum a great 
 number of trade documents which, according to 
 the Catalogue, "cover a period of over two 
 thousand years." There are "tablets of the 
 time of Rim-sin, Hammurabi, and Samsu-iluna ; 
 tablets of the time of the Assyrian supremacy, 
 of the time of the native kings, and of the time 
 
 ^ "Was den Anfang des Jahres betrifft, so haben wir schon 
 gezeigt, das die seleucidische Aera, wie sie in unseren drei Tafeln 
 vorliegt, ihre Jahre mit dem Nisan, also im Friihjahr begann." 
 (Epping and Strassmaier, Astronomisches aus Babylon, p. 181). 
 
4 THE ACCADIAN CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 of the Persian supremacy ; tablets of the times of 
 the Seleucidae, and the Arsacidcc." -"^ 
 
 These documents are all dated in such and 
 such a month of such and such a year of some 
 king's reign ; the months are the same (at first 
 under their earlier Accadian names ^) as those we 
 
 ' See Guide to the Nimroud Central Saloon, B.M., 1886. The 
 dates of the rulers mentioned are as follows : — 
 
 Rim-sin, about 2,300 B.C. 
 
 Hammurabi, about 2,200 e.g. 
 
 Samsu-iluna, about 2,100 B.C. 
 
 Assyrian supremacy from about 1275 to 609 B.C. 
 
 The latest tablet in the collection is dated, according to the 
 Catalogue, 93 b.c. 
 
 - Assyrian. Accadian month names, and translations. 
 
 1. Ni'sannu, .... f-S''"''' (or Bar) sig-gar ("the sacrifice of 
 
 ' ' ' ' " I righteousness "). 
 
 2. Airu, jT/irtr-jz'^/ (" the propitious bull")- 
 
 3. 'Sivanu, ^;- Tsivan, . /^^««-.?-'^ ("of bricks"), and Kas ("the 
 
 \ twins"). 
 
 4- Duzu, 6*/^ /f'/^/-7Z(! (" seizer of seed "). 
 
 5- Abu, ^(5 rt^-^rtr(" fire that makes fire"). 
 
 6. Uhilu, . . . . A7 6^z>2^z>-«« ("the errand of Istar"). 
 
 7. Tasritu, Tul-cu (" the holy altar "). 
 
 8. Arahk-samna ("thel .,. ,„ , 
 
 8th month ") I ^P'"-'™^'^ (the bull-like founder?"). 
 
 9. CisiHvu, or Cuzallu, . Can ganna (" the very cloudy "). 
 
 10. Dharbitu, .... ^/j^^ «(?',-/;^ ("the father of light "). 
 
 11. Sabahu, ^j (!-««(" abundance of rain "). 
 
 12. Addaru, . . . 5<'-/f'z-«7 ("sowing of seed"). 
 
 13. Arakh-makru ("the"i c- j- /<ij 1 r .1 n r 
 
 incidental month"),/ ""'■'''' ^ ^""'^ f"^'""''^] "^ =°«''"g ")■ 
 
 —Records of the Past, vol. i. p. 166. 
 
PART I.] CALENDAR 2000 B.C. 5 
 
 find in the almanacs translated by Epping and 
 Strassmaier, and we meet in them, and in other 
 historical inscriptions, with the intercalary months, 
 the second Elul, and the second Adar. It would 
 seem, then, that it was the same calendar, worked 
 in the same way, that held its place through these 
 two thousand years. ^ 
 
 ^ As evidence of the antiquity of a fixed calendrical method 
 of counting the year, and of a method closely resembling, if not 
 identical with, that used in the latest periods of Babylonian 
 history, the importance and trustworthiness of these documents 
 can scarcely be over-rated. They were inscribed on soft clay 
 (which was afterwards baked either by sun or fire), many of them 
 four thousand years ago. No correction or erasure can have 
 been made in them since that date. A translation of one of 
 these tablets as given at p. 75 in the Guide to the Nimroud 
 Central Saloon, is here given as an example of the style of many 
 others. 
 
 "No. 3. Tablet and outer case inscribed with a deed of 
 partnership or brotherhood between Sini-Innanna and Iriba™-Sin. 
 
 "Tablet. Sini-Innanna and Iriba^-Sin made brotherhood; 
 they took a judge for the ratification, and went down to the 
 temple of the sun-god, and he answered the people thus in the 
 temple of the sun-god : ' They must give Arda-lustamar-Samas 
 and Antu-lislimam, the property of Iraba™-sin, and Ardu-ibsinan 
 and Antu-am-anna-lamazi, the property of Sini-Innanna.' He 
 proclaimed [also] in the temple of the sun-god and the moon- 
 god: 'Brother shall be kind to brother; brother shall not be evil 
 towards, shall not injure, brother ; and brother shall not harbour 
 any angry thought as to anything about which a brother has 
 disputed.' 
 
 "They have invoked the name of Innannaki, Utu, Marduk, 
 
6 THE ACCADIAN CALENDAR [iart i. 
 
 But, further, there are astrological works copied 
 for the library of Assurbanipal from ancient Baby- 
 lonian originals. The compilation of many of these 
 originals is placed by scholars in the reign of Sargon 
 of Accad/ at the remote date of 3,800 B.C. 
 
 Lugal-ki-usuna, and the name of Hammurabi [Kimta-rapastu] the 
 king." 
 
 Here follow the names of eight witnesses. The translation of the 
 inscription on the outer case is much to the same purpose, and need 
 not here be quoted ; the names of nine witnesses are appended to 
 it. The Guide continues, after some other explanations, as follows : 
 
 "The whole of the first paragraph (except a few ideographs) is in 
 Semitic Babylonian. The invocation is in Akkadian. The list 
 of ' witnesses,' again, is in Semitic Babylonian, and the date in 
 Akkadian. . . . The tablet is dated in the same way as the other 
 documents of this class : ' Month Adar of the year when Ham- 
 murabi the king made (images of) Innanna and Nana.'" 
 
 ^ Sargon I. of Accad was of Semitic race. He was established 
 as ruler in the city of Accad, and there reigned over a great 
 non-Semitic race, in ancient cuneiform inscriptions styled the 
 Accadai (Accadians). This word, as scholars tell us, carried the 
 meaning of " highlanders," or " mountaineers." From this fact it 
 is inferred they were not indigenous to the low plain surrounding 
 the city of Accad, to which they gave their name. Their lan- 
 guage contains few words for the productions of the almost 
 tropical climate of Babylonia, but it shows familiarity with those 
 of higher latitudes. At the time when Sargon, either by peaceful 
 or warlike arts, was established as ruler over the Accadians 
 they were already a very highly civilized people. They possessed 
 a literature of their own, which embraced a wide variety of 
 subjects. The learning of the Accadians was highly esteemed 
 
vA-RTi.] CALENDAR 3800 B.C. 7 
 
 In these ancient astrological works, the same 
 calendar referred to in the trade documents, and 
 in the late Babylonian almanacs, appears to obtain. 
 We find in them the same year of twelve lunar 
 months, reinforced at intervals by a thirteenth in- 
 tercalated month, and, which is very important, the 
 order of the months is always the same. Nisan 
 (Accadian Barzig-gar), everywhere appears as 
 "the first month," and is distinctly stated to be 
 "the beginning of the year."^ 
 
 As early as the year 1874, Professor Sayce 
 pointed out that there was good reason for sup- 
 posing that the twelve Babylonian months corre- 
 sponded to the twelve divisions of the Zodiac. At 
 page 161 of his Paper, T^e Asironomy and 
 
 and translations into the Semitic language were made of important 
 religious and scientific Accadian works. These works, down to 
 the latest days of Babylonian power, were preserved and venerated, 
 and many copies of them were made and preserved in public 
 libraries in Babylonia and Assyria. 
 
 The Accadian after Sargon's date gradually dropped out 
 of general use, and became a " learned " language, holding 
 amongst Babylonians and Assyrians much the same position as 
 Latin and Greek amongst Europeans. 
 
 ^ See Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archczology, 1874. 
 Paper entitled. The Astronomy and Astrology of the Baby- 
 lonians, Prof. Sayce, p. 258, W.A.I, iii. 60, 
 
8 THE ACCADIAN CALENDAR [fart i. 
 
 Astrology of the Babylonians, we read : " Now 
 a slight inspection of the calendar will show that 
 the Accadian months derived their names from the 
 signs of the Zodiac." 
 
 He then proceeds to discuss and compare the 
 meanings of the Accadian and Semitic month 
 names, and to point out those in which a reference 
 to the Zodiac might most clearly be traced. 
 
 That the constellations of the Zodiac were from 
 a remote age recognized by the dwellers in Meso- 
 potamia is scarcely to be doubted. We find on the 
 boundary stones in the British Museum representa- 
 tions of several of their figures. The Bull, the 
 Tortoise (in lieu of the Crab), a female figure^with 
 wings, t' Scorpion, the Archer, and the Goat-fish, 
 are all portrayed, not only on boundary stones, but 
 also on cylinder seals and gems. 
 
 Again, in the old astrological works, we find 
 mention of the Scorpion " Gir-tab," and of the 
 Goat-fish " Muna-xa," and as planets are said to 
 "approach to," and "linger in," the stars of Gir- 
 tab and of Muna-xa, it may well be supposed that 
 they were the Zodiacal constellations still repre- 
 sented under the forms of Scorpion and Goat-fish. 
 
PART I.] ANCIENT CALENDAR SIDEREAL 9 
 
 Out of the many star-groups mentioned in the 
 old tablets, only a few have as yet been certainly 
 identified with their modern equivalents. As to 
 the identity of others, we may guess. For instance, 
 when it is said " Mercury^ lingered in the constella- 
 tion Gula," we may guess that Gula represents 
 Aquarius, which sign in the Epping and Strass- 
 maier tablets figures as " Gu." 
 
 From all these sources of information, we orather 
 that the twelve divisions of the ecliptic had been 
 mapped out at the time the astrological works were 
 drawn up, and that some (at least) of these divi- 
 sions corresponded exactly to those now repre- 
 sented on celestial globes. 
 
 The suggestion, therefore, put forward^ Pro- 
 fessor Sayce and other scholars, that the twelve 
 Accadian months corresponded to the twelve 
 constellations of the Zodiac, and that we may 
 trace a resemblance in some instances between 
 the name of the month in the old Accadian lan- 
 guage and the constellation into which the sun 
 at that time of the year entered, is not in itself 
 improbable. 
 
 Infra, p. 47, note. 
 
10 THE ACCADIAN CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 The followinsf months are those in which this 
 resemblance is very striking : 
 
 ist month, Bar zig-gar (" the sacrifice of right- 
 eousness "), Aries. 
 
 2nd month, Khar-sidi ("the propitious bull"), 
 Taurus. 
 
 3rd month (sometimes called) Kas (" the 
 Twins"), Gemini. 
 
 6th month, Ki Gingir-na ("the errand of 
 I star"), Virgo. 
 
 We know from the Epping and Strassmaier 
 tablets as a matter of fact, that the months and 
 the constellations of the Zodiac did in the second 
 century, B.C., correspond with each other in order 
 and sequence as above suggested, and if further 
 research should establish the fact that they so 
 corresponded in Sargon's time, then as we find 
 Nisan (Bar zig-gar) throughout all these ages 
 holding the place of "first month," and marking 
 "the beginning of the year," it will necessarily 
 follow that the Accadian, Babylonian, and Assyrian 
 calendars dealt with a sidereal and not a tropical 
 year. 
 
 Ours is a tropical year, that is to say, accordino- 
 
PART I.] MODERN CALENDAR TROPICAL 1 1 
 
 to the Julian calendar (afterwards amended by Pope 
 Gregory) it is bound to the seasons, and its months 
 maintain a constant relation to the four oreat divi- 
 sions of the ecliptic, i.e. the solstices and the 
 equinoxes. The winter solstice always falls about 
 the 22nd of December, the spring equinox about 
 the 2 1 St of March, the summer solstice about the 
 2 1 St of June, and the autumnal equinox about the 
 23rd of September. 
 
 But (as has been suggested) the Accadian year 
 was a sidereal year, and its months maintained a 
 constant relation to the twelve star-marked divi- 
 sions of the ecliptic, or, as they are called, the 
 constellations of the Zodiac. Nisan always cor- 
 responded (as closely as a lunar month might) 
 to the time during which the sun traversed the 
 constellation Aries ; Airu to the time during which 
 it traversed the constellation Taurus ; and so on 
 through the twelve months of the year. 
 
 The equinoctial points are, however, always, 
 though slowly, changing their position amongst the 
 twelve constellations of the ecliptic. The months, 
 therefore, which in 3,800 b.c, and still in the second 
 century B.C., corresponded to the same star-groups, 
 
12 THE ACCADIAN CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 as above noted, must have held in different ages 
 very different positions in regard to the four great 
 divisions or seasons of the year. 
 
 We find in the tablets translated by Epping 
 and Strassmaier the year " beginning "with Nisan, 
 hence in the spring'' and this seems a more or 
 less natural season from which to count the year ; 
 but when, taking the precession of the equinoxes 
 into account, we find that the year in Hammurabi's 
 time (2,200 B.C.) must have commenced one month, 
 and in Sargon's time (3,800 B.C.) two months 
 before the spring equinox, we feel surprised and 
 perplexed to find that the year must then have 
 begun without any reference to the seasons — the 
 four great and most easily observed divisions of 
 the ecliptic. 
 
 It is difScult to imagine that the astronomers 
 who so skilfully divided the ecliptic into its twelve 
 parts, and who originated the wonderful Accadian 
 calendar — a calendar so well thought out that, as 
 we have seen reason to believe, it resisted all the 
 shocks of time for nearly four thousand years — it 
 is difficult to imagine that such astronomers should 
 have taken no note of the four prominent divi- 
 
PLATE I. 
 FIG. 1. 
 
 
 """""'flSTwiNTEB MONTH 
 FIG. 2. 
 
 .#/ 
 
 
 '*'"»'AfCF,BSTSIRIN0»or»1^ 
 
 
 The first and last months of the Accadian, sidereal, year, compared with the 
 months of the Gregorian, tropical, year : at 6,000 B.C. and at 600 .\.d. 
 
 Vfo/ace p. 13. 
 
PART I.] SOLSTICE IN ARIES 6000 B.C. 13 
 
 sions of the year and of the ecliptic, i.e. the 
 solstices and the equinoxes. 
 
 There is, however, a way to account for this 
 anomaly, or, rather, there is a supposition which, 
 if adopted, will allow these astronomers of old to 
 have taken note, not only of the months, but also of 
 the seasons of the year, when first they drew up 
 their mighty scheme. 
 
 Let us suppose that the calendar which, as we 
 may learn from the astrological tablets, was already 
 in Sargon's time a well known and venerated 
 institution, had been originally drawn up at a date 
 much earlier than Sargon's, when the first month 
 (Bar zig-gar), was not the first spring month, but 
 when it was the first winter month of the year. 
 This date (see Plate I., fig. i) would have been about 
 6,000 B.C. ; for then the sun entered the constella- 
 tion Aries at the winter solstice — a season equally 
 well, if not better suited than the spring equinox 
 to hold the first place in the calendar. ^ Under this 
 
 ' After this paper had appeared in the Proceedings of the 
 Society of Biblical Archceology, a corroboration of this opinion 
 occurred to the writer's mind, suggested by a further study of the 
 month names in the Accadian calendar. It is as follows : — 
 
 The twelfth month is named " sowing of seed." Seed may be 
 
14 THE ACCADIAN CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 supposition, it would no longer be difficult to 
 imagine why the ancient Accadian astronomers 
 should have chosen Aries as the first constellation 
 of the Zodiac, and Nisan (Bar zig-gar) as the first 
 month, and the "beginning of the year." 
 
 Nor need we throw discredit on the early 
 
 and is, sown in many latitudes in spring, and also in winter 
 time. "Sowing of seed" might therefore describe a month at 
 the ending of an equinoctial or of a solstitial year : but the thirteenth 
 {i.e. the occasionally intercalated) month is named that of " dark 
 sowing." This epithet dark, added to the "sowing" of the 
 twelfth month, very plainly points to a solstitial or midwinter 
 ending of the year. 
 
 The thirteenth month in a luni-solar year, whose beginning 
 should be bound to the vernal equinox, must always cover some of 
 the concluding days of March and some of the first days of April ; 
 and those days are certainly much lighter, not darker than those 
 of the preceding month, covering parts of February and March, 
 whereas, the thirteenth intercalary month in a luni-solar year, whose 
 beginning should be bound to the winter solstice, must always 
 cover the concluding days of December and those at the begin- 
 ning of January ; and might well be distinguished by the epithet 
 dark, not only from the days of the preceding month, but indeed 
 from those of any other month of the year (see Plate I., figs, i, 2.) 
 
 It is of interest here to note that this insistence in Accadian 
 month nomenclature on the darkness of the thirteenth month, 
 tends to confirm the already formed opinion of scholars, that the 
 Accadians were not indigenous to Babylonia, but had descended 
 into it from more northern latitudes, where darkness is a more 
 marked concomitant of winter than in the nearly tropical lati- 
 tude of Babylonia. 
 
PARTI.] STARS RECEDE FROM SEASONS 15 
 
 calendar makers 6,000 b.c, if we take for granted 
 that they were not acquainted with the fact that 
 slowly but inevitably the seasons must change their 
 position amongst the stars, and that, not knowing 
 this, they believed that in making the beginning of 
 the year dependent on the sun's entry into the 
 constellation Aries, they were also binding it to the 
 season of the winter solstice. 
 
 As centuries rolled by, however, and slowly the 
 stars of Aries receded from the winter solstice, 
 Bar zig-gar was no longer the first month in the 
 sense of being the first winter month. Still, the 
 authority of the originators of the calendar held 
 sway ; provision had been only made for counting 
 the year as a sidereal year ; and Bar zig-gar, or 
 the month in which the sun entered Aries, was 
 still called the first month, and looked on as the 
 beginning of the year. 
 
 To carry out the reformation of any long estab- 
 lished calendar is, we know, not a trifling under- 
 taking. Even on secular grounds, any proposed 
 reform encounters strong opposition. But the 
 calendar in Babylonia was not only a civil, it was also 
 a religious, institution. Its origin was attributed 
 
1 6 THE ACCADIAN CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 to the Creator, and as the work of the Creator, it 
 is described in one of the old Babylonian tablets/ 
 
 " For each of the twelve months He fixed three 
 stars " (or groups of stars). " From the day when 
 the year issues forth to the close." ^ 
 
 The astronomical and astrological texts drawn 
 up for Sargon of Accad are entitled " The Illumina- 
 tion of Bel,"^ and still as late as the second cen- 
 tury B.C., all Babylonian almanacs bore the heading: 
 " At the command of my Lord Bel and my Lady 
 Beltis, a decree." * Thus it was, we may suppose, 
 that under the protection of the gods the Accadian 
 calendar continued unchanged throughout all the 
 changing ages. 
 
 1 Records of tlie Past. New series. Vol. i. p. 145. 
 
 2 In modern works we find the terms "useless," "fanciful," 
 and "inconvenient," applied to the Zodiac and its constellations; 
 and for regulating a tropical year the constellations af-e " useless " 
 and "inconvenient," but the theory that the reckoning of the 
 year and all its religious festivals depended on the observance 
 of the Zodiacal star-groups, would help to account for the widely 
 spread veneration in which they were held throughout so many 
 ages and by so many nations. 
 
 ^ Transactions of the Society of Biblical .Irchceology, 1874, 
 pp. 150, 151. 
 
 * Epping and Strassmaier, Astronomisches aus Babylon, 
 p. 1 6 1. {Auf Geheiss von Bel uiid Beltis meiner Herrin, eine 
 E?ttscke idling.) 
 
PART I.] EQUINOX IN ARIES 200 B.C. 17 
 
 But during- all the ages the winter solstice 
 moved on steadily through almost a quarter of 
 the great circle of the ecliptic,^ and in the second 
 century B.C., the spring equinox was not far from 
 the same point of the star-marked ecliptic where 
 
 1 This moving of the equinoctial point through a quarter of 
 the great circle may perhaps explain the tradition to which 
 Syncellus twice alludes, once when he states that Eusebius was 
 aware of the Greek opinion that many ages, or rather myriads 
 of years had passed since the creation of the world, during ihe 
 mythical retrograde movement of the Zodiac, from the beginning of 
 Aries, and its return again to the same point {Chronographia, p. 17.) 
 
 And again at p. 52, he refers to "the return of the Zodiac to 
 its original position, according to the stories of the Greeks and 
 Egyptians, that is to say, the revolution from one point back again 
 to the same point, which is the first minute of the first division 
 of the equinoctial sign of the Zodiac, which is called K/oibs 
 (Aries) by them, as has been stated in the Genica of Hermes 
 and in the Cyrannid books." 
 
 He goes on to say that this is the ground of the chronological 
 division of Claudius Ptolemy. 
 
 Jean Silvain Bailly, speaking of the Indian Zodiac, the begin- 
 ning of which is placed by the Brahmins at the first point of 
 Aries, suggests that a similar tradition may have prevailed amongst 
 the Indians and other ancient nations to account for the pre- 
 eminence so generally accorded to Aries. He says : 
 
 " Mais pourquoi ont-ils choisi cette constellation pour la 
 premiere? 11 est evident que c'est une affaire de pr^jug^ et de super- 
 stition ; le choix du premier point dans un cercle est arbitraire. lis 
 auront ^te d^cid^s par quelque ancienne tradition, telle par 
 example que celle que Muradi rapporte d'apres Albumassar et 
 deux anciens livres egyptiens, oil on lisoit que le monde avoit ^t^ 
 
1 8 THE ACCADIAN CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 the zuinter solstice had been when first the 
 calendar-makers had "fixed" the constellations 
 "for the twelve months from the day when the 
 year issues forth to the close," and we who now 
 read the almanacs drawn up at that late period of 
 Babylonian history are not (as has been said above) 
 surprised to find the year " beginning with Nisan, 
 hence in the spying." (See Plate I., fig. 2.) 
 
 The propositions contained in this Paper are 
 these : — 
 
 I. The Accadian year was counted as a sidereal 
 year. 
 
 II. The Accadian calendar was first thought 
 out and originated at a date not later than 6,000 B.C. 
 
 The first proposition is founded on the opinion, 
 
 renouvelle apres le deluge lorsque le soleil ^toit au 1° du holier, 
 regulus etant dans le colure des solstices. D'Herbelot ne parle 
 point de rdgulus ; mais il dit que selon Albumassar les sept 
 planetes etoient en conjonction au premier point du holier lors 
 de la creation du monde. Cette tradition, sans doute fabuleuse, 
 qui venoit des memes prejug^s que celle de Berose, etoit asiatique, 
 Elle a pu suffire, ou telle autre du meme genre, pour fonder la 
 preference que les brames, ou les anciens en general, ont donnee 
 a la constellation du belier, en I'etablissant la premiere de leur 
 zodiaque. lis ont cru que ce point du zodiaque etoit una 
 source de renouvellement, et ils ont dit que le zodiaque et 
 I'ann^e se renouvelloient au meme point ou le monde s'dtoit 
 regenere." (Bailly, Histoire de F Astronomic Ancienne, pp. 482, 
 483-) 
 
PART I.] ARIES, LEADER OF THE SIGNS 19 
 
 long ago expressed by many Oriental scholars, that 
 the Accadian months corresponded in very early 
 ages with the constellations of the Zodiac, Nisan 
 — the month during which the sun was in conjunc- 
 tion with the constellation Aries — holding the first 
 place then, as also in the latest times of Babylonian 
 history, and, presumably, through the intervening 
 period. 
 
 But even if the first proposition is granted, the 
 second, it must be confessed, is only an opinion 
 based on the unlikelihood that the old Accadian 
 and sidereal year, otherwise so skilfully dealt with 
 in the calendar, should have begun, in what would 
 appear to be a haphazard manner, at no definite 
 season of the year. 
 
 It may seem that too much weight has been 
 attached in this Paper to what can only be called 
 a guess ; but where there is so much that we 
 desire to know, and so little as yet absolutely 
 known of the early history of astronomy, the 
 temptation to make such guesses is great. 
 
 It is to their earliest heroes and to their gods 
 that the ancient heathen nations attributed the 
 invention of astronomy, and amongst the Jews 
 
20 THE ACCADIAN CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 also, according to Josephus, the children of Seth 
 were looked upon as being the first teachers of the 
 science.^ 
 
 Modern astronomers often speak in general 
 terms of their science as having existed in a 
 " hoar antiquity," and in "prehistoric times." But 
 questions as to when, and where it took its rise, 
 are still unanswered. During the last hundred 
 years these questions have been keenly discussed. 
 Babylon, Egypt, Greece, India, and China, have 
 each been claimed as "the cradle" of the science. 
 Some few writers (and prominent amongst them 
 Jean Silvain Bailly, a brilliant scholar and an 
 eminent astronomer) have contended for the view 
 that not by any one nation were the chief advances 
 in astronomy made, but that before the great races 
 of mankind separated from the parent stock, and 
 spread themselves over the globe, the phenomena 
 of astronomy had been closely observed, and 
 scientific methods for measuring time had been 
 adopted. Bailly speaks of " une astronomic per- 
 fectionn^e," of which only "les debris" are to be 
 met with in possession of the civilized races of 
 1 Antiquitates Judaica, I. 2, § 3. 
 
PART I.] ANTEDILUVIAN ASTRONOMY 21 
 
 antiquity. He claims an antediluvian race as the 
 originators of astronomic science. 
 
 It may seem a bold suggestion to place the 
 formation of the calendar at a date so high as 
 6,000 B.C., a date exceeding as it does by 2,000 
 years that given to us in the margin of our Bibles 
 for the story of the fall of man and his expulsion 
 from Eden. It was in following Archbishop 
 Usher's calculations that the date of 4,004 was 
 adopted and placed, where it still remains, in 
 our English Bibles. But the difficulty of determin- 
 ing the early dates of Bible history has always 
 been felt to be very great, and " it is quite possible 
 to believe that Genesis gives us no certain data for 
 pronouncing on the time of man's existence on the 
 earth." ^ Scholars, in basing their calculations on the 
 authority of Scripture, have arrived at very different 
 conclusions. Some only demand 3,616, others 6,984 
 years, as required from Scriptural sources for "the 
 years of the world to the birth of Christ."^ 
 
 1 Introduction to the Pentateuch, by E. Harold Browne, D.D., 
 Bishop of Ely. Holy Bible, with Commentary, edited by F. C. 
 Cook, M.A., Canon of Exeter. 
 
 ^ The following extracts are taken from the Preface to An 
 Universal History from the Earliest Account of Time to the Present ; 
 
22 THE ACCADIAN CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 It will be seen that the earlier of these dates 
 leads us back to an even more remote age than 
 that in which, if the theory here proposed is a true 
 one, the marvellous achievement of the formation of 
 a scientific sidereal calendar was accomplished. 
 
 To attribute to the dwellers in Eden or to their 
 
 immediate descendants intellectual gifts that should 
 
 enable them to perfect so grand a scheme, does 
 
 certainly not contradict the story of the fall, but 
 
 Compiled from Original Authors \Etc\ Dublin : Printed by 
 Edward Bate for the Editors : M,dcc,xliv. 
 
 They are interesting as showing that even before archaeological 
 research had extended the limits of ancient history, as it has 
 done during the last fifty years, many biblical scholars assigned 
 a far higher date than Archbishop Usher's 4,004 years for the 
 history of Adam's race on earth. 
 
 P. Ixv. et seq. : "So that on a strict view and due examina- 
 tion of the antiquities of nations, and the records that have been 
 left us, those of the Jews, exclusive of their divine authority, will 
 evidently appear to be the most certain and authentick. . . . How- 
 ever it must be confessed that there is no certain uniformity in the 
 Jewish computation, and that the several copies of their records, 
 viz., the Hebrew, Samaritan Pentateuch, and Septuagint differ 
 very much from one another. . . . This variety of computations 
 hath left room for Chronologers to enlarge or contract the space 
 of time betwixt the flood and the birth of Christ, by adhering to 
 one copy rather than another ; or by rejecting or retaining the 
 whole numbers, or the particulars, just as it suited their humour 
 of making the Sacred History agree with the Prophane ; or other- 
 wise of reducing the Prophane to the Sacred, and as the disagree- 
 ment among the heathen writers is great also, and every author 
 hath followed the historian he liked best, hence a wide difference 
 
PART I.] " KNOWING GOOD AND EVIL;' 
 
 23 
 
 rather may open up for us fresh lines of thought, 
 when we read of that transgression in which the 
 pride of intellect played so important a part. 
 
 hath arisen amongst modern Chronologers as appears by the 
 various computations . . . which we here give as collected by 
 StrauchiuSj Chevreau, and others. It would be endless as well as 
 unnecessary here to examine into the particular causes of this 
 great difference amongst authors, every one still pretending to 
 ground his system on the authority of the Scripture. 
 
 A Table of the years of the world to the birth of Christ, 
 according to the computations of several chronologers. 
 
 Alphonsus, King of Castile, in Muller's Tables 
 The same, in Strauchius 
 Onuphrius Panvinius 
 Suidas 
 
 Lactantius, Philastrius 
 Nicephorus 
 Clemens Alexandrinus 
 The author of the Fasti Siculi 
 Isaac Vossius, and the Greeks 
 Etc. etc." 
 
 6,984 
 
 6,484 9 months 
 
 6,310 
 
 6,000 
 
 5,801 
 
 5,700 
 
 5,624 
 
 5,608 9 months 
 
 5,598 
 
II 
 
 THE CONSTELLATION ARIES 
 
 [Reprinted from the Proceedings of the Society of Biblical 
 Archaology, March 1893] 
 
 In the January number of the Proceedings of 
 the Society of Biblical Archcsology for last year, 
 under the title The Accadian Calendar, two pro- 
 positions were advanced : — 
 
 I. The Accadian year was counted as a 
 sidereal year. 
 
 II. The Accadian calendar was first thought 
 out and originated at a date not later than 6,000 
 
 B.C. 
 
 The fact that the sun's entry into the con- 
 stellation Aries appears to have marked through 
 many millenniums the beginning of the Accadian 
 year, was cited in support of the first proposition, 
 and the fact that the sun's entry into Aries coin- 
 cided about 6,000 B.C. with the winter solstice, 
 was relied on to support the probability of the 
 
tART I.] ARIES NOT CONSPICUOUS 2$ 
 
 second proposition, namely, that at the above date 
 the calendar, which so honoured the inconspicuous 
 constellation Aries, was first drawn up. 
 
 If we now find this inconspicuous part of the 
 heavens equally honoured by several nations in 
 very ancient times, we shall be led to think either 
 that these nations, independently of each other, 
 happened to observe and mark out the sun's 
 annual course through the heavens at exactly the 
 same date, and therefore chose the same point as 
 marking the winter solstice ; or we must suppose 
 that they derived their calendar and knowledge of 
 the Zodiac from observations originally made by 
 some one civilized race. 
 
 The Brahmins of India claim a high antiquity 
 for the science of astronomy in their country, and 
 their observations and calculations profess to date 
 back to the fourth millennium B.C. The names of 
 the Indian constellations are preserved to us in 
 the Sanscrit language, and these names are, so 
 to speak, identical with those that we use at the 
 present day when we speak of the figures of the 
 Zodiac. Many scholars of to-day believe that only 
 after Alexander's conquests in India did the know- 
 
26 THE CONSTELLATION ARIES [part i. 
 
 ledge of the twelve-fold division of the Zodiac pene- 
 trate into that country. Some, on the other hand, 
 maintain the opposite opinion, namely, "that the 
 names of the signs can be proved to have existed 
 in India at as early a period as in any other 
 country." ^ 
 
 Jean Silvain Bailly, whose opinions as to the 
 antiquity of the science of astronomy have been 
 already quoted in the foregoing Paper, in his work 
 on the history of ancient astronomy, speaking of 
 the Brahmins of India, the initial point of whose 
 Zodiac is at the first star in the constellation Aries, 
 writes as follows : " — 
 
 ^ V. p. 90. 
 
 ^ The initial point of the Hindu Zodiac (see Plate III.) is about 
 9^ degrees to the west of the boundary line of the constellation 
 Aries, as it is drawn on our celestial globes. One foot of Aries, 
 however, extends beyond the boundary line, and touches a line 
 drawn through the initial point of the Hindu Zodiac and the 
 poles of the ecliptic. At page 132, the question of the date of the 
 fixation of this initial point is discussed, and a high antiquity for 
 it is claimed. There are many considerations which may lead us 
 to the opinion that not only in India, but amongst the ancients 
 generally, the first degree of the constellation coincided with the 
 Hindu initial point, and not with the boundary line of the con- 
 stellation, as it is now drawn. Greek and Latin authors, writing in 
 the first century B.C., speak of the solstitial and equinoctial 
 colures, as being "at the eighth degree of the Zodiac," and these 
 
PART 1.] ARIES WIDELY HONOURED 27 
 
 " Mais pourquoi ont-ils choisi cette constellation 
 pour la premiere ? II est evident que c'est une 
 affaire de prejuge et de superstition ; le choix 
 du premier point dans un cercle est arbitraire. 
 lis auront ete decides par quelque ancienne 
 tradition." 
 
 Dupuis, writing at nearly the same date as 
 Bailly, about a hundred years ago, and in conflict 
 with him on many points relating to the Zodiac, 
 was also struck by the choice of this same incon- 
 spicuous point in the great circle of the ecliptic, 
 not only by the Brahmins of India, but also by 
 other ancient nations. He further explains that 
 the difference in the choice of initial point by the 
 Chinese, and by the other nations, is only an ap- 
 parent, and not a real difference. On the wonder- 
 ful agreement shown by so many nations, in their 
 choice of the stars by which they marked the 
 beginning of their Zodiacs, Dupuis relied to 
 
 statements, which have caused modern commentators much 
 perplexity (see Handbuch der Klassischen Alterthumsivissen- 
 schaft ; Zeitrechnung der Griechen und Jidmer, Unger), may be 
 easily explained, if we realize that they, in all hkelihood, counted 
 the degrees of the Zodiac from the same initial point as that in 
 use amongst Hindu astronomers, which in the first century b.c. 
 was eight degrees to the west of the equinoctial point. 
 
28 THE CONSTELLATION ARIES [fart i. 
 
 support his views concerning the unity of the 
 astronomical and religious myths of all nations. 
 
 At the end of his work, Mdmoire Explicatif 
 du Zodiaque, Dupuis gives in a diagram several 
 Zodiacs in concentric circles ; some divided into 
 twelve, some into twenty-seven or twenty - eight 
 parts. He represents the colures by a cross 
 which quarters these concentric Zodiacs, and 
 speaking of the twenty-seven- and twenty-eight- 
 fold divisions, he observes as follows : 
 
 " On remarque d'abord, que ces divers systemes 
 lunaires, tires de I'Astronomie de dififerens peuples, 
 s'accordent tous a placer dans les cases correspond- 
 antes a-peu-pres les memes etoiles. II suffit, pour 
 s'en assurer, de comparer les etoiles designees dans 
 la meme case de la division de chaque peuple. 
 On remarque aussi qu'ils ont pris tous, excepte 
 les Chinois, les memes etoiles, pour point initial de 
 la division, savoir, celles de la tete du Belier. Les 
 Chinois, au contraire, ont fix6 le point initial dans 
 la partie du ciel diametralement opposee, vers les 
 pieds de la Vierge et pres I'Epi " (p. 4). 
 
 Dupuis' arguments, drawn from the choice by 
 several nations of the first division of Aries as 
 the initial point of the Zodiac and year, are of 
 
PART I.] ARIES MARKED A SEASON 29 
 
 equal cogency in support of a calendar such as he 
 suggests, drawn up more than 12,000 B.C., for a 
 year beginning at the mUtmin equinox; or for 
 a calendar, as suggested in this Paper, drawn up 
 about 6,000 B.C., and dealing with a year beginning 
 at the winter solstice ; and it may be claimed 
 that the facts brought to light by the study of 
 the ancient Accadian calendar, while greatly 
 strengthening the ground for Dupuis' opinion con- 
 cerning the early acceptance by many nations of the 
 stars of Aries as a mark for the beginning of the year 
 in prehistoric times, seem more in favour of the 
 first month of that year having been counted from 
 the winter solstice than from the autumn equinox. 
 
 Quotations from authors like Bailly and Dupuis 
 may seem nowadays somewhat out of date ; for 
 though they were amongst the foremost scholars 
 of their time, they were necessarily ignorant of 
 all the archaeological discoveries that have suc- 
 ceeded each other with such rapidity during the 
 last century. Unless, therefore, the brilliant guesses 
 and astronomical speculations of these writers can 
 find confirmation in the results of modern re- 
 searches, their theories may well be disregarded. 
 
30 THE CONSTELLATION ARIES [part i. 
 
 But it seems to me that many of their theories 
 are meeting with such confirmation. 
 
 Turninof first to some of the facts which 
 archaeology has taught us regarding the ancient 
 Egyptians, it will be interesting to see if there are 
 any indications in their astronomy or mythology of 
 honour paid to the constellation Aries in connexion 
 with the progress of the sun and moon through 
 the figures of the Zodiac. 
 
 It is true that the acquaintance of the ancient 
 Egyptians with these figures is a matter still in 
 dispute, and the various methods of counting the 
 year followed by them also present great difficulties 
 to scholars. It is, however, admitted that they 
 were a people much given to the observation and 
 worship of the heavenly bodies, and that their 
 astronomy and mythology were very closely 
 interwoven with each other. 
 
 In the time of the Middle Empire, it seems, 
 the months in the civil year were not counted 
 as lunar months, but as months of thirty days 
 each. The year was not counted as a sidereal 
 year, but as one of three hundred and sixty days 
 —twelve months of thirty days — with five days 
 
PART I.] TWO CALENDARS IN EGYPT 31 
 
 added at the end of each year to bring up the 
 number to three hundred and sixty-five days. No 
 attention was paid to the odd hours and minutes 
 over and above the three hundred and sixty-five 
 days, vi^hich are occupied by the sun in completing 
 his annual course. 
 
 Mr Griffiths has remarked in the number of 
 the Proceedings of the Society of Biblical 
 Archesology for March 1892, that the hieroglyph 
 for month points to an originally lunar month, 
 and I w^ould suggest that the star under the 
 first crescent seems to point also to a month 
 originally counted sidereally, i.e., dependent upon 
 the conjunction of the sun and moon in some 
 particular star-group of the ecliptic. As a matter 
 of fact, the Egyptians made use not only of a civil 
 year such as has been above described, but also of 
 a sidereal year, counted from the heliacal rising of 
 Sirius, and it is perhaps possible that the months 
 in this sidereal year were counted as lunar months, 
 and the year treated as soli-lunar and sidereal. 
 
 In these two Egyptian calendars — so far as 
 they are at present understood— no reference to 
 the constellation Aries seems to be discernible. 
 
32 THE CONSTELLATION ARIES [part i. 
 
 The agricultural importance of the season of the 
 summer solstice in Egypt, coinciding as it does with 
 the rising of the Nile, may have induced calendar- 
 makers at some very early date to re-arrange the 
 order of the year, so as to make it begin at the 
 Slimmer rather than the ivinter solstice — the season, 
 as it is contended in these Papers, originally chosen 
 6,000 B.C. by astronomers in a more northern 
 latitude than that of Egypt as the starting-point 
 of a year sidereally marked by the conjunction of 
 the sun with the constellation Aries. 
 
 But if we turn to the Egyptian mythology, the 
 importance of the Ram, or rather of the head of the 
 Ram, as it is revealed in the monuments, and in the 
 pictorial art of the ancient Egyptians, must continu- 
 ally strike the student of Egyptian symbolism. 
 
 Amen, the great god of the Theban triad 
 (Amen, Maut, and Chons), is sometimes represented 
 as ram-headed — his boat and his sceptre are always 
 adorned with a ram's head, and the great temple 
 to him, in conjunction with the sun, i.e. to 
 Amen-Ra, is approached through an avenue of 
 gigantic ram-headed sphinxes, and this is also 
 the case as regards the temple of Chons — the 
 
PART I.] AMEN'S RAM-HEADED SYMBOLS 33 
 
 moon-god — at right angles, and in close proximity, 
 to the great temple of Amen-Ra. 
 
 Scholars tell us that Horus, Isis, and Osiris, 
 — the Memphian triad — symbolized the diurnal 
 motion of the sun and other heavenly bodies, 
 and it need not appear improbable that the great 
 Theban triad, Amen, Maut, and Chons, should 
 have originally symbolized the annual course 
 of those same bodies through the constellations 
 of the Zodiac. This would account for the pro- 
 minence of the Ram in connexion with the worship 
 of this triad — the Ram, which, as I have argued, 
 in many countries, and possibly in Egypt also, 
 marked the first division of the Zodiac and year. 
 
 A prayer to Amen is translated by G. Maspero 
 in the April number for 1891 of the Proceedings 
 of the Society of Biblical Archceology ; ^ from this 
 translation it would appear that Amen is implored 
 to bring the calendar into touch with the real 
 seasons of the year. If Amen represented a 
 
 1 " II ne me reste plus qu'a donner la traduction suivie du texte 
 (Papyrus Anastasi, iv., p. 10. L 1-5), dont je viens d'expliquer le 
 sens et le developpement littdraire. 
 
 "Viens a moi, Amon, me delivrer de I'annee facheuse, oii le 
 dieu Shou (Shou dtait, a I'^poque des Ramessides et plus tard, 
 le dieu du soleil solstitial, du soleil d'et^, comme Brugsch I'a 
 
 C 
 
34 THE CONSTELLATION ARIES [part i. 
 
 sidereally marked point in the yearly course of 
 
 the sun, such a prayer might suitably have been 
 
 addressed to him by the Egyptians. 
 
 The great temple to Amen-Ra at Thebes, 
 
 approached, as has been stated above, through 
 
 an avenue of ram-headed sphinxes, is oriented 
 
 to the setting sun of the season so important to 
 
 Egyptians, that of the summer solstice, and this 
 
 fact strengthens the opinion that Amen was 
 
 considered to be a god in some way presiding 
 
 over the course of the year and its right 
 
 measurement. It is true that this orientation 
 
 of his temple precluded the possibility of the 
 
 light from any star of the constellation Aries 
 
 ever shining into the shrine of the god ; but it is 
 
 perhaps possible that the ceremony of "the great 
 
 montr^ fort ingtjnieusement) ne se leve plus, ou vient I'hiver oil 
 etait \'6te, ou les mois s'en vent hors leur place, ou les heures 
 se brouillent, ou les grands t'appellent, 6 Anion, ou les petits te 
 cherchent, ou ceux meme qui sont encore dans les bras de leur 
 nourrice, ceux-la (crient) : ' Donne les souffles ! ' — Amon trouve 
 Amon ecoute, Amon est le sain devant qui marchent les souffles 
 agr^ables ; il me donne d'etre comme I'aile du vautour, comme 
 la palette chargee des discours des Esprits pour les bergers dans 
 les champs, pour les laveurs sur la berge, pour les garde-chasse 
 qui sortent au territoire des gazelles afin de lacer (le gibier)." 
 
 M. Maspero states that the latter lines of the text are injured 
 and difficult to decipher or to understand. 
 
PART I.] AMEN AND EGYPTIAN YEAR 35 
 
 feast-day of Anion Father," described by Ebers, 
 may have been devised by the votaries of Amen 
 as a means whereby they could honour the god, 
 as one presiding over the most propitious season 
 of the year, and also recall the sidereal connexion 
 of the god of the year with the, from times im- 
 memorial highly reverenced, constellation Aries. 
 
 At pp. 277 and 278 of Egypt, Descriptive, 
 Historical, and Picturesque, vol. ii., Ebers, having 
 referred to some figures represented on the walls 
 of a Memnonium in the Nekropolis erected by 
 Rameses II., exactly opposite to the Great Temple 
 of Karnak, observes : — 
 
 " Of these figures the inscription says : — ' As 
 they approach the king their arms are filled with 
 choice produce and stores, and all the good things 
 that the earth brings forth are gathered by them 
 to add to the joy on the great feast-day of Amon, 
 the father.' " 
 
 "These words refer to the great 'feast of the 
 Valley' {heb en-ant), when, on the 29th day of the 
 second month of the inundation, the statue of Amon 
 was brought forth from the sanctuary with much 
 magnificence and solemnity, and conveyed across 
 the Nile to the Nekropolis, that the god might there 
 
7,6 THE CONSTELLATION ARIES [part i. 
 
 offer sacrifices to his ancestors in the other world. 
 The priests of the house of Seti received the pro- 
 cession with the splendid bark Sam, the most sacred 
 of all the vessels that were preserved in the temple of 
 Karnak : in this the statue of the god was placed, and 
 borne first to the Memnonium of Seti, and then round 
 about the Nekropolis, preceded by a crowd of temple 
 servants, who strewed the way with sand. The 
 solemnities ended with a grand nocturnal spectacle, 
 on the great sacred lake of which traces may still 
 be seen to the extreme south of the Nekropolis. 
 
 " The Egyptian religion prescribed to all its 
 followers that they should visit the tombs of their 
 dead and bring offerings, in grateful remembrance 
 of their parents and forefathers ; and as, day after 
 day, millions of suns had gone to rest — as men do 
 — behind the realm of tombs in the Libyan hills, 
 the god himself was brought to do honour to his 
 departed ancestry, and to sacrifice to them." 
 
 The rising of the Nile in Egypt coincides very 
 closely with the season of the summer solstice. 
 At the date of Rameses II. — a date not yet 
 unanimously agreed on by scholars, but which 
 may be safely placed between 1,400 and 1,100 B.C. 
 — the sun at the season of the summer solstice was 
 in the constellation Cancer (see Plate II.), and 
 
-s« 
 
 "J CO 
 
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PART I.] AMEN AND ARIES 37 
 
 two months later its place in the ecliptic was a 
 few degrees to the west of a point exactly op- 
 posed to the first stars of Aries and to the initial 
 point of the Indian Zodiac. On the evening, 
 therefore, of the 29th day of the second month 
 of the inundation, when the sun had now sunk 
 behind the Libyan hills, and daylight had faded 
 sufficiently to allow them to show their light, ^ 
 the first stars of Aries rose above the eastern 
 horizon, and at midnight attained to the southern 
 meridian. 
 
 Thus at the season of all the year, when 
 Aries specially dominated the ecliptic, the statue 
 of the god Amen was, as we learn, brought 
 out of his dark temple shrine and carried in 
 procession to the Nekropolis, from whence the 
 constellation Aries — not hidden by obstructing 
 walls and columns — was fully visible ; and there 
 honour was done and sacrifice offered to " Amon 
 Father." 
 
 But it may be said that we should under- 
 stand "the second month of the inundation" 
 
 ' When the sun is about 7° below the western horizon, stars in 
 the opposite quarter of the heavens begin to be visible. 
 
38 THE CONSTELLATION ARIES [part i. 
 
 to refer to the second month of the Egyptian 
 sidereal year counted from the ist Thoth 
 (fixed) and marked by the hehacal rising of 
 Sirius. At the date of Rameses the beginning 
 of this sidereal year fell, as may be proved, a 
 fortnight after the summer solstice (see Plate II.), 
 and still on the 29th of the second month 
 of this sidereal year the stars of Aries might 
 be seen rising in the east — no longer only its 
 first stars, but nearly the whole constellation then 
 becoming visible — and at about midnight its 
 brightest stars, « and ^ Arietis, culminated on 
 the meridian. Whether, therefore, the " Feast 
 of the Valley " was held at the end of the 
 second month of the actual inundation, or of 
 the second month of the sidereal year, the 
 stars of Aries presided over its " nocturnal " 
 solemnities. 
 
 Some scholars claim, however, that all Egyptian 
 festivals were swept round through the seasons, 
 and the stars that marked those seasons, in the 
 course of fourteen or fifteen hundred years, inas- 
 much as they were firmly bound to the vagtie 
 calendrical year of 365 days. If this was indeed 
 
PART I.] FIXED AND VAGUE YEARS 39 
 
 so, it would be difficult to imagine that Seti I. or 
 Rameses II. could have established the festival 
 in question as in any way connected with honour 
 to be paid to the constellation Aries ; for though 
 during the reign of Seti, and perhaps during the 
 early part of that of Rameses, the vague and 
 fixed years coincided more or less closely (see 
 Plate II.), yet before the death of Rameses they 
 were already so far apart that the ist Thoth 
 (vague) fell, not a fortnight later than the summer 
 solstice, but about a fortnight earlier ; and there- 
 fore on the 29th day of the second month of the 
 vague year the stars of Aries would not have 
 risen until long after sunset, nor would any one 
 of them have culminated on the meridian at 
 midnight. 
 
 If now we turn our attention to the temple 
 to Amen-Ra at Aboo Simbel, we may observe 
 that, unlike that to the same god at Karnak, 
 it is not oriented to any definite season of the 
 year. The rising sun shines into it now, and 
 must always have shone into the Holy of Holies 
 of that rock-hewn temple on the morning of a 
 day somewhat more than two months distant 
 
40 THE CONSTELLATION ARIES [part i. 
 
 from the winter solstice, and somewhat less than 
 a month before the season of the spring equinox, 
 namely, on the morning of the 26th February 
 (Gregorian)/ 
 
 The sun now (1893 a.d.) is, at the season named, 
 in the constellation Aquarius ; but if we calculate 
 back to a date anywhere between 1,400 and 
 1,100 B.C., we shall find (see Plate III.) that 
 when Rameses II. dedicated this temple to 
 
 1 " I was fortunate in seeing another wonderful thing during 
 my visit to Aboo Simbel. The great temple is dedicated to 
 Amen-Ra, the sun-god, and on two days in the year the sun is 
 said to rise at such a point that it sends a beam of light through 
 both halls till it falls on the shrine itself in the very Holy of 
 Holies. Many theories are based on the orientation of the 
 temples, and Captain Johnston wished to find on which day 
 in the spring of the year the phenomenon took place ; so he 
 took his instruments, and we all went up to the temple before 
 dawn. It was the 26th February. The great hall, with its 
 eight Osiride pillars, was wrapped in semi-darkness. Still darker 
 were the inner hall and shrine. Behind the altar sat the four 
 gods, Amen, Horus, Ptah, and Rameses himself, now deified. 
 All the East was a deep rosy flush ; then that paled, and 
 a hard white light filled the sky. Clearer and whiter it grew, 
 till, with a sudden joyous rush, the sun swung up over the 
 low ridge of hill, and in an instant, like an arrow from the 
 bow of Phoebus Apollo, one level shaft of light pierced 
 the great hall and fell in living glory straight upon the shrine 
 itself"— A. F. [Extract from the Pall Mall Gazette, 20th 
 April, 1892.] 
 
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PARTI.] TEMPLE ORIENTED TO ARIES 41 
 
 Amen-Ra, the sun when it penetrated into the 
 shrine of the temple at Aboo Simbel was in 
 conjunction with the first stars of the constella- 
 tion Aries, and this fact must, it would seem, 
 encourage us to adopt the opinion put forward 
 above concerning the desire of Rameses II. to 
 honour that constellation in connexion with the 
 god Amen. 
 
 It would seem then that there are indications 
 in the mythology and in the history of the 
 Egyptians, of honour paid to the constellation 
 Aries, and as we further study the records of 
 antiquity, now within our reach, it will, I believe, 
 become evident that not only the Egyptians, but 
 also all the great civilized nations of the East, 
 had traditions of a year beginning when the sun 
 and moon entered the constellation Aries — such a 
 year as 'that in use amongst the Babylonians during 
 their long existence as a nation, and such as that 
 which is used by the Hindus in India to this 
 present day. 
 
 If we allow weight to these considerations, it 
 will be difficult to think that such a method of 
 reckoning the year — involving, as it did, the recog'. 
 
42 THE CONSTELLATION ARIES [part i. 
 
 nition of the ecliptic star-groups under the fanciful 
 figures of the Zodiac — should have been arrived at 
 by each of these nations independently. Whether 
 one nation borrowed these ideas from another, or 
 whether some " earlier race of men " bequeathed 
 this knowledge to their many descendants, is still an 
 open question. Scholars have not unanimously 
 awarded the palm of seniority in civilization to any 
 one nation, and we are not at variance with proved 
 facts, if we elect to adopt the theory of a common 
 stock, from which the divergent races sprang. If, 
 then, it should appear that these races possessed and 
 incorporated into their mythologies a knowledge 
 of the Zodiac, and of the first degree of Aries 
 as its initial point, their separation from the parent 
 stock must have been subsequent to the formation 
 of the scheme that dealt with a calendar based on 
 an observation of the colure of the winter solstice 
 at that point, and under this supposition the date of 
 6,000 B.C. becomes a foothold for the chronology of 
 ancient history. We should also be led to think of 
 the common ancestors of the civilized races not as 
 ignorant barbarians, but rather as men graced with 
 high intellectual gifts — men whose teachings have 
 
PART I.] ZODIAC PREHISTORIC 43 
 
 been handed down through all the ages to this 
 present day, and of whose imaginings the Zodiac 
 remains as the most ancient monument of the work 
 of intelligent man. 
 
Ill 
 
 ^* {GU), ELEVENTH CONSTELLATION OF THE ZODIAC 
 
 [Reprinted from the Proceedings of the Society of Biblical 
 Archceolog)', February 1896] 
 
 In the astronomical tablets (of the ist and 2nd cent. 
 B.C. ) translated by Epping and Strassmaier, the twelve 
 constellations of the Babylonian Zodiac are con- 
 stantly referred to. Their names appear under very 
 abbreviated forms in the tablets, and are as follows ■} — 
 
 1. ][Ey {ku{sarikku)) = aries. 
 
 2. j^y {te{mennu)) = taurus. 
 
 3. »]f- >^ (masu) = gemini. 
 
 4. -^K, {jpulukku) = cancer. 
 
 5. W {aril) = leo. 
 
 6. JEJ"* (seriT) — virgo. 
 
 7. ^\ {zibanitu) = libra. 
 
 8. **■ ^^ {aqrabu) = scorpio. 
 
 9. rif: (fa) = arcitenens. 
 
 10. J^ jJ^J (enzu) 
 
 11. ■JJ^i^ (gu) 
 
 12 
 
 = caper. 
 
 = amphora [aquarius]. 
 
 = pisces. 
 
 1 Zeitschrift fiir Assyriologie, v Band, 4 Heft, Oct. 1890, p. 351. 
 
 41 
 
PART I.] MEANING OF GU UNCERTAIN 45 
 
 Also in Epping- and Strassmaier's work, 
 Astronornisches aus Babylon, under the heading 
 Die Zeichen des Thierkreises, pp. 170, 171, 
 and Namen der Stei^ne, pp. 174, 175, the 
 twelve abbreviations met with in the tablets are 
 discussed at some length. 
 
 From a study of the list here given and of 
 the passages referred to, we learn that it has been 
 found possible to suggest for some of the abbre- 
 viations suitable terminations, and in the completed 
 words thus obtained, the familiar constellations of 
 the Zodiac, as we know them, are easily to be 
 recognized. 
 
 As regards other of the abbreviations, and 
 amongst them that of ^^ (Gu) for the eleventh 
 sign (Amphora or Aquarius), no termination has 
 been suggested ; and of it Strassmaier thus writes ■} 
 p. 171: — " Gu ist sonst fast ausschliesslich nur 
 als Silbenzeichen gu bekannt"; and Jensen, dis- 
 cussing Epping and Strassmaier's constellation 
 list, writes thus of the abbreviation Gu for the 
 eleventh constellation:^ "Ob Gu einen ' Was- 
 
 ^ Astronornisches aus Babylon. 
 ^ Kosmo logic der Babylonier, p. 314. 
 P 
 
46 ELEVENTH CONSTELLATION [part i. 
 
 sereimer,' ' Schopfeimer,' bezeichnen kann, weiss ich 
 nicht. Die bisher veroffentlichten Texte geben 
 keinen Aufschluss dariiber." 
 
 As a probable completion for the abbreviation 
 Gu, the following suggestion is here put forward : — 
 
 In the ancient astrological tablets translated 
 by Professor Sayce in his Paper, The Astronomy 
 and Astrology of the Babylonians} pp. 189, 190, 
 " the star of Gula" is mentioned. The first syllable 
 of this word is composed of the same cuneiform 
 group as that used in the abbreviation for the 
 eleventh constellation of the Zodiac in the astro- 
 nomical tablets of the first and second centuries B.C. 
 above referred to. But this fact, if it stood alone, 
 would not be enough to do more than point 
 to a possible identification of Gu in the late 
 tablets with Gula in the ancient astrological works. 
 Amongst the many constellations in the heavens 
 the name of more than one mio-ht have begun 
 with the syllable Gu. 
 
 We find, however, at a later page (206) of 
 Professor Sayce's Paper, this sentence translated 
 from W.A.I., III. 57, i :— 
 
 1 Transactions^ Biblical Archaology, vol. iii., February 1874. 
 
PART I.] GU=GULA=BAU 47 
 
 " Jupiter^ in the star of Gula lingers." None of 
 the five planets known to the Babylonians could ever 
 with truth have been described as appearing or 
 "lingering" in any part of the heavens outside 
 the band of the Zodiac stars. " The star (or con- 
 stellation) of Gula," we must therefore assume, was 
 a Zodiacal star or constellation. This restriction 
 of the position of the "star of Gula" renders it 
 scarcely a rash conclusion to arrive at, that the 
 Zodiacal Gu of the later tablets is an abbreviation 
 for the Zodiacal Gula of the ancient astrological 
 works. 
 
 As to a mythological reason for the choice 
 of the goddess Gula to preside over the constellation 
 known to us as Aquarius, we find it in the fact 
 that Gula appears as another name for the god- 
 dess Bau ^ and Bau (or Bahu) was a personification 
 of the dark water, or chaos. 
 
 If we adopt this identification of the star or 
 constellation Gula with the constellation, or some 
 star in the constellation, Aquarius, it will throw light 
 
 1 Or, rather, "Mercury." See Epping and Strassmaier, 
 Astronomisches aiis Babylon, p. 112 et seq. 
 
 2 Maspero, Dawn of Civilization, p. 672, notes i, 2. 
 
48 ELEVENTH CONSTELLATION [part r. 
 
 on many of the inscriptions found on statues and 
 other monuments at Telloh (the modern name of 
 the mound which covers the ruins of the ancient 
 city of Lagash). 
 
 We find from these inscriptions that the deities 
 especially worshipped at Lagash were not the same 
 as those who held the foremost places contem- 
 poraneously in the Accadian, and at a later time 
 in the Babylonian Pantheon. Ningirsu and "his 
 beloved consort," the goddess Bau, received in 
 Lagash the highest honours. On one of the 
 statues of Gudea, "the priestly governor of La- 
 gash," this inscription occurs ■} — 
 
 " To Ningirsu, the powerful warrior of Ellilla 
 [this is dedicated] by Gudea, priestly governor of 
 Lagash, who has constructed the temple of Eninnu, 
 consecrated to Ningirsu. 
 
 " For Ningirsu, his lord, he has built the temple 
 of Ekhud, the tower in stages, from the summit of 
 which Ningirsu grants him a happy lot. 
 
 " Besides the offerings which Gudea made of his 
 free will to Ningirsu and to the goddess Bau, 
 daughter of Anna, his beloved consort, he has made 
 others to his god Ningiszida. 
 
 1 Evetts, JVeiv Light Ofi the Bible, p. 162, 
 
PART I.] NINIB AND BAU 49 
 
 " That year he had a block of rare stone brought 
 from the country of Magan ; he had it carved into a 
 statue of himself 
 
 " On the day of the beginning of the year, the 
 day of the festival of Bau, on which offerings were 
 made : one calf, one fat sheep, three lambs, six full 
 grown sheep, two rams, seven pat of dates, seven 
 sab of cream, seven palm buds. 
 
 " Such were the offerings made to the goddess 
 Bau in the ancient temple on that day." 
 
 Ningirsu, the god — so highly exalted in this 
 and in other inscriptions found in the mounds of 
 Telloh — has been identified with the god Ninib^ of 
 the Babylonians. Much difference of opinion pre- 
 vails as to what astronomical ideas were connected 
 by the ancient inhabitants of Mesopotamia with the 
 god Ninib. 
 
 Jensen admits that the generally received opinion 
 as to Ninib is that he represents the "southern 
 sun."^ He, however, contends, with great eager- 
 ness, that this is a mistaken opinion, and that Ninib 
 is really the eastern or rising sun. Many of Jen- 
 sen's arguments against the possibility of Ninib 
 
 ' Maspero, Dawn of Civilization, pp. 637, 645. 
 - Jensen, Die Kosmologie der Babylonier, p. 460. 
 
so ELEVENTH CONSTELLATION [part i. 
 
 representing the southern sun are based on the 
 assumption that the epithet "southern," applied to 
 the sun, denotes the power of the mid-day sun ; 
 whereas, in other descriptions of Ninib, he appears 
 as struggHng with, though in the end triumphant 
 over, storm, and cloud, and darkness. 
 
 The sun in his daily course attains the southern 
 meridian at noon, and that may well be described 
 by Jensen as the "alles verzehrenden und versen- 
 genden Siid-oder Mittagssonne," but if we think 
 of the sun in his annual course, the words "southern 
 sun " may more fitly in an astronomical sense mean 
 the struggling and finally triumphant sun of the 
 winter solstice. And if we so understand the ex- 
 pression, the apparently contradictory references to 
 Ninib are easily explained. 
 
 At mid-winter the sun rises and sets more to 
 the south than at any other time of the year ; at 
 noon on the day of the winter solstice the sun is 
 forty-seven degrees nearer to the south pole of the 
 heavens than it is at the summer solstice. 
 
 If, instead of adopting Jensen's contention, and 
 looking upon Ninib as the eastern rising sun, we 
 revert to the generally held opinion that Ninib was 
 
PART I.] WINTER SOLSTICE IN AQUARIUS 51 
 
 the god of the southern sun, and if we understand 
 the southern sun in its astronomical sense as the 
 winter, or more strictly speaking the mid-winter 
 sun, it will naturally lead us to the conclusion that 
 "the day of the beginning of the year," the day 
 of the festival of Bau, Ningirsu's ( = Ninib's) "be- 
 loved consort," was held at the time of the winter 
 solstice. 
 
 Speaking in round numbers, from 4,000 to 2,000 
 B.C., the winter solstice took place when the sun 
 was in conjunction with the constellation Aquarius, 
 which constellation, or some one of its stars, was, 
 as has been suggested, called by the Babylonian 
 astronomers, Gula, Gula being another name for Bau. 
 
 It is not therefore surprising to find that those 
 rulers of Lagash, whose dates fell between 4,000 
 and 2,000 B.C., should have so often associated 
 together Ningirsu and Bau ; and further, that 
 Gudea, whose rule is placed at about 2,900 B.C., 
 should on "the day of the beginning of the year" 
 have kept high festival in honour of Bau, as the 
 beneficent deity presiding in conjunction with Nin- 
 girsu over the revolving years. 
 
 The precession of the equinoxes must neces- 
 
52 ELEVENTH CONSTELLATION [part i. 
 
 sarily in the course of ages introduce confusion 
 into all Zodiacal calendars, and into all ritual and 
 mythological symbolism founded on such calendars. 
 From 2,000 B.C. down to the beginning of our era, 
 the winter solstice took place when the sun was 
 in conjunction with Capricornus, not with Aquarius. 
 In those later days, if the inhabitants of Lagash still 
 celebrated their new year's festival at the winter 
 solstice, Bau ( = Gula = Aquarius) could only have 
 laid a traditional claim to preside over it. 
 
 In accordance with these astronomical facts, we 
 learn from the teachings of the tablets that the 
 especial reverence paid to Bau = Gula, in the 
 Lagash inscriptions was not extended to her in 
 later times. 
 
 As to Ninib, we know that even at Gudea's 
 date in the neighbouring state of Accad, and in 
 later times in Babylon, he did not hold the pre- 
 eminent position accorded to him by the early rulers 
 of Lagash. 
 
 This difference in the religious observances of 
 Accad and Lagash regarding Ninib — if we suppose 
 him to be the god of the winter solstice — may also 
 receive an astronomical explanation. 
 
PART I.] ARIES AND AQUARIUS 53 
 
 According to the evidence of The Standard 
 Astrological Work, the compilation of which is 
 generally attributed to the date 3,800 e.g., and 
 according to the evidence of many other tablets, 
 the year in Accad and afterwards in Babylon began 
 not at the winter solstice, but on the ist day of 
 Nisan, and Nisan (Ace. Bar zig-gar), the month 
 of " the sacrifice of righteousness," was, as its name 
 suggests, the month during which the sun was in 
 conjunction with the constellation Aries. 
 
 At Gudea's date, about 2,900 B.C., the ist of 
 Nisan, if it was dependent on the sun's entry 
 into Aries, must have fallen about midway between 
 the winter solstice and the spring equinox, and as 
 century succeeded century, the ist of Nisan must 
 slowly but surely have receded further from the 
 solstice and have approached more and more to the 
 equinoctial point. 
 
 In Accad, therefore, neither at Gudea's nor at 
 any later date, did the year begin at the winter 
 solstice, and hence we can understand why in that 
 state, and afterwards in Babylon, Ninib was not as 
 highly honoured as in Lagash, and why he and 
 his consort Bau ( = Gula) were not referred to as 
 
54 ELEVENTH CONSTELLATION [part i. 
 
 the deities presiding over the beginning of the 
 year. 
 
 In a former number of these Proceedings^ I 
 drew attention to the Accadian calendar. It was 
 there suggested that the choice of the first degree 
 of Aries as the initial point of the Zodiac was 
 originally made when the winter solstice coincided 
 with the sun's entry into that constellation, i.e. 
 about 6,000 B.C. 
 
 If that suggestion, and the present one con- 
 cerning the new year's festival in Lagash are 
 accepted, it will be easy to imagine that the 
 Lagash observance betokened a sort of effort to 
 reform the sidereal calendar in use in Accad, and 
 it may be elsewhere. 
 
 In Accad the calendar makers clung to the 
 originally instituted star-mark for the year, and 
 made it begin with the sun's entry into Aries ; 
 therefore by degrees the beginning of their year 
 moved away from the winter solstice, and in the 
 first century B.C. coincided very closely with the 
 spring equinox. 
 
 In Lagash, on the contrary, the calendar makers 
 1 January 1S92, V. p. 13. 
 
PART I.] RIVAL CALENDARS 55 
 
 clung to the originally established season of the 
 year, and made it begin at the winter solstice ; 
 therefore by degrees the beginning of their year 
 moved away from the constellation Aries, and in 
 Gudea's time the new year's festival was held in 
 honour of the goddess Bau = Gula = Aquarius. 
 
IV 
 
 THE MEDIAN CALENDAR AND THE CONSTELLATION 
 
 TAURUS 
 
 [Reprinted from the Proceedings of the Society of Biblical 
 Archceolog)', June 1897] 
 
 In a former number^ of these Proceedings I 
 contrasted as follows, what I believed to be the 
 calendar of the Accadians with that of the in- 
 habitants of Lagash : — 
 
 " In Accad the calendar makers clung to the 
 originally instituted star-mark for the year, and 
 made it begin with the sun's entry into [the 
 constellation] Aries ; therefore by degrees the be- 
 ginning of their year moved away from the winter 
 solstice, and in the first century b.c. coincided very 
 closely with the spring equinox. 
 
 "In Lagash, on the contrary, the calendar 
 makers clung to the originally established season 
 
 ' V. p. 54. 
 
 56 
 
PART I.] EQUINOX IN TAURUS 57 
 
 of the year, and made it begin at the winter 
 solstice ; therefore by degrees the beginning of 
 their year moved away from the constellation 
 Aries, and in Gudea's time [about 2,900 B.C.] the 
 new year's festival was held in honour of the 
 goddess Bau = Gula = Aquarius," 
 
 I now desire to draw attention to the Median 
 calendar, which appears to have differed from 
 that used, as above suggested, in Accad or in 
 Lagash ; inasmuch as the beginning of the Median 
 year was not dependent on the sun's entry into 
 the constellation Aries, as in Accad ; nor was it 
 fixed to the season of the "winter solstice as in 
 Lagash. 
 
 The beginning of the Median year was fixed 
 to the season of the spring equinox, and remain- 
 ing true to that season, followed no star-mark. 
 The great importance, however, of Tauric sym- 
 bolism in Median art seems to point to the fact 
 that when the equinoctial year was first established 
 the spring equinoctial point was in the constella- 
 tion Taurus. Astronomy teaches us that was the 
 case, speaking in round numbers, from 4,000 to 
 2,000 B,C. 
 
58 THE MEDIAN CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 It is true that we have no documentary proof 
 of the existence of a Median equinoctial calendar in 
 the remote past, such as that which we possess in 
 the Babylonian standard astrological works re- 
 garding the ancient sidereal Accadian calendar. 
 We have, however, among the modern repre- 
 sentatives of the Medes, the Persians, a very 
 distinctive calendrical observance, namely, that of 
 the Nowroose, or the festival of the new year ; 
 and we have the Persian tradition that the institu- 
 tion of this festival was of fabulous antiquity. I 
 quote from Ker Porter's remarks on this subject : — 
 
 "The 2 1 St of March, the impatiently antici- 
 pated day of the most joyous festival of Persia, 
 at last arrived. It is called the feast of the Now- 
 roose, or that of the commencement of the new 
 year; and its institution is attributed to the cele- 
 brated Jemsheed, who, according to the traditions 
 of the country, and the fragments yet preserved 
 of its early native historians, was the sixth in 
 descent from Noah, and the fourth sovereign of 
 Persia, of the race of Kaiomurs, the grandson 
 of Noah. . . . But to return to the feast of the 
 Nowroose. It is acknowledged to have been cele- 
 brated from the earliest ages, in Persia, indepen- 
 
PART I.] PERSIAN NOWROOSE 59 
 
 dent of whatever religions reigned there ; whether 
 the simple worship of the One Great Being, or 
 under the successive rites of Magian, Pagan, or 
 Mahomedan institutions." {Travels, vol. i. p. 316.) 
 
 This equinoctial and solar year, as the writer 
 proceeds to point out, is adhered to by the Per- 
 sians, though they, being Mahomedans, also cele- 
 brate Mahomedan lunar festivals, and for many 
 purposes make use of the Mahomedan lunar 
 year. 
 
 It is easy to see how greatly the Persian Now- 
 roose differs from the purely lunar Mahomedan 
 anniversaries — anniversaries which in the course 
 of about thirty-two and a half years necessarily 
 make a complete circuit through the seasons. The 
 difference, though not so marked, which exists 
 between the purely solar Nowroose, and all 
 soli-lunar festivals, such as those of the Baby- 
 lonians, should also be taken note of. These last, 
 like our Easter, were dependent on the phases of 
 the moon, and were therefore "moveable." The 
 Persian Nowroose, like our Christmas Day, is an 
 "immoveable" festival — fixed to the day of the 
 sprmg equmox. 
 
6o THE MEDIAN CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 Modern tradition concerning the distinctively 
 Persian custom of celebrating the Nowroose would, 
 if it stood alone, furnish very slight grounds on 
 which to found a far-reaching theory ; but historical 
 evidence confirms this tradition to a great extent, 
 by teaching us that the Median and Persian wor- 
 shippers of Ahura Mazda, and of Mithras, certainly 
 under the Sassinide dynasty, and almost with 
 equal certainty under the Achaemenid kings, kept 
 their calendar and celebrated their religious fes- 
 tivals in a manner differing from that of the sur- 
 rounding nations ; their months were not lunar, 
 their years were not soli-lunar but distinctly solar, 
 and the spring equinox was the date to which as 
 closely as possible the beginning of their year was 
 fixed. 
 
 In Darmesteter's translation of the Zend Avesta 
 the Persian months are treated of in Appendix C, 
 p. 33, and in Appendix D, p. 37, we read of the 
 Persian years : — 
 
 " L'annde etait divisee en quatre saisons, corre- 
 spondant aux notres. Cette division ne parait guere 
 que dans les textes post-avest^ens ; mais il y a dans 
 I'Avesta meme des traces de son existence ancienne, 
 
PART I.] MITHRAS AND EQUINOX 6i 
 
 La division normale de I'annee est, dans I'Avesta, 
 en deux saisons, 6t€ et hiver ; I'et^, hama, qui com- 
 prend les sept premiers mois (du i" Farvardin au 
 30 Mihr, soit du 21 mars au 16 octobre). . , . 
 Cette division a une valeur religieuse, non seule- 
 ment pour le rituel, mais aussi pour les pratiques, 
 qui varient selon la saison." 
 
 The worship of the Persian sun-god Mithras 
 was introduced into Rome about the time of the 
 fall of the Republic. How far this worship differed 
 from that taugfht in the Zoroastrian writing's we need 
 not inquire ; however changed it may have been, 
 it was evidently derived originally from a Persian 
 or a Median source. The worship of Mithras, in 
 spite of much opposition, gained many followers in 
 Rome. The birthday of the sun-god was kept at 
 the winter solstice, but the great festivities in his 
 honour, ''the mysteries of Mithras,^' were as a rule 
 celebrated at the season of the spring equinox,^ 
 
 ^ Cumont, in the first volume of his Monuments figuris relatifs 
 aux mysteres de Mithra, p. 326, having spoken of the solstitial 
 festival in honour of the birthday of the god, observes as follows : 
 " Nous avons certaines raisons de croire que les equinoxes etaient 
 aussi des jours feries ou I'on inaugurait par quelque salutation le 
 retour des Saisons divinisees. Les initiations avaient lieu de pre- 
 ference vers le debut du printemps, en mars ou en avril. . ," 
 
 E 
 
62 THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS [part i. 
 
 and were famous even among Roman festivals. 
 Let us now turn our attention to the Tauric sym- 
 bolism so closely connected with Mithraic obser- 
 vances in Rome. 
 
 A writer in the AthencBum thus describes a 
 Roman Mithraeum •} " Discovery was made during 
 some excavations at Ostia of a handsome house 
 containing among its various rooms a mithr(Bum. 
 . . . Into the kitchen opens a narrow and tortuous 
 passage, from which by a small half-concealed stair- 
 case the rnithrcBum is reached ; ... it is quad- 
 rangular and regular in shape, as is usually the case 
 in buildings of the kind. Almost the whole length 
 
 o o 
 
 of the two lateral walls run two seats, and on the 
 side opposite the door is seen a little elevation, 
 which served as the place for the usual statue of 
 Mithras in the act of thrusting his dagger into the 
 neck of the mystic Bull. A very singular peculi- 
 arity of this little Ostian mithrceum is that it is 
 entirely covered with mosaics — pavements, seats, 
 and walls alike. The various figrures and the 
 symbols are splendidly drawn, and all executed in 
 black tessercB on a white ground. Upon each side 
 of the seats, turned to the entrance door, is figured 
 a genius bearing a lamp, that is, the genius of the 
 
 1 Athenaum, 1886, October 30 and November 6. 
 
PART I.] MITHRAS SLAYS BULL 63 
 
 spring- equinox, with the face raised, and that of 
 the autumn equinox, with the face cast down. . . . 
 It is known, in fact, that the whole myth of Mithras 
 is related to the phases of the sun . . . hence are 
 represented in the ground below the seats all the 
 twelve signs of the zodiac, by means of the usual 
 symbols, but each accompanied by a large star." 
 
 In the many sculptures of the Mithras group 
 similar to that above described, which have been 
 so well figured in Lajard's Culte de Mithras, 
 various heavenly bodies are represented. The 
 Scorpion (the constellation Scorpio of the Zodiac 
 opposed to Taurus) joins with Mithras in his attack 
 upon the Bull, and always the genii of the spring 
 and autumn equinoxes are present in joyous and 
 mournful attitudes. 
 
 In looking at these plates the conviction is 
 clearly forced upon our minds that the Bull so per- 
 sistently, and, it may be added, so serenely, slain 
 by Mithras in these Roman representations, is the 
 Zodiacal Bull, overcome, and as it were destroyed 
 or banished from heaven, in the daytime by the 
 sun-god, and at night by Scorpio, the constellation 
 in opposition. With almost equal conviction we 
 
64 THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS [part i. 
 
 arrive at the conclusion that this triumph of Mithras 
 was associated traditionally — in Roman days it 
 could only have been traditionally — with the oc- 
 currence, at a remote date, of the spring equinox 
 during the time that the sun was in conjunction 
 with the constellation Taurus. 
 
 In the ruins of Persepolis, ruins of buildings 
 designed, erected, and decorated by the worshippers 
 of the supreme God Ahura Mazda, and of his 
 friend and representative Mithras, Tauric symbolism 
 abounds. We do not amongst these ruins find por- 
 trayals of Mithras as a youth wearing a Phrygian 
 cap, and "thrusting his dagger into the neck of 
 the mystic Bull," but again and again, in the bas- 
 reliefs adorning the walls, we do find a colossal 
 being thrusting his dagger into the body of a 
 still more " mystic " creature than the Bull of the 
 Roman sculptures — a creature combining in one 
 instance at least ^ the attributes of Bull, Lion, 
 Scorpion, and Eagle, and frequently those of two 
 or more of these animals. 
 
 Perrot and Chipiez have supposed this con- 
 stantly repeated scene to represent imaginary 
 
 1 See Plate IV. 
 
li^ 
 
 
 Persepolis. Combat du roi et du griffon. Palais n° 3. 
 
 Perrot et Chipiez. Histoire de I'Art dans rA7itiqintc, 
 
 Tome v. opposite page 547. 
 
 \To /ace p. 64. 
 
PART I.] BULL LION SCORPION EAGLE 65 
 
 contests between the reigning monarch and all 
 possible or impossible monsters, but a very 
 different impression was produced on the mind of 
 Ker Porter by these same bas-reliefs ; and though 
 he did not adopt a purely astronomic theory to ex- 
 plain them, he was firmly convinced that the combat 
 depicted was not one waged between an ordinary 
 human being and an ordinary or extraordinary 
 animal, but that it was a symbolical representation 
 of the combat constantly carried on by Ormuzd 
 (Ahura Mazda), and by his representative Mithras, 
 against the powers of evil and darkness.^ 
 
 With the astronomic clue to Persian symbolism 
 
 1 "The man who contends with the animals ... is repre- 
 sented as a person of a singularly dignified mien, clad in long 
 draperied robes, but with the arms perfectly bare. His hair, 
 which is full and curled, is bound with a circlet or low diadem ; 
 and his sweeping pointed beard is curled at different heights, in 
 the style that was worn by majesty alone. . . . The calmness 
 of his air, contrasted with the firmness with which he grasps the 
 animals, and strikes to his aim, gives a certainty to his object, and 
 a sublimity to his figure, beyond anything that would have been in 
 the power of more elaborate action or ornament to effect. From 
 the unchanged appearance of the hero, his unvaried mode of 
 attack, its success, and the unaltered style of opposition adopted 
 by every one of the animals in the contest, I can have no doubt 
 that they all mean different achievements towards one great aim. 
 . . ." — Ker Porter's Travels, vol. i. p. 672. 
 
66 THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS [part i. 
 
 put into our hands by the Roman sculptures, of 
 which mention has been made, and by a study 
 of the researches of Lajard, it is not difficult to 
 recognize in the composite animals represented on 
 the bas-reliefs allusions not only to the Zodiacal 
 Bull, traditionally associated with the spring 
 equinox, but also to three other constellations 
 which at the same date of the world's history 
 (namely, from 4,000 to 2,000 b.c.) marked more 
 or less accurately the remaining colures, i.e. the 
 Lion, the Scorpion, and the Eagle. 
 
 The constellations of the Lion and the Scorpion, 
 there can be no doubt, were appropriate star 
 marks for the summer and autumn seasons, when 
 the spring equinoctial point was in the Bull,^ but 
 as regards the Eagle it must be admitted that 
 though it adjoins the Zodiacal Aquarius (the con- 
 stellation in which the winter solstitial point was 
 then situated), yet its principal stars lie consider- 
 ably to the north and west of that constellation. 
 
 A reason for the substitution of the Eagle 
 
 (Aquila) for the Zodiacal Water-man or Water-jar 
 
 ^ The solstitial and equinoctial colures were situated, speaking 
 in round numbers, for 2,000 years in the constellations Taurus, 
 Leo, Scorpio, and Aquarius. 
 
PART I.] EAGLE FOR WATER-MAN 67 
 
 (Aquarius or Amphora) may, however, be found 
 in the fact of the very great brilliancy of the 
 star Altair in the Eagle. It is a star of the first 
 magnitude. In the Water-man there is no star 
 above the third. The Persians, we are told, had 
 a tradition that four brilliant stars marked the four 
 cardinal points {i.e. the colures). In Taurus, Leo, 
 and Scorpio we find stars of the first magnitude : 
 there was therefore no temptation for Mithraic 
 calendar makers and mythologists to seek for an 
 extra- Zodiacal star to mark and represent the 
 spring, summer, or autumn seasons ; but for the 
 winter solstice the only stars of the first magnitude 
 within at all suitable distance were Aquila, to the 
 north-west, or Fomalhaut to the south of Aquarius. 
 For a nation dwelling as far to the north as the 
 Medians are supposed to have done, Fomalhaut 
 (when the winter solstice was in Aquarius very 
 far to the south of the equator) would have been 
 rarely visible. The choice by a Median astronomer 
 and symbolic artist in search of a very brilliant star 
 mark for the solstice would therefore have been re- 
 stricted to the constellation of the Eagle, containing 
 the conspicuous Altair, a star of the first magnitude. 
 
68 THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS [part i. 
 
 The very constant association, not only in 
 Persian and Median, but also in the mythologic 
 art of other nations, of the Lion and the Eagle, 
 seems to confirm the view here put forward, i.e. 
 that the constellations of Leo and Aquila rather 
 than of Leo and Aquarius were sometimes chosen 
 to symbolise the summer and winter solstices. 
 
 The Griffin, a fabulous animal sacred to the 
 sun, composed of a Lion and an Eagle, is a 
 well-known figure in ancient classic art. 
 
 In Babylonian and Assyrian sculptured and 
 glyptic art Merodach is often represented as in 
 conflict with a Griffin. Merodach has been claimed 
 by Jensen and. other writers as a personification 
 of the sun of the spring equinox. The for ever 
 recurring triumph of spring over winter is probably 
 figured in Merodach's triumph over the Griffin. 
 
 The association of Eagle and Lion is to be 
 noticed in the arms of the city of Lagash ; they 
 were "a double-headed Eagle standing on a Lion 
 passant or on two demi-lions placed back to back." ^ 
 In Lagash, as was pointed out in a former paper, the 
 new year's festival appears to have been held at the 
 
 ^ Maspero, Dawn of Civilization, p. 604. 
 
TART 1.] GRIFFIN AND SOLSTICES 69 
 
 winter solstice : such a supposition would furnish an 
 astronomical interpretation for the arms of Lagash.^ 
 Mythological references to the Eagle alone are 
 also to be met with which point to the Celestial 
 Eagle (Aquila) marking the winter solstice in lieu 
 of the constellation Aquarius, as for instance the 
 Babylonian legend of the ambitious storm-bird, Zu,^ 
 who stole the tablets of destiny, and thus sought to 
 vie in power with " the great gods." Here we may 
 find allusions to the substitution (deemed by some, 
 
 1 In this connexion the following passage from Sayce's 
 Hibbert Lectures, p. 261, is interesting : — 
 
 A text copied for Assur-banipal, from a tablet originally written 
 at Babylon, contains part of a hymn which had to be recited " in 
 the presence of Bel-Merodach ... in the beginning of Nisan," — 
 " . . . . O Zamama, 
 Why dost thou not take thy seat ? 
 Bahu, the Queen of Kis, has not cried to thee." 
 
 He adds in a note that Zamama was the Sun-god of Kis, and 
 was consequently identitied with Adar by the mythologists. On 
 a contract-stone he is symbolized by an eagle, which is said to be 
 "the image of the southern sun of Kis." 
 
 It was claimed in a former paper (Feb. 1896) that " the Southern 
 sun " was " the sun of the winter solstice" and that Gula ( = Bahu) 
 was the name of the constellation, or of some stars in the constella- 
 tion Aquarius (V. p. 50). In these lines Bahu, as I have sup- 
 posed, Aquarius, and Zamama, symbohsed by the Eagle, the 
 image of the Southern sun or winter solstice, are closely associated. 
 
 2 Maspero, Dawn of Civilization^ p. 666. 
 
70 THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS [part i. 
 
 no doubt, unauthorized) of an extra- Zodiacal for a 
 Zodiacal constellation. 
 
 Again, in Grecian mythology the Eagle is sent 
 by Zeus to carry Ganymede up to heaven, and 
 in Grecian astronomy Ganymede is placed in the 
 constellation Aquarius. It does not therefore seem 
 unreasonable to suppose that the Eagle associated 
 in the Persepolitan bas-reliefs with the Lion, the 
 Bull, and the Scorpion (as at Plate IV.), is the con- 
 stellational Eagle, symbolizing the winter solstice, 
 and that the compound animal is emblematic of 
 the four seasons of the year, and also, it may be, 
 of the four quarters of the world. 
 
 If to the composite monster of the bas-reliefs 
 we ascribe an astronomic motive, we shall be ready 
 to grant the same to other Tauric symbolisms 
 prominent in the Persepolitan ruins. 
 
 With full conviction we shall recognize in the 
 demi-bulls which crowned the columns in Persepolis 
 and Susa representations of the demi-bull of the 
 Zodiac. The resemblance is so striking that words 
 are scarcely required to point it out when once 
 the outlines of the two figures have been compared 
 (Plate v.). In the spirited description of these 
 
PLATE V. 
 
 
 THE 
 
 CONSTELLATION 
 
 TAURUS 
 
 CAPITAL 
 FROM SUSA 
 
 [To /ace p. 70. 
 
PART I.] PERSEPOLITAN DEMI-BULLS 71 
 
 capitals, quoted here from Perrot and Chipiez,^ are 
 some lines, marked with italics, which might be 
 applied with exactness to the demi-bulls of the 
 Zodiac. 
 
 " On ne saurait cependant ne point admirer le 
 grand gout et I'art ingdnieux avec lequel, dans ses 
 bustes de taureau, il [I'artiste perse] a p\\6 la forme 
 vivante au necessit^s de la decoration architecturale. 
 II a su la simplifier sans lui enlever I'accent de la 
 vie ; les traits caracteristiques de I'espece sur 
 laquelle s'est porte son choix restent franchement 
 accuses, quoique les menus details soient dlimin^s ; 
 ils auraient risqu6 de distraire et de troubler le 
 regard. Les polls de la nuque et du dos, de 
 I'epaule, des fanons, et des flancs sont reunis en 
 masses d'un ferme contour, auquelles la frisure des 
 boucles dont elles se composent donne un relief plus 
 vigoureux ; en meme temps le collier qui pend au 
 col, orn6 de rosaces et d'un riche fleuron qui tombe 
 sur la poitrine, 6carte toute idee de realitd ; ce sont 
 la des etres sacres et presque divins, que I'imagina- 
 tion de I'artiste a comme crees a nouveau et modeles 
 a son gre pour les adapter a la fonction qu'elle leur 
 donnait a remplir. Cependant, tout place qu'il soit 
 en dehors des conditions de la nature, I'animal n'a 
 
 1 ffistoire dfT Art dans rantiquite, Perse, p. 519. 
 
72 THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS [part i. 
 
 pas perdu sa physionomie propre. Dans le mouve- 
 ment de la tete, Idgerement inclince en avant et sur la 
 cotd, on sent la force indompt^e qui anime ce corps 
 ample et puissant. Hardiment indiquees, la con- 
 struction et la musculature des membres infdrieurs, 
 replUs sous le ventre, laissent deviner de quel elan le 
 taureau se leverait et se dresserait en pied, s'il 
 venait a se lasser de son eternel repos. J 'en ai fait 
 plusieurs fois I'experience au Louvre, devant la partie 
 de chapiteau colossal que notre musde doit a M. 
 Dieulafoy : parmi les visiteurs qui se pressaient dans 
 cette salle, parmi ceux memes qui semblaient le 
 moins prepares a eprouver ce genre d'impressions, 
 il n'en est pas un qui n'ait subi le charme, qui 
 de maniere ou d'autre, n'ait rendu hommage a 
 la noblesse et a 1 'Strange beaute de ce type 
 singulier." 
 
 For the exquisite columns crowned by these 
 Tauric capitals the same writers have claimed a 
 distinctively Median origin. This claim they sus- 
 tain at great length, and with much architectural 
 learning. They show that in their proportions, and 
 in every detail of their ornamentation, the Perse- 
 politan differed from the Ninevite, Grecian, or 
 Egyptian column. They also point out that no- 
 where except at Persepolis and at Susa is the 
 
PART I.] MEDIAN AND ASSYRIAN ART 73 
 
 demi-bull of the capital to be met with ; and 
 yet they express the opinion that this feature, 
 so far as is known proper to Persia, was mainly 
 derived from, or helped at least by, the models 
 of Assyria. 
 
 Very close resemblances can indeed be traced in 
 Medo- Persian to Assyrian art, and as the Medo- 
 Persian buildings, whose ruins are at Persepolis and 
 Susa, were erected certainly at a later date than the 
 palaces of the Assyrian kings discovered on the 
 site of Nineveh, it is natural to attribute, as Perrot 
 and Chipiez, and nearly all writers on the sub- 
 ject attribute, such resemblances to imitations of 
 Assyrian art and symbolism on the part of the 
 Medo-Persians. 
 
 There are, however, some considerations which 
 make it difficult to adopt this view. In the first 
 place, the symbolism supposed to have been copied 
 by the Medo-Persians was religious symbolism, and 
 the religion of the Aryan Medo-Persians was very 
 different from that of the Semitic Assyrians. 
 
 The Achsemenid kings who built their palaces 
 at Persepolis claimed constantly that they were 
 worshippers of the one great Lord Ahura Mazda, 
 
;4 THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS [part i. 
 
 of whom Mithras was the friend and representative. 
 That these kings should have adopted from the 
 polytheistic Assyrians not only the Tauric sym- 
 bolism above described, but also, as it is sug- 
 gested, the emblem of their one great Lord 
 Ahura Mazda from that of Assur (see Plate VI. 
 figs. I, 2, 3), would in itself be strange, but that 
 they should have done so when Assur and all his 
 followers had been utterly vanquished by the 
 victorious worshippers of Ahura Mazda, seems still 
 more improbable. 
 
 From the state in which the ruins of Nineveh 
 were when discovered by Layard it is easy to 
 see that, from the very day of the sacking of 
 the city, it had for the most part been left 
 just as it fell. It may have been rifled of its 
 material wealth, but its literary and artistic 
 treasures were left uncared for and undesired. A 
 few hundred years later the very site of Nineveh 
 was unknown. 
 
 The great city would not have been treated with 
 such neglect had the Medo- Persian artists turned 
 to it for inspiration and for themes of symbolic 
 art with which to decorate the palaces of Persepolis. 
 
PLATE VI. 
 FIG. 1. 
 
 ^he Assyrian god Assur. 
 FIG. 2. 
 
 The Assyrian god Assur. 
 
PLATE VI. 
 FIG. 3. 
 
 The Median god Ahura Mazda. 
 
 FIG. 4. 
 
 Western portion of Constellation Sagittarius and the 
 Constellation Corona Australis. 
 
 [To face p. 74. 
 
PART I.] ASSYRIANS COPIED MEDES 75 
 
 The resemblance, however, between Medo- 
 Persian and Ninevite art is in many instances so 
 striking that some way of accounting for it must 
 be sought, and those who are dissatisfied with one 
 explanation will naturally look about to find some 
 alternative suggestion. 
 
 The alternative suggestion I would now pro- 
 pose is that the progenitors of the Assyrians at an 
 early period of the world's history borrowed Tauric 
 and other religious symbolisms from the ancestors of 
 the Medes. 
 
 In support of this theory the following con- 
 siderations are put forward : 
 
 Tauric symbolism, if it is at all astronomic, 
 points us back to a very remote date for its first 
 institution, to a date considerably earlier than that 
 at which the existence of the Assyrian people as 
 an independent nation is generally put. The sym- 
 bolism already discussed must, at the latest, have 
 been originated about 2,000 B.C. Of the Assyrians 
 as a nation we have no monumental proof earlier 
 than 1,700 B.C. 
 
 But further, in the symbol of Ahura and Assur, 
 I believe an astronomic reference may be traced 
 
;6 THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS [part i. 
 
 to the position of the colures amongst the con- 
 stellations, a reference which points us back not 
 merely to a date between 4,000 and 2,000 B.C., but 
 rather, and with curious precision, to the furthest 
 limit of the time mentioned, namely to 4,000 B.C. 
 
 To penetrate into the meaning of this symbol 
 of Ahura we must study both the Median and 
 Assyrian representations of the figure presiding 
 over the winged disc, and we may also seek for 
 further light to be thrown upon it by other refer- 
 ences in Assyrian art to the god Assur. 
 
 Ahura presiding over the winged circle holds 
 in his hand a ring or crown ; Assur in some ex- 
 amples is similarly furnished ; but more often he 
 appears armed with bow and arrows. In this figure, 
 variously equipped, 1 believe that the heavenly 
 Archer, the Zodiacal Sagittarius (Plate VI. fig. 4), 
 is to be recog'nized — Sao-ittarius, the constellation in 
 which the autumnal equinoctial point was situated, 
 speaking in round numbers, from 6,000 to 4,000 B.C. 
 
 The fact that a crown or wreath or ring often 
 replaces the bow and arrows in the hand of Ahura 
 and of Assur might at first sight make us doubtful 
 as to the connexion of the figure with the constella- 
 
PART I.] AHURA MAZDA AND ASSUR Tj 
 
 tion Sagittarius, but a glance at the celestial globe 
 will rather make this fact tell in favour of the astro- 
 nomical suggestion here made : for there we find 
 close to the hand of the Archer the ancient Ptole- 
 maic constellation Corona Australia (the Southern 
 Crown), actually incorporated with the Zodiacal con- 
 stellation Sagittarius. 
 
 Not only do Assur's bow and crown remind 
 us of Sagittarius, but his horned tiara, resembling 
 so closely that worn by the man-headed Assyrian 
 bulls, inclines us to look for some astronomic and 
 Tauric allusion in this Assyrian and Median 
 symbol. 
 
 True it is that, speaking generally, Gemini 
 and not Taurus is the constellation of the Zodiac 
 opposed to Sagittarius, but owing to the irregu- 
 larity in the shape and size of the portions assigned 
 in the ecliptic to the Zodiacal constellations, the 
 extreme western degrees of Sagittarius are opposed 
 to the extreme eastern degrees of Taurus. There- 
 fore about 4,000 B.C. the equinoctial colure passed 
 through the constellations of the Archer and the Bull. 
 
 In the Assyrian Standard (depicted in 
 Layard's Monuments of Nineveh, Plate XXII.) 
 
78 THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS [part i. 
 
 we see the figure of an Archer above that 
 of a galloping Bull, and in another Assyrian 
 
 Standard, that of Sargon II., we find not only 
 
PLATE VII. 
 
 Standard of Sargon II., King of Assyria, 722-705 B.C. 
 Perrot et Chipiez. Histoire de PArt dans t'Antiqidie, Tome v. 
 opposite page 508. \Tojacep. 79. 
 
PART I] ARCHER, BULL, LION, WATER-MAN 79 
 
 the Archer and the Bull, the two constellations 
 which 4,000 B.C. marked the equinoctial colure, 
 but we may also clearly trace a reference to the 
 two constellations which at the same date marked 
 the solstitial colure, namely, those of the Lion 
 and the Water-man (Plate VII.). 
 
 Here the Archer dominates over a circle in 
 which symmetrically duplicated Bulls appear, and 
 duplicated Lions' heads emerge out of what appears 
 to be a hollow vessel resembling a water jar ; the 
 wavy lines that traverse the disc suggest streams 
 that unitedly pour their waters into this jar. Below 
 the jar again are to be seen halved and doubled 
 heads, partly Lion and partly Bull. 
 
 This Standard of Assur may (like the Perse- 
 politan monster earlier described) be considered 
 as an astronomic monogram representing the four 
 constellations which marked the four seasons of 
 the year, and the four quarters of the earth. 
 
 The monogram of the Standard refers us back, 
 however, to an earlier date for its origin than 
 does the monogram of the composite animal in 
 the Persepolitan bas-relief, for in the Standard the 
 Archer is opposed to the Bull, in the bas-relief 
 
8o THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS [part i. 
 
 the Scorpion takes the place of the Archer, and 
 the Eagle takes the place of the Water-man. 
 
 The precession of the equinoxes advances from 
 east to west amongst the stars. Therefore the 
 Scorpion marked the colure at a later date than 
 did the Archer. The Eagle, as has already been 
 pointed out, is considerably to the west of Aquarius, 
 and could scarcely have been chosen as a sub- 
 stitute for that constellation when the colure was 
 in its extreme eastern degrees. 
 
 At Plate VIII. is given the position of the 
 colures at 4,000 B.C. ; not much earlier or much 
 later than this date can we place the origin of the 
 symbolism in the Standard shown at Plate VII. 
 Earlier not Leo and Aquarius, but Virgo and 
 Pisces, would have marked the solstitial colure. 
 Later not Sagittarius, but Scorpio, would have in 
 opposition to Taurus marked the equinoctial colure. 
 
 At this date, 4,000 B.C., suggested with such 
 curious accuracy by this Assyrian Standard, we 
 have absolutely no trace of the existence of the 
 Semitic nation of the Assyrians in Northern Meso- 
 potamia. In Babylonia two hundred years later 
 the Semitic Sargon I. ruled at Accad. In the 
 
PLATE VIII. 
 
 c,CC&.^o. 
 
 ^■4bT^ 
 
 Position of Colures amongst the Constellations at the dates 
 4,500-4,000 and 3,500 B.C. 
 
 [ To face p. 80. 
 
PART I.] MANDA PROBABLY MEDES 8i 
 
 astrological work drawn up, if not for Sargon yet, 
 as we may judge from internal evidence, for some 
 king of Accad, no mention is made of the Assyrian 
 nation. 
 
 The Phoenicians, the Hittites, the Kings of 
 Gutium, and the " Umman Manda" are then the 
 dreaded foes of Accad. Of the Manda we read as 
 follows : " The Umman Manda comes and governs 
 the land. The mercy seats of the great gods are 
 taken away. Bel goes to Elam." 
 
 Professor Sayce is opposed to the view that 
 the Manda are necessarily identical with the 
 Medes ; but he admits that Herodotus, following 
 the authority of Medo-Persian writers, claimed as 
 Median the victories of the Manda.^ 
 
 If now on the authority of Herodotus and the 
 Medo-Persian writers we assume, at least as a 
 possibility, that these Manda were Medes, we 
 should expect to find them worshippers of Ahura 
 Mazda. Ahura, it is on all hands admitted, is the 
 Iranian form of the Vedic Asura, just as Mithras 
 is the Iranian form of the Vedic Mitra. At what- 
 ever date the separation between Iranian and Vedic 
 1 Proceedings, vol. xviii. Part vi. pp. 176, 177. 
 
82 THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS [part i. 
 
 Aryans took place, the worship of Ahura (still 
 probably under the form Asura) must have existed 
 amongst the Iranians; indeed, many have sup- 
 posed that the monotheistic reform which placed 
 one great Ahura or Asura above all other Asuras, 
 and above the Devas, occasioned the separation 
 of these two great Aryan races. 
 
 It is for the Lord Ahura, called, as here 
 supposed, Asura, in early times, by the Aryan 
 Manda, that I would claim the astronomical 
 symbol of the Archer presiding over the circle of 
 the ecliptic, or, in other words, over the circle of 
 the year, and of a year beginning at the spring 
 equinox — a year, as has already been pointed out, 
 distinctively Median. 
 
 According then to this supposition, a powerful 
 Median race was established in the vicinity of 
 Babylonia early in the fourth millennium B.C. — a 
 race who worshipped one great Lord, first under 
 the name of Asura, afterwards under that of 
 Ahura. 
 
 It is for these Aryan Manda or Medes that I 
 would claim, at the date of 4,000 u.c, the original 
 conception of the astronomic monogram in which 
 
PART I] SYMBOLIC STANDARD MEDIAN 83 
 
 so plainly may be read an allusion to the four con- 
 stellations of the Zodiac, which at that date marked 
 the four seasons and the four cardinal points, i.e. 
 Sagittarius and Taurus, Aquarius and Leo. This 
 monogram was used as a Standard thousands of 
 years later by the Semitic Assyrians. 
 
 To the Manda or Medes, also, I would, as 
 has been suggested, attribute the first imagining 
 of the astronomic emblem common to Ahura and 
 Assur — that of the divine Being presiding over 
 the circle of the ecliptic. 
 
 Berosus mentions a Median dynasty as having 
 reigned in Babylon for one or two hundred years. 
 Let us now suppose that the Manda for more 
 than a thousand years held power in Northern 
 Mesopotamia, but that at last the tide of conquest 
 turned, and after many struggles with the Semites 
 in the south the Aryans were finally driven from 
 the land now known as Assyria, and a Semite 
 race firmly settled in the regions from whence in 
 Sargon's time the Umman Manda had threatened 
 the inhabitants of the Kingdom of Accad. That 
 this was the case about 2,200 b.c. may perhaps be 
 gathered from the monuments of Hammurabi, the 
 
84 THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS [part i. 
 
 Semitic king of Babylon, for he refers in his letters 
 to his troops in Assyria, and in a lately discovered 
 inscription of this king he speaks of restoring to 
 the city of Assur its propitious genie, and of 
 honouring Istar in the city of Nineveh. 
 
 To account for the existence of the Assyrian 
 nation, their close resemblance in language and 
 race to the ruling Semitic class in Babylon, and 
 yet to explain the great difference in the religion 
 of these two peoples, has always been a difficulty. 
 
 The Assyrians worshipped, and worshipped with 
 enthusiasm, all the Babylonian gods ; but high 
 above the whole Babylonian Pantheon they placed 
 as their supreme and great Lord Assur — Assur 
 whose very name is not to be met with in Baby- 
 lonian mythology. This difficulty I would explain 
 in the following manner. 
 
 When the Medes had, by Hammurabi or his 
 successors, been driven out of Northern Mesopo- 
 tamia, they were replaced by Semitic settlers who 
 (like the settlers sent into Samaria more than a 
 thousand years later by a king of Assyria) adopted, 
 to a certain extent, the religion of the nation whom 
 they had dispossessed. In 2 Kings xvii. we read 
 
PART I.] ASSUR, THE "GOD OF THE LAND" 85 
 
 that in this parallel instance " the king of Assyria 
 brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and 
 from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, 
 and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of 
 the children of Israel : and they possessed Samaria, 
 and dwelt in the cities thereof." Later in the same 
 chapter we read that in order to appease, as they 
 believed, the wrath of the " God of the land," these 
 idolatrous settlers, retaining in full the worship of 
 all their own gods, added to it a worship of the 
 Lord of the dispossessed Israelites. 
 
 I would suppose then that the polytheistic 
 Semites, who in Hammurabi's time were settled in 
 Northern Mesopotamia, had acted in a similar 
 manner. Coming into a region where for nearly 
 2,000 years the monotheistic Medes or Manda had 
 been established, they, to avert the wrath of the 
 god of the land, adopted to a certain extent his 
 worship. In fact, like the Samaritans, " they feared 
 the Lord [Asura], and served their own gods." 
 
 This explanation of the difference in religion 
 between the Babylonians and the Assyrians seems 
 to yield also an explanation of the resemblances 
 between the Assyrian and Median religions, or 
 
86 THE CONSTELLATION TAURUS [part i. 
 
 rather of the resemblances between the religious 
 art of the two peoples ; and thus we return to the 
 problem proposed for discussion earlier in this 
 Paper, namely, the inadequacy of the generally 
 held opinion which accounts for the resemblances 
 in Persepolitan and Ninevite symbolic art by 
 supposing that the Medes borrowed from the 
 Assyrians. 
 
 In support of the alternative suggestion put 
 forward at p. 75, that the progenitors of the 
 Assyrians at an early period of the zvorld's history 
 borrowed Tauric and other religious symbolisms 
 from the ancestors of the Medes, I would claim that 
 the Assyrians borrowed not only religious sym- 
 bolisms, but even the very name of their god Assur 
 from the Medes. For I look upon Assur as a 
 "loan word" adopted from the Aryan Asura. 
 
 To the Medes or Manda, who were, as has 
 been argued, in power in Northern Mesopotamia 
 about 4,000 B.C., I have attributed the origin of 
 the astronomic Assyrian and Ahurian emblem. 
 To them, on the same grounds, I attribute 
 the first imagining of the astronomic Assyrian 
 Standard, and the devising of the man-headed and 
 
PART I] ASSUR DERIVED FROM ASURA 87 
 
 winged monsters so well known as "Assyrian 
 Bulls " ; and to them I would, with full conviction, 
 leave the honour of having invented, and not bor- 
 rowed, the idea of the magnificent Tauric capitals 
 that crowned the columns of Persepolis and Susa. 
 To all these conclusions I have been led by 
 a consideration of the distinctively equinoctial 
 character of the Median calendar, taken in con- 
 nexion with the importance given in Median art 
 to the constellation Taurus. 
 
V 
 
 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA 
 
 [Reprinted from the Report of the Acies of the Twelfth Oriental 
 Congress held at Rome] 
 
 Not much more than a hundred years ago the 
 Sanscrit language began to yield to the study of 
 Europeans some of its literary treasures. Almost 
 on the moment, a controversy arose as to the 
 antiquity of the science of astronomy in India ; 
 for scholars were amazed to find in this already 
 long dead language many learned astronomical 
 treatises, besides complete instructions for calcul- 
 ating, year by year, the Hindu calendar, as also 
 for calculating horoscopes. 
 
 Some then proclaimed the wonderful facts re- 
 vealed, and extolled the antiquity and accuracy 
 of this Indian science, while others, noticing the 
 many points of resemblance between European 
 
 and Indian methods, supposed, and warmly advo- 
 
 ss 
 
PART I.] GREEK V. INDIAN SCIENCE 89 
 
 cated the opinion, that much of the astronomy 
 contained in Sanscrit works had been borrowed 
 from the Greeks. 
 
 Sir William Jones was amongst the first to 
 enter the lists against this Grecian theory ; and 
 he thus throws down his glove in defence of the 
 antiquity and originality of the science of as- 
 tronomy in India. 
 
 " I engage to support an opinion (which the 
 learned and industrious M. Montucla seems to 
 treat with extreme contempt) that the Indian 
 division of the Zodiack was not borrowed from 
 the Greeks or Arabs, but, having been known in 
 this country (India) for time immemorial, and being 
 the same in part with that used by other nations 
 of the old Hindu race, was probably invented by 
 the first progenitors of that race before their dis- 
 persion." ^ 
 
 Since Sir William Jones wrote this challenge, 
 and supported it with whatever linguistic and 
 scientific resources were at his command, volumes 
 of heated controversy by many authors have been 
 devoted to the same subject. 
 
 ^ On the Antiquity of the Indian Zodiack. Complete Works, 
 vol. i. p. 333. 
 
90 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 Just at present, however, an almost indifferent 
 calmness has taken the place of the excited interest 
 formerly manifested. The majority of scholars, 
 both European and Indian, appear to have ac- 
 cepted, as an axiom, the opinion that much of 
 Indian astronomy, and certainly the Indian ac- 
 quaintance with the twelve-fold division of the 
 Zodiac, is to be attributed to Grecian influence. 
 
 A minority of writers still hold the view advo- 
 cated by Sir William Jones about a hundred years 
 ago, and thus reiterated by Burgess (the translator 
 of the Indian standard astronomical work the 
 Silrya-Siddhdnta) in i860. "The use of this 
 (twelve-fold) division, and the present names of 
 the signs, can be proved to have existed in India 
 at as early a period as in any other country."^ 
 
 The minority who hold this view are so few 
 at present that, as has been said, the majority rest 
 in their opposed opinion in all the calmness of 
 conviction. 
 
 I will now as briefly as possible state the 
 chief arguments put forward, for and against, this 
 conviction. 
 
 ^ Journal of the American Oriental Society, vol. vi. p. 477. 
 
FART I.] SOLAR ZODIAC GRECIAN 91 
 
 I. In favour of the comparatively late intro- 
 duction into India of the twelve-fold division of 
 the Zodiac, it is contended that the divisions of 
 the Indian Solar Zodiac so closely resemble those 
 of the Grecian (the Zodiac which we to this day 
 depict on celestial globes), that it is not possible 
 to believe that two nations or two sets of as- 
 tronomers could independently of each other have 
 imagined the same fanciful and apparently incon- 
 sequent series. 
 
 History does not tell of communication between 
 Greece and India, sufficient to account for this 
 similarity of astronomical method, till after the 
 date of Alexander's conquest — about 300 b.c. The 
 Greeks could not at that late date have first become 
 acquainted with the figures of the Zodiac, for in 
 Grecian literature of a much earlier age the figures 
 of the Zodiac and other constellations are alluded 
 to as already perfectly well known. As the Greeks 
 therefore could not have learnt all their astronomic 
 lore from the Indians, the Indians must have learnt 
 theirs from the Greeks at some date later than 
 Alexander's Eastern conquests. 
 
 A corroboration of this opinion is drawn from 
 
92 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 the consideration that, in the most ancient Sanscrit 
 work in existence — the purely Indian Rig Veda, 
 containing- no Grecian taint — the twelve-fold 
 divisions of the Zodiac appear to be unknown. 
 This opinion as to the Rashis or constellations 
 of the Solar Zodiac is so generally adopted, that 
 the age of any Sanscrit work in which mention 
 of these Rashis occurs is at once — no matter what 
 its claims to antiquity may be — set down as not 
 earlier than the comparatively modern date of 
 300 B.C. 
 
 II. As regards the Indian Lunar Zodiac. The 
 Indians make use at present for calendrical pur- 
 poses, not only of the twelve-fold Solar Zodiac, 
 they have also a series of 27 Nakshatras, or Lunar 
 mansions (this is for convenience sake designated 
 by European writers as the Lunar Zodiac). It is 
 admitted on all hands that the Nakshatra series 
 was not derived from Grecian sources. But it is 
 contended that the fixation of the initial point of 
 this Lunar Zodiac (a point at the end of Revati 
 and the beginning of AswinI, 10 degrees west of 
 the first point of our constellation Aries) was due 
 to an astronomical reform of the Hindu calendar, 
 
PART I.] HINDU CALENDAR 570 A.D. 93 
 
 probably carried out under Grecian auspices at a 
 date not much earlier than 600 a.d. A very clear 
 statement of this opinion is thus given by Whitney 
 (the editor of Burgess' translation of the Surya 
 Siddhdnta) : — 
 
 "The initial point of the fixed Hindu sphere 
 from which longitudes are reckoned, and at which 
 the planetary motions are held by all schools of 
 Hindu astronomy to have commenced at the 
 creation, is the end of the asterism Revati, or the 
 beginning of A9vini. Its situation is most nearly 
 marked by that of the principal star of Revati . . . 
 that star is by all authorities identified with 
 f Piscium, of which the longitude at present, as 
 reckoned by us, from the Vernal Equinox, is 
 17° 54'. Making due allowance for the precession 
 (of the equinoxes), we find that it coincided in 
 position with the vernal equinox, not far from the 
 middle of the sixth century, or about a.d. 570. 
 As such coincidence was the occasion of the point 
 being fixed upon as the beginning of the sphere, the 
 time of its occurrence marks approximately the 
 era of the fixation of the sphere, and of the com- 
 mencement of the history of modern Hindu 
 astronomy."^ 
 
 ^ Journal of the American Oriental Society, vol. vi. p. 158, 
 
94 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 In further corroboration of this view — deduced 
 from the astronomical supposition (to which I 
 have drawn attention by italics) put forward in 
 this extract — ancient Sanscrit literature is appealed 
 to. Hymns and lists referring to the Nakshatras 
 are to be met with in the Yajur and Atharva 
 Vedas, in which Krittika, now the third Nakshatra, 
 holds the first place. 
 
 The Nakshatra Krittika contains the group of 
 stars known to us as the Pleiades. The most 
 brilliant stars in the Nakshatra Aswini are the 
 two stars in the head of the constellation Aries 
 (the Ram), known to astronomers as a and p 
 Arietis. 
 
 The vernal equinoctial point coincided about 
 2,000 B.C. with the constellation Krittika. It is 
 considered to be most probable that on account 
 of this coincidence, at the early date when the 
 hymns and list in question were composed, 
 Krittika was chosen as the leader of the Nakshatra 
 series, and hence a similar reason for the later 
 choice of AswinT as leader relegates it to a date 
 not much earlier than 570 a.d. 
 
 These very briefly, as far as I have been able 
 
PARI I.] INDIAN V- GREEK SCIENCE 95 
 
 to gather them, are the chief arguments in favour 
 of— 
 
 (i) The Grecian introduction of the twelve- 
 fold Zodiac into India about 300 B.C. 
 
 (2) The date of 570 a.d. for the fixation of 
 the initial point of the Indian Zodiacs, and for 
 the commencement of the history of Indian 
 astronomy. 
 
 These propositions are based on cogent reason- 
 ings, and are maintained by very high authorities. 
 The opponents of the modern theory have brought 
 and bring forward the following considerations : — 
 
 "The Brdhmans were always too proud to 
 borrow their science from the Greeks, Arabs, 
 Moguls, or any nation of MlSchcKhas, as they call 
 those who are ignorant of the Vtfdas, and have not 
 studied the language of the Gods ; they have often 
 quoted to me (Sir William Jones) the fragment of 
 an old verse, which they now use proverbially 
 {ita nicho yavandtparah), or, ' no base creature can be 
 lower than a Yavan,' by which name they formerly 
 meant an Ionian or Greek, and now mean a 
 
 Mogul r 1 
 
 1 Sir William Jones, The Antiquity of the Indiati Zodiack, 
 Complete Works, vol. i. p. 345. 
 
96 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 Again the same writer points out that the" 
 resemblance between the Indian and the Greek 
 Zodiac is — 
 
 " not more extraordinary than that, which has 
 often been observed between our Gothick days of 
 the week and those of the Hindus, which are 
 dedicated to the same luminaries, and (what is yet 
 more singular) revolve in the same order : Ravi, 
 the Sun ; Sdma, the Moon ; Mangala, Tuisco ; 
 Budha, Woden ; Vrihaspati, Thor ; Sucra, Freya ; 
 Sani, Sater ; yet no man ever imagined that the 
 Indians borrowed so remarkable an arrangement 
 from the Goths or Germans." 
 
 These considerations put forward by Sir 
 William Jones are further emphasized by the 
 reflection that not only does the Grecian theory 
 entail the improbability of the proud and jealous 
 Brahmins adopting into their science and their 
 mythology the teachings of foreigners ; but that 
 it also entails the greater improbability of the two 
 rival Hindu sects. Brahmins and Buddhists, having 
 at the same date and with equal enthusiasm 
 adopted into their science and religious symbolism 
 and calendars the same innovations. 
 
PART I.] WEEK-DAYS— OLD WRITERS 97 
 
 Again the opinion of the Greek writers at the 
 beginning of our era may be quoted as showing 
 the high estimation in which, at that time of the 
 world, Indian astronomy was held : as for instance 
 in the life of Apollonius of Tyana (written about 
 210A.D. by Philostratus), the wisdom and learning 
 of Apollonius are set high above those of all his 
 contemporaries ; but from the sages of India he 
 is represented as learning many things, especially 
 matters of astronomy. ^ 
 
 This high opinion held by Greeks in regard 
 to Indian astronomy may be contrasted with the 
 very moderate praise bestowed on the Grecian 
 science by Garga, a Hindu writer of, it is supposed, 
 the first century B.C. He says : — 
 
 "The Yavanas (Greeks) are MIechchas (non- 
 Hindus, or barbarians), but amongst them this 
 science (astronomy) is well established. Therefore 
 they are honoured as Rishis (saints) ; how much 
 more then an astronomer who is a Brahman ? " ^ 
 
 Somewhat to the same effect speaks a Hindu 
 
 author of a later date, Varahamihira, who wrote 
 
 ' Apollonius of Tyana, Book iii. chapter 13. 
 
 ^ Romesh Chunder Dutt, Ancient India, p. 136. 
 
98 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 an astronomical dissertation treating of five different 
 works known to him on the science of astronomy. 
 He says : — 
 
 "There are the following Siddhantas : The 
 Paulisa, the Romaka, the Vasistha, the Saura, and 
 the Paitamaha. Out of these five, the first two 
 (the Paulisa and Romaka, which appear to have 
 been European treatises) have been explained by 
 Latadeva. The Siddhanta made by Paulisa is 
 accurate, near to it stands the Siddhanta pro- 
 claimed by Romaka ; more accurate is the Savitra 
 (Saura) ^ {STlrya Siddhanta, the Hindit standard 
 work) ; the two remaining ones are far from the 
 truth. "2 
 
 This moderate, and, as it reads, judicial opinion 
 of Varahamihira, touching the superiority of the 
 native Surya Siddhanta over the Paulisa and 
 Romaka Siddhantas, may be appealed to as not 
 
 ' This opinion of Varaha has been confirmed by modern 
 European scholars. Burgess (from whose translations of the 
 Surya Siddhanta we have already quoted) remarks, " in regard to 
 . . . the amount of the annual precession of the equinoxes, the 
 relative size of the sun and moon as compared with the earth, 
 the greatest equation of the centre of the sun, the Hindus are 
 more nearly correct than the Greeks." {Journal of the American 
 Oriental Society, vol. vi. p. 480.) 
 
 2 The Pancliasiddhaniikd. Edited by G. Thibaut, ch. i. § 3. 
 
PART I.] VARAHAMIHIRA— BENTLEY 99 
 
 conveying the impression that when Varaha 
 wrote his co - religionists and scientists were 
 accepting, wholesale and with avidity, Grecian 
 astronomic methods in place of their own already 
 well-established native science. It is true that 
 in Varaha's work many words evidently of Grecian 
 origin are to be met with ; and some scholars 
 have claimed that these " Greek terms occurrine 
 in Varahamihira's writings are conclusive proofs 
 of the Greek origin of Hindu astronomy." That 
 such terms should occur in a work professedly 
 a resunid of five astronomic treatises — some of 
 them Indian, and some European — can scarcely be 
 considered as conclusive proof that in the writer's 
 time no purely Indian astronomic science existed. 
 Varaha's writings suggest an author interested 
 in comparing the resemblances and the differences 
 to be met with in home and foreign methods, rather 
 than one introducing for the first time important 
 astronomic truths to the notice of his readers. 
 
 It may be further urged that the claims to anti- 
 quity in Sanscrit astronomical works are so well 
 known, that those who adopt the Grecian theory 
 must necessarily throw discredit in a very wholesale 
 
lOO ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 manner on all their authors. Bentley's furious 
 diatribes may be quoted as an extreme example of 
 the way in which the evidence of such Sanscrit 
 claimants to antiquity is sometimes dealt with ; and 
 it may be pointed out that such violent denuncia- 
 tion cannot be looked on as convincing argument. 
 
 "The fact is," writes Bentley, "that literary 
 forgeries are now so common in India, that we can 
 hardly know what book is genuine, and what not : 
 perhaps there is not one book in a hundred, nay, 
 probably in a thousand, that is not a forgery, in 
 some point of view or other ; and even those that 
 are allowed or supposed to be genuine, are found 
 to be full of interpolations, to answer some particular 
 ends : nor need we be surprised at all this, when 
 we consider the facilities they have for forgeries, 
 as well as their own general inclination and interest 
 in following that profession ; for to give the ap- 
 pearance of antiquity to their books and authors 
 increases their value, at least in the eyes of some. 
 Their universal propensity to forgeries, ever since 
 the introduction of the modern system of astronomy 
 and immense periods of years, in a.d. 538, are but 
 too well known to require any further elucidation 
 than those already given. They are under no 
 restraint of laws, human or divine, and subject to 
 
PART I.] NEW SOURCES OF KNOWLEDGE loi 
 
 no punishment, even if detected in the most flagrant 
 Hterary impositions." i 
 
 It is unnecessary now to further pursue the pros 
 and cons of what has hitherto been said and written 
 on the vexed questions as to the originaHty and 
 antiquity of astronomy in India, and especially as 
 to the Indian acquaintance with the twelve-fold 
 divisions of the Zodiac, and the date of the fixation 
 of the initial point in their Zodiac. We have seen 
 that by the majority the Grecian and modern theory 
 is the favoured one. 
 
 Within the last quarter of a century, however, 
 an unexpected reinforcement has come into the 
 field, in aid of the disheartened and nearly silenced 
 minority, who still believe in a great antiquity for 
 the science of astronomy in India. 
 
 The researches of archaeologists in Western Asia 
 have of late brought to our knowledge vast hoards 
 of information concerning the ancient inhabitants 
 of Babylonia and Assyria, and the surrounding 
 highlands and plains ; amongst other matters, con- 
 cerning the science of astronomy possessed by 
 these peoples. 
 
 ■ A Historical View of the Hindu Astronomy, etc., p. i8i. 
 
I02 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 In 1874, a Paper entitled The Astronomy and 
 Astrology of the Babylonians was read by Professor 
 Sayce before the " Society of Biblical Archaeology,' 
 and since that date other Papers, by various authors, 
 dealing with the subject have appeared in the same 
 Society's Proceedings. Also in the Zeitschrift 
 fiir Assyriologie, articles have been contributed 
 by such writers as Epping and Strassmaier, Oppert, 
 Mayer, Mahler, Jensen, Lehmann, and others, in 
 which the calendars and astronomical methods in 
 use in Mesopotamia are discussed. 
 
 Epping and Strassmaier's Astronomisches aus 
 Babylon and Jensen's Die Kosmologie der 
 Babylonier, are important volumes devoted to 
 these same matters. 
 
 Whatever else concerning the subject of all 
 these writings remains uncertain and open to dis- 
 cussion, some facts are clearly established. We 
 now know that the inhabitants of Babylonia in a 
 remote age (certainly as early as the fourth 
 millenium b.c.) were acquainted with the twelve 
 divisions of the Zodiac, and that these divisions 
 were imagined under figures closely resembling in 
 almost every instance those now depicted on our 
 
PART I.] ZODIAC IN ASIA, 3000 B.C. 103 
 
 celestial globes. The calendar used by the Acca- 
 dians, and later by the Semitic Babylonians and 
 Assyrians, was indeed based on the observance of 
 the Zodiacal constellations and of the journeyings 
 through them of the sun and moon. The varying 
 positions of the planets, Mercury, Venus, Mars, 
 Jupiter, and Saturn are also noted by references 
 to the Zodiacal asterisms : and not only Zodiacal, 
 but several of the extra-Zodiacal ancient constella- 
 tions are represented on the monuments. 
 
 All this information gained from the cuneiform 
 tablets concerning the science of astronomy in 
 Western Asia must undoubtedly affect the judg- 
 ment of enquirers into the history of the same 
 science in India, 
 
 Now that it is clearly proved that 3,000 b.c. and 
 earlier the twelve-fold fanciful signs of the Solar 
 Zodiac were known to the inhabitants of Babylonia, 
 it cannot any longer be asserted dogmatically 
 that the inhabitants of India must have waited 
 till 300 B.C. to learn this twelve-fold division from 
 Grecian astronomers after the date of Alexander's 
 conquest. 
 
 But again as regards the fixation of the initial 
 
I04 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 point of the distinctively Indian Lunar Zodiac, or 
 
 circle of the Nakshatras, at the "end of Revati, 
 
 and the beginning of A9vini," that is to say, at 
 
 a point not far from the first degree of Aries — 
 
 cuneiform tablets teach us the important fact that 
 
 long before the equinoctial point coincided with 
 
 any of the degrees of Aries, that constellation was 
 
 the leader of the Zodiacal series — inasmuch as 
 
 the month Bar zig-gar (Accadian) the " Sacrifice of 
 
 righteousness," that is, the month when the sun 
 
 was in conjunction with Aries, always in the tablets 
 
 appears as the ist month of the year.^ 
 
 These late revelations of archaeology seem to 
 
 strike at the root of the main arguments relied on 
 
 by the advocates of the Grecian and modern origin 
 
 of astronomic science in India; and this being the 
 
 case, it is possible to turn with unbiassed minds 
 
 ' This fact is admitted (see art. " Zodiac," sub-heading " first 
 sign," Encyclopedia Briian?iica). But it is a fact opposed to the 
 hitherto received opinion touching the necessary connexion of 
 the equinoctial point and of the initial point of the Zodiac. " A 
 prehistoric reform " of the calendar is supposed, and corrections 
 of the ancient texts to suit this reform, are suggested. Until 
 traces of such reform and corrections can be shown to exist, 
 the evidence of the tablets may still be cited as pointing to a 
 year counted from the sun's entry into Aries, in the earliest 
 ages of Babylonian civilization. 
 
PART I.] ARIES LEADER, 3000 B.C. 105 
 
 to a consideration of the teachings of Sanscrit 
 literature, and endeavour to learn from them what 
 is the real truth as to the acquaintance of ancient 
 Indian authors with the figures of the Zodiac and 
 other astronomic phenomena. 
 
 The opinion has been very generally adopted, 
 as has been said, that in the Rig Veda there is no 
 mention of any of the twelve figures of the Solar 
 Zodiac. Some few writers have contended that 
 occasional references to these figures are to be met 
 with, and this question has been argued on 
 etymological grounds. My entire ignorance of 
 the Sanscrit language prevents me from at all 
 following the arguments employed in this dis- 
 cussion. And here it may be said, and said with 
 good reason, that for the discussion of points 
 connected with Vedic literature, writers ignorant 
 of the language in which the Vedas were com- 
 posed are but ill equipped for the task. At every 
 step I keenly feel my own disqualifications ; but 
 many translations and commentaries on the Rig 
 Veda are in existence ; and without entering into 
 etymological questions, it has seemed to me that 
 broad astronomic explanations of some of the 
 
io6 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 myths might be supplied, if only the possibility 
 of the Vedic Rishis having been acquainted with 
 the strange figures of the celestial sphere should 
 be admitted. In this paper I am anxious to 
 draw the attention of those who can study Vedic 
 texts in their original language to these possible 
 explanations. Those only who know Sanscrit are 
 really qualified to judge finally whether the sug- 
 gestions here made can be sustained on further 
 enquiry into the Vedas. If the interpretations 
 of Vedic myths here proposed are correct— no 
 doubt corroboration will be found for them in the 
 Sanscrit names and epithets of mythic personages. 
 If no such corroborations are to be met with, 
 the probabilities in favour of the correctness of 
 the astronomic interpretations will be greatly 
 diminished. 
 
 But to return to our subject. It is sometimes 
 argued that the Vedic bards could not have been 
 acquainted with the twelve-fold division of the 
 Zodiac, as otherwise these great constellations 
 would surely have claimed at their hands clear 
 and outspoken notice. With this argument I 
 cannot fully agree. Even before pointing out 
 
PART I.] ZODIAC IN VEDA DENIED 107 
 
 the important place which I believe astronomical 
 phenomena hold in the Rig Veda, I would draw 
 attention to the fact that according to the generally 
 received and non astronomic explanation of the 
 myths, it is necessary to suppose that still more 
 striking and important natural phenomena than 
 those connected with the constellations of the 
 Zodiac — phenomena with which the Vedic bards 
 must certainly have been acquainted — were almost 
 entirely ignored by the authors of the Rig Veda. 
 It is true that some great scholars claim on 
 linguistic grounds a solar origin for much Vedic 
 imagery and nomenclature ; yet when the hymns 
 are examined in translations, and the notes and 
 commentaries which accompany these translations 
 are studied, the impression left on the mind of 
 any reader unacquainted with Sanscrit must be 
 that very little attention or honour is given to 
 sun, moon, or stars, in comparison to that so freely 
 lavished on the elements of fire, air and water, 
 and on the mysterious properties of the juice of 
 the Soma plant. 
 
 The beauty of the dawn is almost the only 
 celestial glory that appears to appeal with any 
 
io8 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part . 
 
 insistence to the imaginations of the Vedic 
 Rishis. 
 
 If out of the more than one thousand hymns of 
 the Rig Veda, not one is addressed to the moon, 
 and on the most liberal calculation considerably 
 less than a hundred to the sun, under any aspect, 
 it need not be cause for wonder if the constellations 
 of the Zodiac are not remembered. The poets 
 of the Rig Veda, however ignorant of astronomy, 
 and at whatever age they lived, must have some- 
 times lifted their eyes above the sacrificial fire and 
 its smoke, above the rain and storm-clouds, above 
 their altars and libations of Soma. They must 
 have often seen "the sun when it shined " and 
 "the moon walking in brightness," and if they so 
 rarely hymned these great luminaries with whose 
 appearance and existence they so certainly were 
 acquainted, it would prove no ignorance on their 
 part of the twelve-fold division of the Zodiac and 
 its quaintly imagined figures, were it indeed the 
 case that all mention of these figures is absent 
 from the Rig Veda. 
 
 But as has been stated above, my desire is to 
 draw attention to possible astronomic interpre- 
 
PART 1.] ZODIAC IN VEDA CLAIMED 109 
 
 tations of many of the Vedic myths, and the 
 adoption of such interpretations would necessarily 
 entail a reversal of the dictum that all mention of 
 the twelve-fold Zodiac is absent from the Rio^ Veda. 
 
 o 
 
 Those who have studied this wonderful and 
 mysterious collection of hymns most constantly 
 and deeply are obliged to confess that it is still 
 very imperfectly understood, and though it is 
 agreed unanimously that the Gods of the Veda 
 are personifications of the phenomena of nature, 
 yet as to the exact phenomena underlying the 
 various Vedic myths there is among scholars 
 much difference of opinion. It is impossible not 
 to feel in reading the hymns and the many 
 speculations, notes, and comments appended to 
 them, that notwithstanding all the labour and 
 research bestowed on the work, much of this 
 ancient Veda still remains a cypher, for the right 
 understanding of which the modern reader does 
 not possess the key. 
 
 Guided by the teachings of archaeology, I 
 now make the suggestion that the key to this 
 cypher may perhaps be found in crediting the 
 authors of the Veda with a somewhat advanced 
 
1 10 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 knowledge of astronomy, and an acquaintance with 
 the, to us, apparently fanciful constellations of the 
 celestial sphere and Zodiac ; and in assuming 
 that the figures of the " ancient constellations " 
 often supplied the basis of Vedic imagery. 
 
 To pursue this possible clue towards the under- 
 standing of the myths, it were much to be desired 
 that all students should be acquainted with the 
 names and positions in the heavens of the forty-five 
 constellations — so well distinguished by the epithet 
 " ancient " — and that they should master some of 
 the more easily observed conditions of their diurnal 
 and annual apparent movements, as also those of 
 the sun and moon, and further that they should 
 have learnt what changes in the scenery of the 
 heavens have been brought about by the slow 
 movement known to astronomers as the "precession 
 of the equinoxes." 
 
 Classical and philological scholars have how- 
 ever so rarely time and attention to spare from 
 their own intensely interesting and important 
 studies that as a rule astronomical phenomena are 
 not much observed or considered by them. The 
 accompanying diagrams drawn from a celestial 
 
PART I] INDRA IN THE RIG VEDA 1 1 1 
 
 precessional globe may, it is hoped, enable those, 
 who have not as yet devoted thought to such 
 subjects, to judge for themselves of the reason- 
 ableness or otherwise of the following astronomic 
 suggestions concerning the most important of the 
 Vedic gods. 
 
 According to A. A. Macdonell — who in his 
 late work Vedic Mythology has summed up 
 clearly and compendiously the opinions of a host 
 of scholars on the nature of the Vedic gods — 
 Indra is the favourite national god of the Rig 
 Veda; he is celebrated in 250 hymns, a greater 
 number than that "devoted to any other god, 
 and very nearly one-fourth of the total number 
 of hymns in the Rig Veda." ^ 
 
 What may be called the central myths related 
 of Indra, stripped of all epithet and ornament, 
 relate that, invigorated by copious draughts of 
 Soma, Indra fights with, overcomes, and drives 
 from heaven and earth a demon called Vritra 
 or Ahi, who is represented under the form of a 
 dragon, serpent or water snake. Indra also 
 searches for, finds, and releases cows which had 
 
 1 Macdonell, Vedic Mythology, p. 54. 
 
112 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 been stolen from the gods (or according to some 
 commentators, from the angirasas, or priests). 
 Indra bestows on his worshippers all the bless- 
 ings of plenty, especially he is the dispenser of 
 rain. 
 
 According to the usual non astronomic ex- 
 planations of these myths, Indra, an "atmospheric 
 god," 1 is " primarily the thunder god " who 
 conquers " the demons of drought or darkness," 
 or again, " Indra ^ is a personification of the 
 phenomena of the firmament, particularly in the 
 capacity of sending down rain. This property is 
 metaphorically described as a conflict with the 
 clouds which are reluctant to part with their 
 watery stores until assailed and penetrated by 
 the thunder bolt of Indra ; . . . the cloud is 
 personified as a demon named Ahi or Vritra 
 ... a popular myth represents him (Indra) also 
 as the discoverer and rescuer of the cows, either 
 of the priests or of the gods which had been 
 stolen by an A sura named Pani or Vala." 
 
 Macdonell, alluding to the same incident, ob- 
 
 1 Macdonell, Ve-^ic Mythology, p. 66. 
 
 - Wilson, Rig Veda, Introduction, pp. xxx.-xxxi. 
 
PART I.] INDRA AN "ATMOSPHERIC GOD" 113 
 
 serves:^ These "cows released by Indra may, 
 in many cases, refer to the waters, for we have 
 seen that the latter are occasionally compared 
 with lowing cows. Thus Indra is said to have 
 found the cows for man when he slew the dragon. 
 . . . But the cows may also in other cases be 
 conceived as connected with Indra's winning of 
 light, for the ruddy beams of dawn issuing from 
 the blackness of night are compared with cattle 
 coming out of their dark stalls. Again, though 
 clouds play no great part in the Rig Veda under 
 their literal name {abkra, etc.), it can hardly be denied 
 that, as containing the waters, they figure mytho- 
 logically to a considerable extent under the name 
 of cow {go), as well as udder (iidhar) . . . thus 
 the rain-clouds are probably meant when it is 
 said that the cows roared at the birth of Indra." 
 At the close of the section devoted to Indra, 
 Macdonell refers to the probably pre-Vedic origin 
 of the Indra myths. He says:^ "The name of 
 Indra occurs only twice in the A vesta. Beyond 
 the fact of his being no god, but only a demon, 
 
 1 Vedi'c Mythology, p. 59. 
 
 2 Jbid., pp. 66. 
 
1 14 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 his character there is uncertain. Indra's distinctive 
 Vedic epithet vrtrahan [Vritra-slayer] also occurs 
 in the Avesta in the form of verethraghna, which 
 is, however, unconnected with Indra or the thunder- 
 storm myth, designating merely the God of Victory. 
 Thus it is probable that the Indo-Iranian period 
 possessed a god approaching to the Vedic form 
 of the Vrtra-slaying Indra. It is even possible 
 that beside the thundering god of heaven, the 
 Indo - European period may have known as a 
 distinct conception a thunder-god, gigantic in size, 
 a mighty eater and drinker, who slays the dragon 
 with his lightning bolt." 
 
 In reading the Indra hymns in the Veda, and 
 in trying to fit them to the explanation given in 
 the passages quoted, a constant and very dis- 
 agreeable strain is put on the imagination ; it 
 must, for instance, attempt to grasp and hold, at 
 the same time, two very far apart opinions as to 
 the nature of the demon Vritra. Vritra is to be 
 thought of as a demon of darkness, and as a 
 demon of drought ; the cows are clouds, they are 
 also ruddy beams of light ! 
 
 Darkness and drought are not to be easily 
 
PART I.J INDRA, GOD OF SUMMER SOLSTICE 115 
 
 bracketed together. Drought is in all lands, India 
 not excepted, connected with a long continuance 
 of bright and stainless skies. The appearance 
 then of a little cloud "like a man's hand" is the 
 joyously hailed precursor of " the sound of abund- 
 ance of rain." 
 
 Again, the driving away of a snake-like cloud 
 is no forcible simile by which to describe in myth 
 the advent of rain in India — rain which to be of 
 any use is no mere refreshing shower, but a long- 
 continued downpour from clouds not hastily 
 dispersed. 
 
 Indra's action first in driving away the cloud- 
 demon Vritra, and then in seeking for the beneficial 
 cloud cows, is also contradictory. 
 
 For the reconciling of many of these contra- 
 dictions the astronomic interpretation of the Indra- 
 Vritra myths is as follows : — Indra may still retain 
 all his atmospheric attributes of sending down rain 
 but — Indra is primarily and essentially a personi- 
 fication of the summer solstice. 
 
 The summer solstice in India is an all-important 
 agricultural epoch ; it brings with it " the rainy 
 sea^son," the real spring of the Indian year. Before 
 
1 16 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 this season all the land is parched and arid, and 
 vegetation is at a standstill. 
 
 The punctuality of the rains in many parts of 
 India is so exact that the farmer foretells their 
 arrival not only to the day, but to the hour. In 
 good years heavy and almost incessant rain lasts 
 for two or even three months. Indra, as a per- 
 sonification of the season which so punctually 
 brings the rain, is an atmospheric god, the enemy 
 of the demon of drought. But Indra is more than 
 this : many praises are bestowed on Indra in the 
 Rig Veda for deeds which cannot easily be ex- 
 plained on the simple atmospheric theory. " Indra 
 is the highest of all " is the refrain of many 
 Vedic verses ; " Indra placed the sun high in the 
 sky," " Indra tore off one wheel of the sun's 
 chariot," "Indra stopped the tawny coursers of 
 the sun." Now all these phrases are at once 
 and clearly to be interpreted if we think of Indra 
 as the personification of the summer solstice, and 
 especially of the solstice in India, where at that 
 season of the year the sun attains to the very 
 zenith, and thus Indra associated with the sun 
 under one figure of speech is spoken of as "highest 
 
PARTI.] VRITRA AND HYDRA 117 
 
 of all," and in a slightly varied figure associated 
 with the season, is said to have ''placed the sun 
 high in the sky." Or again translating into myth 
 the very meaning of the word solstice or ''the 
 stm being made to stand," we read that Indra 
 "tore off the wheel of the chariot of the sun," 
 and "stopped his tawny coursers." Indra is, I 
 cannot but believe, not merely an atmospheric 
 god ; he is the god of the summer solstice. And 
 if this should be the case, what then may Vritra 
 be ? Is the demon of the solstitial Indra personi- 
 fied as only a snake-like cloud? It is impossible 
 to think so. The astronomic interpretation of the 
 myth I would propose is that — a snake-like 
 constellation, not a snake-like cloud, is the repre- 
 sentation of the demon Vritra. 
 
 On the celestial sphere many serpents and 
 dragons are represented, but the far reaching 
 constellation Hydra exceeds all the others in its 
 enormous length from head to tail. No very 
 brilliant stars mark the asterism, nor in the 
 grouping of its stars is there anything especially 
 snake-like. For some reason other than its appeal 
 to the eye did astronomers of old invest with all 
 
Ii8 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 the horrors of the Hydra-form the monotonous 
 length of this space on the vauk of the skies. 
 
 This reason may be arrived at, with almost 
 certainty, in studying, with the help of a pre- 
 cessional globe, the position in the heavens of this 
 constellation in different ages of the world's history. 
 So studying, we shall find that 4,000 B.C. — or 
 to be more precise, one or two hundred years 
 earlier — Hydra extended its enormous length for 
 more than 90° symmetrically along one astro- 
 nomically important (though invisible) mathe- 
 matical line — the line of the heavenly equator — 
 and was at the same date accurately bisected 
 by another equally important mathematical line, 
 namely the colure of the summer solstice (see 
 Plate IX.). 
 
 Almost irresistibly, as it appears to me, the 
 conviction forces itself on the mind, in considering 
 the position held by the constellation Hydra 
 4,000 B.C., that it was at that date that this baleful 
 figure was first traced in imagination on the sky, 
 there fitly to represent the power of physical (and 
 may we not suppose also, of moral ?) darkness — a 
 great and terrible power — but a power ever and 
 

 
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PARTI.] HYDRA AND DARKNESS I19 
 
 ever again to be conquered by the victorious 
 power of light. In astronomic myth this power 
 was represented as that of the sun at the season 
 of its highest culmination, the season of the 
 summer solstice. For an observer in the temperate 
 northern zone all through the long nights of mid- 
 winter, the whole length of the dreadful Hydra 
 was at the date named visible above the horizon. 
 The dark midwinter season was therefore the 
 time of the Hydra's greatest glory. At every 
 season of the year, except at that of midsummer, 
 some portion of the monster's form was visible 
 during some part of the night. But at the summer 
 solstice no star in the constellation might show 
 itself for ever so short a time.^ 
 
 The supposed latitude of the observer in Plate 
 IX. is 40° N., a latitude considerably to the north 
 of any part of India ; but it is to be remembered 
 that the Indra-Vritra myth cannot be claimed with 
 any certainty as a purely and originally Indian myth, 
 for, as Macdonell points out (as quoted above), there 
 
 ^ Plate IX. represents the constellations above the horizon, 
 but invisible at noon at the midsu?nmer solstice. It therefore 
 represents those above the horizon, and visible at midivinter 
 midnight. 
 
120 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 is a probability that "the Indo-Iranian period pos- 
 sessed a god approaching to the Vedic form of the 
 Vrtra-slaying Indra," and that "it is even possible 
 that beside the thundering god of heaven, the 
 Indo European period may have known as a 
 distinct conception a thunder-god, gigantic in size, 
 a mighty eater and drinker, who slays the dragon 
 with his lightning bolt." ^ 
 
 For the origin of this world-wide myth, therefore, 
 we should not look to the tropical Indian Zone ; 
 but it is in Indian latitudes that we should look for 
 an explanation of the physical phenomena hymned 
 by Vedic bards in the distinctly Indian development 
 of the Indra- Vritra myth. I believe that in thus 
 tracing the course of the Indra story from tem- 
 perate to tropical latitudes, we shall find a reason 
 for the contradictory attributes assigned to the 
 demon Vritra, namely those of darkness and 
 drought. 
 
 In northern latitudes winter is distinctly the 
 dark season ; in tropical India there is little or no 
 perceptible difference between the darkness of 
 winter and summer. But in India winter is dis- 
 
 1 V. p. 114. 
 
> 
 H 
 W 
 
PART I.] HYDRA AND DROUGHT i3i 
 
 tinctly the dry season. Midsummer is the all- 
 important season of the rains. Indra's conquest 
 over Vritra, or the arrival of solstitial rains, marked 
 by the disappearance of the constellation Hydra 
 from the sky, was mythologically in the Vedas 
 described as Indra's conquest over the demon 
 of drought, but still traditionally — for the power of 
 tradition is great — even in India Indra retained the 
 attributes of the conqueror over the demon of 
 darkness. 
 
 At Plate X. a drawing is given of the southern 
 heavens and of the constellations — invisible at 
 midsummer and visible at midwinter, above the 
 horizon of an observer in latitude 23° N. at the date 
 3000 B.C., a thousand years later than the date 
 referred to in Plate IX. For reasons which will 
 appear more clearly when we come to the discussion 
 of the Soma myth, it is to about this date that I 
 would attribute the composition of many of the 
 Vedic hymns. 
 
 But if Indra is to be considered as representing 
 the summer solstice, and Vritra as representing the 
 constellation Hydra, we must surely expect some 
 astronomic interpretation for Soma — Soma by which 
 
122 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 the mighty Indra is invigorated and enabled to 
 trmmph gloriously over the demon. According to 
 non-astronomic explanations, "the concrete terres- 
 trial plant and the intoxicating juice extracted 
 therefrom " are considered to be the basis of the 
 mythology of Soma. It is admitted that in post- 
 Vedic literature Soma is a regular name of the 
 moon, which is regarded as being drunk up by 
 the gods, and so waning. Some writers point to 
 the possibility that even in the Rig Veda, " in 
 the Soma hymns there may occasionally lurk a 
 veiled identification of arnbrosia and the moon, 
 . . . but on the whole, with the few exceptions 
 generally admitted, it appears to be certain that 
 to the seers of the Rig Veda the god Soma 
 is a personification of the terrestrial plant and 
 juice. 
 
 One German writer, Hillebrandt, very strongly 
 upholds the view that Soma in the Rig Veda 
 "often personifies the moon,"^ and especially 
 according to him is this the case in the 114 
 hymns of Mandala IX., all addressed to Soma 
 
 ^ Macdoncll. Ve die Mythology, "p. 113. 
 - Ibid. 
 
PARTI.] SOMA PAVAMANA = THE MOON 123 
 
 pavamana, or "purified Soma," prepared for and 
 quaffed by Indra to invigorate him for the Vritra 
 combat. 
 
 That Soma in the Rig Veda is primarily the 
 moon, and that the moon is symbolized and always 
 more or less directly referred to in the Vedic 
 hymns to Soma, fits in, as must be evident to 
 the readers of this paper, with the astronomic 
 theories advocated in it. If we consider that 
 Indra's conquest over Vritra represents the god 
 of the summer solstice, with his bright weapons, 
 conquering, and driving from heaven and earth 
 the constellation Hydra, we can easily understand 
 how in this contest Indra might be strengthened 
 by copious draughts of Soma, i.e. by the bright 
 light of the full moon flooding the heavens with 
 radiance and enfeebling all but the brightest 
 stars. 
 
 But a further confirmation of the lunar character 
 of Soma, and an elucidation of the imagery of the 
 Soma pavamana hymns of Mandala IX., are to be 
 found if — still crediting the Vedic Rishis with a 
 knowledge of the ancient constellations — we study 
 the position of these constellations at the date 
 
124 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [fart i. 
 
 3,000 B.C. (see Plate XI.)^ At that date the full 
 
 moon of the midsummer or solstitial season was 
 
 always to be observed in the constellation Aquarius. 
 
 With this thought in our mind as we read the 
 
 mystical hymns of Mandala IX., in which Soma 
 
 is so often described as rushing impetuously to 
 
 the vase or pitcher, and as surrounded by celestial 
 
 waters, with many other such expressions, we 
 
 easily recognise an allusion to the midsummer full 
 
 moon in the constellation Aquarius; and when 
 
 further we read the legend so often repeated, that 
 
 the eao;le brousfht the Soma to Indra, or to the 
 
 sacrifice, we have only to look at the celestial 
 
 globe to see the eagle (Aquila) directing its flight 
 
 towards the pitcher of Aquarius — and to remember 
 
 that the very night before the moon attained the 
 
 celestial vase, it would have been on the same 
 
 meridian as the constellation Aquila ; and the 
 
 imaginative Vedic bard might then describe it as 
 
 borne along by the eagle, — one of the most 
 
 glorious constellations in that part of the sky. 
 
 ^ Lunar dates are variable. The full moon nearest to the 
 summer solstice might have been observed somewhat to the 
 east or the west of its position in the diagram, but always 
 in the constellation Aquarius. 
 
'^::y.. ^ 
 
PART I.] THE MOON IN AQUARIUS 125 
 
 In one hymn especially devoted to the legend 
 of the Soma-bearing eagle (or hawk), allusion to 
 the small but well-marked-out constellation Sagitta 
 (the arrow) may be detected. In Wilson's trans- 
 lation of Mandala IV. 27 (vol. iii. p. 174), we read : 
 " When the hawk screamed (with exultation) on his 
 descent from heaven, and (the guardians of the 
 Soma) perceived that the Soma was (carried away) 
 by it, then, the archer Krisdnu, pursuing with the 
 speed of thought, and stringing his bow, let fly an 
 arrow against it." 
 
 Now to turn to another important Vedic deity, 
 Agni. 
 
 Agni is classed, according to Macdonell, amongst 
 terrestrial gods, but he points out that in some 
 passages he is to be identified with the sun. 
 Wilson describes Agni as comprising' "the element 
 of Fire under three aspects : i", as it exists on 
 earth, not only as culinary or religious fire, but as 
 the heat of digestion and of life, and the vivifying 
 principle of vegetation ; 2"'^, as it exists in 
 the atmosphere, or mid-heaven, in the form of 
 lightning ; and 3'''^, as it is manifested in the 
 
 1 Wilson, Eig Veda, Introduction, vol, i. pp. xxvii.-xxviii, 
 
126 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 heavens, as light, the sun, the dawn, and planetary 
 bodies." And — having enumerated various deities 
 who in the hymns appear as manifestations of the 
 sun — he adds, "still, however, the sun does not 
 hold that prominent place in the Vaidik liturgy 
 which he seems to have done in that of the ancient 
 Persians, and he is chiefly venerated as the 
 celestial representative of Fire." 
 
 The classification of Agni as a terrestrial god, 
 given by Macdonell, and the order of his "aspects," 
 as given by Wilson, are not in accordance with 
 the theory here advocated, nor, according to 
 Macdonell, is it the classification or order always 
 adhered to by Vedic authorities. 
 
 For some very puzzling myths concerning Agni, I 
 believe an astronomic interpretation may be given, and 
 thereby the position of Agni in \}a& first place, rather 
 than in the last, as a celestial god, may be established. 
 
 The Vedic deity Apam Napat — the son of 
 Waters, is classed by Macdonell as an atmospheric 
 god, and he says,^ "In the last stanza of the Apam 
 napat hymn, the deity is invoked as Agni, and 
 must be identified with him," and again, ^ " Agni's 
 
 > Vedic Mythology, p. 70. 2 /^/^_^ p. 92. 
 
PART I.] AGNI IN THE WATERS 127 
 
 origin in the aerial waters is often referred to. 
 The ' son of waters ' has, as has been shown, 
 become a distinct deity." Then turning to other 
 legends regarding Agni he says, "In such passages 
 the Hghtning form of Agni must be meant. Some 
 of the later hymns of the Rig Veda tell a legend 
 of Agni hiding in the waters and plants, and being 
 found by the gods. ... In one passage of the 
 Rior Veda also it is stated that Asjni rests in all 
 streams ; and in the later ritual texts, Agni in the 
 waters is invoked in connexion with ponds and 
 water-vessels. Thus, even in the oldest Vedic 
 period, the waters in which Agni is latent, though 
 not those from which he is produced, may in 
 various passages have been regarded as terrestrial. 
 ... In any case the notion of Agni in the waters 
 is prominent throughout the Vedas." 
 
 To explain this legend, Wilson makes other sug- 
 gestions. He writes:^ " The legend of his (Agni's) 
 hiding in the waters, through fear of the enemies of 
 the gods, although alluded to in more than one place, 
 is not very explicitly related .... the allusions of 
 the Sit-ktas (hymns) may be a figurative intimation 
 of the latent heat existing in water, or a misappre- 
 hension of a natural phenomenon which seems to 
 have made a great impression in later times — the 
 
 1 Wilson, Rig Veda, Introduction, vol. i. p. xxx. 
 K 
 
128 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 emission of flame from the surface of water either 
 in the shape of inflammable air, or as the result 
 of submarine volcanic action." 
 
 It cannot but be admitted that these myths are 
 puzzling, and that to account for the notion so 
 prominent throughout the Vedas of " Agni in the 
 waters," the various suggestions of "lightning," 
 "latent heat existing in water," "the emission of 
 flame from the surface of the waters, either in the 
 shape of inflammable air or as the result of sub- 
 marine volcanic action," are inadequate to explain 
 the fact that Agni, whose very name "is the 
 regular designation of fire " ^ should in the hymns 
 be so closely associated with water. Nor are the 
 difficulties concerning " Agni in the waters " to be 
 overcome by the tempting and poetic suggestion, 
 put forward by some writers, that in these pas- 
 sages reference is made to the sun rising in the 
 morning out of the ocean, and again hiding itself 
 beneath the waves at sunset. The composition 
 of the Rig Veda is attributed to Aryan settlers 
 " scattered over the Punjaub and regions lying 
 to the west of the Indus " : by such settlers the 
 
 ' Macdonell, Vedic Mythology, p. 88. 
 
PART I.] THE SUN IN AQUARIUS 129 
 
 sun could never have been seen rising out of the 
 ocean, for no ocean bounded their horizon on the 
 east. Even the phenomenon of the sun hiding 
 itself at evening in the water, could only have been 
 observed by those who lived on the western coast, 
 and it is therefore not easy to imagine why sunrise 
 and sunset should in India have been so closely 
 and constantly associated with a sea horizon. 
 
 But if once the acquaintance of the originators 
 of the Agni myths with the Zodiacal figures is 
 admitted, the astronomic interpretation of those 
 relating to Agni in the waters is not difficult ; it 
 is as follows : 
 
 Agni is the personification of fire, but his chief 
 personification is as the fire of the sun. " Agni 
 in the waters " is especially the fire of the sun in 
 the celestial waters of Aquarius. 3,000 B.C. the 
 sun was in conjunction with Aquarius at the time 
 of the winter solstice} Those hymns therefore 
 which dwell upon the myths of Agni hiding himself 
 in, being born in, and rising out of the waters, 
 
 ^ The position of the sun at the winter solstice 3,000 B.C. 
 was identical with that represented at Plate XI. as the position of 
 the full moon at the summer solstice. 
 
130 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 may be considered as hymns referring to the sun at 
 the winter solstice in conjunction with the constella- 
 tion Aquarius, and therefore as hymns especially 
 suitable for use on the occasion of a great yearly 
 festival held at that season of the year. 
 
 European writers often describe the mid-winter 
 sun as hiding itself, or as every day withdrawing 
 itself more and more from view. In poetic similes, 
 the snows of winter often crown the head of the 
 aged out-going year, while the in-coming year is 
 represented as a babe or infant. The appropriate- 
 ness of such similes is due to the fact, that our 
 calendrical new year is fixed within a few days of 
 the winter solstice. Again, in sober prose, the 
 sun at the time of the winter solstice is said, 
 having attained its lowest point, to rise or begin 
 its tipward course on the ecliptic. It is therefore 
 not difficult to understand how the Vedic Rishis, 
 who appear to have combined the characteristics 
 of poets and of scientific observers of the heavens, 
 should have 3,000 B.C. described the fire of the 
 solstitial sun, as hiding in, being born in, and 
 rising out of the celestial ivaters of the constella- 
 tion Aquaritts. 
 
PART I.] VEDIC IMAGERY OUT OF DATE 131 
 
 In this Agni myth, as in that of Indra, we 
 may perceive traces of a pre-Vedic origin. The 
 latitudes in which the Rig- Veda was composed are 
 not those in which attention is forcibly drawn to 
 the diminution of the strength and visibility of 
 the sun at the winter season. In the Rig Veda, 
 however, Indra's conquest over darkness as 
 well as over drought is celebrated, and the 
 same traditional cause may be assigned for the 
 description of Agni hiding himself at the time of 
 the winter solstice in the waters of Aquarius. 
 
 Indra, Soma, and Agni no longer hold the 
 important place in the Hindu Pantheon which 
 they appear to have held in Vedic times, and on 
 the astronomic theory, this fact may partly be 
 accounted for by noticing how slow but inevitable 
 changes in the scenery of the heavens, produced 
 by the precession of the equinoxes, gradually 
 obscured more and more completely the meaning 
 of the imagery employed in the hymns to these 
 deities. Indra, if he represents the summer sol- 
 stice, is indeed still as powerful as ever, and 
 still triumphs over the demon of drought, but 
 no longer is that demon well represented by the 
 
132 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 snake-like constellation Hydra ; for on the night 
 of the summer solstice, after the sun has set, the 
 whole of Hydra is still above the horizon. No 
 longer does the mid-summer full moon bathe its 
 
 o 
 
 brightness in the celestial waters of Aquarius, 
 nor does the mid-winter sun hide itself in them. 
 The hymns remain, the phenomena they referred 
 to, exist no longer. 
 
 But leaving now the subject of the " ancient 
 constellations " and of reference to them in the 
 Rig Veda, let us turn to the second section of the 
 argument in favour of the modern orig-in of 
 Hindu astronomy as stated above. ^ It is a claim 
 made for the very modern date of 570 a.d. as 
 that for the fixation of the initial point of the 
 Indian Zodiac at the "end of Revati and the 
 beginning of A9vini." — This claim I desire to 
 oppose. 
 
 It has been admitted by scholars, but almost 
 with a sort of reluctance, that mention is made of 
 some of the Nakshatras in a few of the Rig Veda 
 hymns. The matter is rather avoided than 
 cordially enquired into. It is, however, a question 
 
 ^ V. p. 92. 
 
PART I.] INITIAT. POINT OF ZODIAC 133 
 
 of great and important interest to ascertain, if 
 possible, whether the circle of the Nakshatras was 
 known to the Vedic Rishis, and if it were known, 
 whether the initial point was fixed there, where 
 as we have read, all schools of Hindu astronomy 
 agree in declaring that the planetary motions com- 
 menced at the creation} 
 
 We have learnt from Babylonian archaeology 
 that we are no longer forced to assume that only 
 at the date of about 570 a.d. could this initial 
 point have been fixed by Indian astronomers. 
 It therefore need no longer be looked upon as 
 an unreasonable quest to search in the ancient 
 pages of the Rig Veda for indications that this 
 important astronomical point had been fixed, 
 even before Vedic times, as the starting-point 
 of a calendrical and sidereal year — and if we 
 should find such indications in the Rig Veda, 
 they may well out-weigh arguments against the 
 antiquity of this fixation, based upon passages in 
 later works, such as the Yajur and Atharva Vedas. 
 
 From the Yajur Veda itself, arguments may 
 be drawn in favour of a year beginning in the 
 
 1 V. p. 93. 
 
1 34 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 month Chaitra,^ at or before the date of the com- 
 position or compilation of that Veda. 
 
 In the Taittiriya Sanhita (contained in the 
 Yajur Veda) a passage occurs ^ which is translated 
 and commented upon by B. G. Tilak (The Orion, 
 or Antiquity of the Vedas, p. 46 et seq.). In this 
 passage is discussed the superior suitability of 
 three different days on which worshippers might 
 consecrate themselves for the yearly sacrifice. 
 Not any one of these three days has any con- 
 nexion with the spring equinox or the sun's 
 conjunction with Krittika. The choice of date 
 for the yearly sacrifice appears to lie between, first, 
 the " Ekashtaka (day) " of some month not named, ^ 
 but one in the "distressed," or "reversed" period 
 of the year, i.e. the mid-winter season ; second, the 
 full moon of PhalgunI ; and third, the Chaitra full 
 moon. B. G. Tilak, after some pages of comment 
 on the passage referred to, states in his summing 
 
 1 Chaitra is tlie month which begins, as closely as a luni-solar 
 month may, at the sun's arrival at the initial point of the Hindu 
 Zodiac — the beginning of Aswini. 
 
 ^ Taittiriya Sanhita, vii. 4. 8. 
 
 ^ At p. 48 he quotes authorities in favour of the Ekashtaka (day) 
 in this passage meaning the 8th day of the dark half of Magha. 
 
PARTi.i ASWINI r. KRITl'IKA 135 
 
 up, amongst others, the following" conclusions which 
 he has arrived at. 
 
 " i", that in the days of the Taittiriya Sanhita 
 the winter solstice occurred before the eighth day 
 of the dark half of Magha . . . and that through- 
 out the whole passage the intention of sacrificing at 
 the beginning (real, constructive, or traditional) of 
 the year is quite clear : . . . . 2""^, that the year 
 then commenced with the winter solstice": " 3"''', 
 that as there can not be three real beginnings 
 of the year, at an interval of one month each, the 
 passage must be understood as recording a tradition 
 about the Chitra full moon and the Phalguni 
 full moon being once considered as the first days 
 of the year." 
 
 This is B. G. Tilak's conclusion ; merely 
 judging from the translation, the passage might, 
 as it seems to me, be understood as unreservedly 
 recommending the full-moon of Chaitra as the 
 most suitable for the beginning of the sacrifice, 
 for in the text of the Taittiriya Sanhita it is said 
 of it, "It has no fault whatsoever." 
 
 But in whichever sense the words are under- 
 stood, this passage from the Yajur Veda may be 
 set against the hymns and lists in the Yajur and 
 
136 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 Atharva Vedas, above alluded to,^ in which 
 Krittlka is celebrated in the first, and AswinI 
 in the twenty-seventh place. 
 
 The fact that the evidence as to the beginning 
 of the year " in the days of the Taittiriya Sanhit^," 
 is, as it seems, so uncertain, and so contradictory 
 to the opinion based on the hymn in the Taittiriya 
 Brahmana concerning Krittika being the leader of 
 the Nakshatras, seems to add interest to the 
 question whether there are, or are not, indications 
 in the Rig Veda that the Indian year was 
 counted from the same point on the ecliptic as 
 at present ? ^ 
 
 And at once, as it seems to me, on turning to the 
 Rig Veda, on page after page, such indications are 
 to be met with. 
 
 The first Nakshatra in the Indian series is named 
 Aswini (Aswins). The two chief stars in that Nak- 
 shatra are the twin stars, as they may fairly be 
 
 1 V. p. 94. 
 
 2 At present the month Chaitra in most parts of India is the 
 first month of the Hindu year. The beginning of the year is 
 measured by the return of the sun to the same point in the 
 Zodiac : at present the beginning of the Lunar Mansion Aswini. 
 (See Indian Calendar, p. 45.) 
 
PARTI.] ASWINI, tt AND fS ARIETIS 137 
 
 called, a and fi Arietis — stars of almost equal 
 radiance. The joyous hymns addressed to the 
 twin heroes, the Aswins, I would claim as new- 
 year hymns composed in honour of these s^ars, 
 whose appearance before sunrise heralded the 
 approach of the great festival-day of the Hindu 
 new year. 
 
 The Hindu year is a sidereal year. It is counted 
 at present in most parts of India from a fixed point 
 on the ecliptic, not from a season. It is a 
 calendrical not a cosmic year. Only one apparently 
 small change in the method of counting the years 
 would now require to be made, and again the 
 Aswins might be hymned by the Hindus as the 
 "wondrous," and "not untruthful," s i ars, mdirking 
 by their heliacal rising a new year's festival — a 
 festival to be held on the 15th, or full moon's 
 day. 
 
 The Hindu year is now counted from the new 
 moon immediately preceding the sun's arrival at 
 the initial point of the lunar Zodiac. The first of 
 Chaitra (the first of the light half of Chaitra) never 
 falls later than the 12th of April, and may arrive a 
 month earlier. If the year were to be counted from 
 
138 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 the same initial point, but from the first new moon 
 following instead of that preceding the sun's arrival 
 at that point, there would be the difference of a 
 whole month in the range of the month Chaitra. 
 The first day of its bright half would then never 
 arrive before the 12th of April, and might fall a 
 month later. 
 
 For the interpretation of the Vedic hymns to 
 the Aswins I would make the provisional suggestion, 
 that when these hymns were composed, the year 
 was so counted from the new moon folloiving and 
 not from that preceding the arrival of the sun at 
 "the end of Revati and the beginning of A9vini." 
 In support of this provisional theory, let us first 
 read the summing up of the Aswini myths, and of 
 the difficulties and uncertainties surrounding them, 
 according to the present modes of explanation ; and 
 then let us consider the astronomic method of 
 interpretation above proposed. 
 
 We read that^ " Next to Indra, Agni, and Soma, 
 the twin deities named the Asvins are the most 
 prominent in the Rig Veda, judged by the frequency 
 with which they are invoked. They are celebrated 
 
 1 Macdonell, Vedic Mythology, p. 49. 
 
PARTI.] THE ASWINS IN THE VEDA 139 
 
 in more than fifty entire hymns and in parts of 
 several others, while their name occurs more than 
 400 times. Though they hold a distinct position 
 among the deities of light and their appellation 
 is Indian, their connexion with any definite 
 phenomenon of light is so obscure, that their 
 original nature has been a puzzle to Vedic inter- 
 preters from the earliest times. This obscurity 
 makes it probable that the origin of these gods is 
 
 to be sought in a pre- Vedic period The 
 
 Asvins are young, the T. S. (Taittirlya Sanhita) 
 even describing them as the youngest of the gods. 
 They are at the same time ancient. They are 
 bright, lords of lustre, of golden brilliancy, and honey- 
 
 hued They possess profound wisdom and 
 
 occult power. The two most distinctive and fre- 
 quent epithets of the Asvins are dasra, 'wondrous,' 
 which is almost entirely limited to them, and 
 ndsatya, which is generally explained to mean 
 ' not untrue. . . .' Their car .... moves round 
 heaven. It traverses heaven and earth in a single 
 day as the car of the sun and that of Usas (the 
 Dawn) are also said to do. . . . The time of their 
 appearance is often said to be the early dawn, when 
 ' darkness still stands among the ruddy cows ' and 
 they yoke their car to descend to earth and receive 
 the offerings of worshippers. Usas (the Dawn) 
 
140 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 awakes them. They follow after Usas in their car. 
 At the yoking of their car Usas is born. Thus 
 their relative time seems to have been between 
 dawn and sunrise. But Savitr (the sun) is once 
 said to set their car in motion before the dawn. 
 Occasionally the appearance of the Asvins, the 
 kindling of the sacrificial fire, the break of dawn, 
 and sunrise seem to be spoken of as simultaneous. 
 The Asvins are invoked to come to the offering;' 
 not only at their natural time, but also in the 
 evening or at morning, noon, and sunset. . . . 
 In the A. B. (Aitareya Brahmana) the Asvins as 
 well as Usas and Agni are stated to be gods of 
 dawn ; and in the Vedic ritual they are connected 
 
 with sunrise The Asvins may originally 
 
 have been conceived as finding- and restorinof or 
 rescuing the vanished light of the sun. In the 
 Rig Veda they have come to be typically succour- 
 ing divinities." . . . Again, at p. 51, the writer 
 adds, "Quite a number of legends illustrating the 
 succouring power of the Asvins are referred to 
 in the Rig Veda." Here follows an enumeration 
 of many miraculous "protections," and cures, — and 
 then^ "The opinion of Bergaigne and others that 
 the various miracles attributed to the Asvins are 
 anthropomorphized forms of solar phenomena (the 
 
 1 Macdonell, Vedk Mythology, p. 53. 
 
PART I.] A PUZZLE TO C;OMMENTATORS 141 
 
 healing of the blind man thus meaning the release 
 of the sun from darkness), seems to lack probability. 
 At the same time the legend of Atri may be a 
 reminiscence of a myth explaining the restoration 
 of the vanished sun. As to the physical basis of 
 the Asvins, the language of the Rsis is so vague 
 that they themselves do not seem to have under- 
 stood what phenomenon these deities represented 
 .... what they actually represented puzzled 
 even the oldest commentators mentioned by 
 Yaska. That scholar remarks that some regarded 
 them (the Asvins) as Heaven and Earth (as does 
 the S. B. — Satapatha Brahmana), others as Day 
 and Night, others as sun and moon, while the 
 ' legendary writers ' took them to be ' two kings, 
 performers of holy acts.' Yaska's own opinion is 
 obscure." 
 
 In contrast to all these vague and often contra- 
 dictory explanations, the astronomical suggestion 
 made at page 137 may to some appear too matter- 
 of-fact and prosaic. But that a firm and scientific 
 base should underlie mythical and imaginative 
 similes does not in reality detract from their 
 poetic excellence. Indeed, an added fitness, and 
 therefore an added beauty, is to be recognized 
 in the Aswin hymns, when we can think of 
 
142 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 them as addressed to well-known and beneficent 
 deities presiding over the new year — deities who 
 manifested themselves in the earliest dawn of the 
 new year's morning under the form of two beautiful 
 and easily to be recognised stars, and to whom their 
 worshippers appealed for "protection," through the 
 unknown dangers of the future year. 
 
 I give two diagrams to illustrate the fact that 
 the time of the rising of the stars a and /? Arietis must 
 necessarily, on such a new year's festival as above 
 proposed, have taken place in some years before 
 the first intimation of dawn, in others a few minutes 
 before the time of sunrise. 
 
 It is of course to be borne in mind that the 
 Vedic years were luni-solar. The actual point 
 therefore on the ecliptic at which the conjunction 
 of sun and moon — or new moon — took place, and 
 from which each year was counted, varied in 
 different years to the extent of nearly 30 degrees. 
 The diagram, Plate XII. Figs, i and 2, represents the 
 maximum and minimum distance between the rising 
 of the Yoga stars of the Nakshatra AswinI, and of 
 the sun on the 1 5th or full-moon's day of the first 
 month of a luni-solar year ; counted from the first 
 
PART I.] NEW YEAR DIVINITIES 143 
 
 conjunction of sun and moon following the sun's 
 arrival at the " end of Revati and the beginning of 
 A9vini." 
 
 It will be seen from the diagram that something 
 more than two hours was the longest interval that, 
 according to the presumed method of counting the 
 Vedic year, elapsed between the appearance of u. and 
 yS Arietis and of the sun above the horizon. 
 
 This astronomic interpretation accounts for the 
 varying times noted in the hymns for the appearance 
 of the Aswins. It also accounts, as it seems to me, 
 for the general tone of the hymns, but as regards 
 the long series of miraculous "protections" of the 
 Aswins, accorded by them to many sick, aged, and 
 decrepit personages, it does not at first sight 
 account. 
 
 We have seen that Bergaigne and others have 
 opined that the various miracles attributed to the 
 Aswins are " anthropomorphized forms of solar 
 phenomena," and with this view the astronomic 
 interpretation, when fully followed out to its logical 
 end, agrees. 
 
 But at first sight we wonder how the sun at 
 the beginning of the calendrical year could, in 
 
144 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 Vedic times, be described as in any way especially 
 sick, aged, or decrepit. 
 
 3,000 B.C., when, as we have seen, the winter 
 solstice was in Aquarius, the Indian calendrical 
 and sidereal year, such as has been supposed, 
 would have begun at its earliest a month and a 
 half after the solstice. ^ The sun at the winter 
 solstice, may be, and often is, described as pale, 
 weak, sick and old ; but at the beginning of a 
 calendrical year, a month and a half after the 
 solstice, the sun no longer could have been thought 
 of as requiring the miraculous protection of the 
 heralding Aswins. 
 
 To help in solving this difficulty, recourse may 
 again wisely be had to Babylonian astronomic lore. 
 The fanciful legends regarding the Aswins, con- 
 sidered only by themselves, can scarcely yield a 
 sufficiently firm foundation on which to build the 
 far-reaching theory I now desire to bring forward 
 
 ' If the Hindu year were noiv counted from the new moon 
 following instead of t\\2it precedhtg the sun's arrival at the initial point 
 of the Zodiac, owing to the precession of the equinoxes, the year 
 would begin at earliest twenty-one days after the spring equinox. 
 Since 3,000 b.c. the seasons have advanced by more than two 
 months, as regards their position amongst the stars. 
 
PART I.] THE ACCADIAN CALENDAR 145 
 
 concerning them ; a theory on all fours with one I 
 ventured some years ago to propound in reference 
 to Babylonian astronomy, in a Paper entitled 
 the " Accadian Calendar."^ It was there sug- 
 gested that the probable date for the origin of 
 that Calendar was about 6,000 B.C. The fact was 
 pointed out that Aries, in the most ancient Accadian 
 and Babylonian astronomical works, always appears 
 as leader of the signs and of the year, and stress 
 was laid on the unlikelihood that this constellation 
 should have been chosen for this leading post at 
 a date when the sun's entry into it did not corre- 
 spond with any one of the four well-marked natural 
 divisions of the year, i.e. the solstices or equinoxes. 
 But as on the cuneiform tablets Aries appears as 
 leader long before the time when the sun sojourned 
 in that constellation during the first month following 
 the equinox, it was suggested that it was when the 
 solstitial not the equinoctial point coincided with 
 the first degree of Aries, that the Accadian 
 calendrical scheme had first been drawn up ; 
 namely about 6,000 B.C. 
 
 A corroboration of the view then put for- 
 
 1 Proceedings of Society of Biblical ArchcEology, January 1892. 
 
146 ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [part i. 
 
 ward is to be drawn from a further study of the 
 Accadian month names. The first three month 
 names, in Accadian, referred, as scholars have 
 pointed out, to the first three constellations of the 
 Zodiac. 
 
 (i.) The month of the " sacrifice of righteous- 
 ness " to Aries. 
 
 (2.) The month of the "propitious Bull" to 
 Taurus. 
 
 (3.) The month of "the Twins" to Gemini. 
 
 The twelfth and thirteenth names in the same 
 series seem to refer equally clearly to a year 
 originally counted as beginning at the winter 
 solstice. They are called respectively : 
 
 " 1 2th. The month of sowing of seed." — " 13th. 
 The dark month of sowing." 
 
 For the sowing of most cereals, late autumn 
 and early winter are the favoured seasons. Many 
 crops however are sown in early spring. There 
 might then be a doubt whether " the month of 
 sowing of seed" more fitly described the spring 
 sowing of seed in the twelfth month of a luni-solar 
 year, counted from the equinox, — or the winter 
 sowing of seed in the twelfth month of a luni-solar 
 
PART I.] AS WIN LEGENDS, PRE-VEDIC 147 
 
 year, counted from the solstice. But when we 
 find this twelfth month followed by a thirteenth, 
 of which the especial and added epithet is dark, 
 there can, as it seems to me, be little if any doubt 
 that the winter month whose range in different 
 years extended from 12th of December to 22nd 
 January is better described by the epithet dark, 
 than the rapidly brightening month whose range 
 extended from 12th March to 22nd April. 
 
 Very curiously, then, and accurately does the 
 Accadian calendar give us the date of its origin, 
 and of the first naming of its months, as that 
 when the winter solstice coincided with the suns 
 entry into the first degree of the constellation Aries'" 
 — the date in round numbers of 6,000 B.C. 
 
 To this same date it is, as I believe, that 
 the miraculous protections accorded by the Aswins 
 to the distressed solstitial sun and moon and 
 earth appear to point, and fully does this view 
 corroborate the opinion that the Aswin-legends 
 took their rise in pre-Vedic times. They also, 
 
 1 The winter solstice now coincides very closely with the 
 sun's entry into Sagittarius. It precedes the sun's entry into Aries 
 by almost a third of the whole circle of the ecliptic. 
 
14^ ASTRONOMY IN THE RIG VEDA [^art i. 
 
 as do the Indra and Vritra myths, refer us for 
 their origin to a more northern latitude than 
 tropical India. In the tropics the sun is scarcely 
 less powerful in winter than in summer. The 
 astronomers who drew up the Accadian calendar, 
 and the myth-makers of the Aswin-legends, must, 
 according to the astronomic theory, have dwelt 
 in temperate zones and formulated calendar and 
 myths about 6,000 b.c. 
 
VI 
 
 NOTES. AHURA MAZDA, ETC. 
 
 [Ahura Mazda, a note reprinted from the Proceedings of the Sociely 
 of Biblical Archaology, February 1900] 
 
 Professor Hommel in the March number for 1899 
 of these Proceedings calls attention in his Assyrio- 
 logical Notes to the name " Assara Mazas " appear- 
 ing in a list of Assyrian gods. The section of the 
 list in which this name appears contains " a number 
 of foreign sounding names " belonging to gods 
 honoured, presumably, in out-lying portions of the 
 Assyrian dominions. 
 
 Professor Hommel claims "that this god (Assara 
 Mazas) is no other than the Iranian Ahura Mazda," 
 and he thus concludes his arguments in favour of 
 this opinion — "concerning Assara-mazas, I should 
 like to remark in closing this paragraph, that we 
 have here the same older pronunciation of Iranian 
 
 149 
 
150 NOTES.— AHURA MAZDA, ETC. [part i. 
 
 words as in the Kassitic Surias, ' sun' (later A Aura 
 and Hvarya, but comp. Sanscrit Asura and surid), 
 which is of the highest importance for the history of 
 the Aryan languages. In the same Kassitic period, 
 between 1,700 and 1,200 B.C., I suppose was borrowed 
 by the Assyrians the Iranian god Assara-mazas." 
 
 In a Paper entitled The Median Calendar and 
 the Constellation Taurus, printed in the June num- 
 ber for 1897 of these Proceedings, I made a very 
 similar claim for the derivation of the name of the 
 great god of the Assyrians — Assur. 
 
 The claim put forward was not based only on 
 the resemblance in sound of " Assur " and " Ahura," 
 but was in the first place founded on the virtual 
 identity of the emblems of Assur and Ahura Mazda. 
 For the origin of these emblems (referring as it was 
 suggested they did to the Zodiacal constellation 
 Sagittarius) a date as high as 4,000 B.C. was, on 
 astronomic grounds, assumed, and it was pointed 
 out that at that date there was no evidence of the 
 existence of the Assyrian nation as a nation, nor 
 any trace of a Semitic worship of the god Assur ; 
 whereas, on the other hand, as early as 3,800 b.c. 
 there is evidence that a powerful Aryan race — the 
 
PARTI.] ASSARA-MAZAS AND ASSUR 151 
 
 Manda — rivalled the power, and threatened the 
 Semitic rule of Sargon of Agane. 
 
 The opinion that the symbol of Ahura Mazda, 
 and of Assur, was of ancient Aryan origin, naturally 
 suggested the further thought that the name Assur, 
 so closely resembling the earlier Indo-Iranian form 
 Asura, of the Iranian Ahura, had, together with the 
 emblem of the god, been borrowed from the Aryan 
 ancestors of the Medo- Persians by the Semitic 
 settlers who, early in the second millennium B.C., 
 established themselves to the north of Babylonia. 
 It may here be pointed out that no very certain 
 Semitic derivation at present holds the field which 
 the proposed Aryan derivation would occupy. 
 According to some scholars it comes from a word 
 signifying " a well-watered plain." According to 
 Professor Hommel, the name Assur is derived from 
 a word which originally meant " the heavenly 
 host." 
 
 Professor Hommel, quoting as his authority the 
 opinions of the Sanscrit scholar Oldenburg, and re- 
 inforcing Oldenburg's opinions by arguments from 
 other sources, further maintains the high probability 
 of the Median god Ahura Mazda having been the 
 
152 NOTES.— AHURA MAZDA, ETC. [part i. 
 
 representative of the Vedic Varuna, and also that 
 Varuna was the moon. 
 
 Vedic scholars are divided in opinion as to what 
 physical phenomenon is represented by Varuna. He 
 is very generally supposed to personify " the vast 
 extent of the encompassing sky," some say especially 
 the sky at night-time — others claim him as a solar 
 divinity, whilst Oldenburg, as we have seen, sup- 
 poses him to be the moon. It is not to the question, 
 however, what phenomenon Varuna represented, 
 but to that of the probability or improbability of 
 his original identity with the Median Ahura Mazda, 
 that I would now draw attention. 
 
 It is said that " the parallel in character, though 
 not in name, of the god Varuna is Ahura Mazda, 
 the Wise Spirit." But a variety of considerations 
 may lead us to entertain the possibility of a Vedic 
 god other than Varuna being the parallel in charac- 
 ter and in epithet of Ahura Mazda ; a parallel which 
 is also still more clearly to be recognized if we 
 adopt the view, above contended for, of the identity 
 of Assur, the a^xher god of Assyria, with Ahura 
 Mazda. 
 
 The Vedic god Rudra is, like Varuna, an Asura 
 
PART I.] RUBRA— ASURA MAHA 153 
 
 or Spirit. He is described as " the wise," and his 
 votaries are encouraged to worship him " for a com- 
 prehensive and sound understanding." But in one 
 passage the epithet " asura maha," so curiously 
 recalling to our ears the name of the Avestan 
 "Ahura Mazda," is actually applied to him.^ As 
 a wise and great Asura, Rudra seems to be as close 
 a parallel to Ahura Mazda as Varuna ; the resem- 
 
 ^ Wilson, Jitg Veda, Mandala ii., i, 6. Uncertainty prevails 
 among scholars as to the exact meaning to be given to the name 
 Ahura Mazda. The Rev. L. H. Mills, D.D., under the heading 
 " Zend," writes thus in Chambers's Encyclopedia : " The Supreme 
 Deity Ahura Mazdah, the Living God or ' Lord ' (ahu = ' the 
 hving,' 'life,' or 'spirit' — root «,^ = 'to be'), the Great Creator 
 (niaz + da = Sansk. mahd + dM), or 'the Wise One' {cf. su-medhds).'" 
 Again, the same writer in his book on the G^ithks, pubhshed in 
 1894, gives on p. 3 in his "verbatim translation," "O magni- 
 donator (?) (vel) O Sapiens (?)," as alternative meanings for 
 Mazda. Similar uncertainty seems to prevail as regards the 
 meaning to be attached to the words of the passage in the Rig 
 Veda to which reference has been made above, i.e., Mandala ii., 
 Siikta i., verse 6. In Wilson's translation of the Rig Veda, 
 vol. ii., p. 2ir, we read: — "Thou, Agni, art Rudra, the expeller 
 (of foes) from the expanse of heaven " : and in his note to this 
 passage he says : " Twam Rudro asuro maho divah : asura is 
 explained satrun^m nirasiti, the expeller of enemies, divas, from 
 heaven ; or it may mean, the giver of strength. . . ." Macdonell 
 ( Fedic Mythology, p. 75) says that Rudra is called in this passage 
 " the great asjira of heaven." 
 
154 NOTES.— AHURA MAZDA, ETC. [part i. 
 
 blance of epithet in the case of Rudra makes the 
 parallelism closer. 
 
 Varuna indeed in Vedic estimation held a much 
 higher and more commanding position than Rudra, 
 but considering how opposed the Avestan was to 
 Vedic mythology on important points, we ought not 
 to expect that the god elevated by the Medians 
 above all others should have held a very exalted 
 place amongst the Brahmins of India. 
 
 But it is when we turn our thoughts not only to 
 Ahura Mazda but to his Assyrian representative 
 Assur, that the parallelism between him and Rudra 
 becomes more marked. 
 
 Rudra is not only a wise and great Asura, he is 
 above everything else celebrated in the Rig Veda as 
 an archer. He has "the sure arrow, the strong 
 bow."i He is "the divine Rudra armed with the 
 strong bow and fast flying arrows."^ 
 
 In the Paper already referred to, it was 
 suggested that an astronomic observation of the 
 equinoctial colure passing through the constellations 
 Sagittarius and Taurus was the probable origin of 
 
 1 Wilson, Rig Veda, Mandala v., x. (xlii.), ii. 
 ^ lb., Mandala vii., xiii. (xlvi.), i. 
 
PARTI] RUDRA, AN ARCHER GOD 155 
 
 Median and (as derived from Median) Assyrian 
 symbolism concerning Ahura Mazda and Assur. 
 This observation could, as was pointed out, only 
 have been made at the date, in round numbers, of 
 4,000 B.C. 
 
 It is a very tempting enterprise to seek in the 
 mythologies of European nations for allusions to 
 this same astronomic observation — an observation 
 made, as we may believe, when the ancestors of the 
 Iranian and Indian Aryans, and possibly the ances- 
 tors of the European nations, were still, if not all 
 dwelling together, at least within easy intellectual 
 touch of each other. 
 
 In Grecian fable we have the Centaur (the Bull- 
 killer) Chiron giving his name to the constellation 
 Sagittarius, and in this fable we may, as it would 
 seem, find a better astrono7nic explanation of the 
 term Bull-killer than that usually given concerning 
 the well-mounted Thessalian hunters of wild cattle. 
 The constellation Sagittarius, an archer, half man, 
 half horse, is not a figure of Grecian invention. 
 It is to be met with depicted on Babylonian monu- 
 ments, unmistakably the archer of our celestial 
 sphere ; and this constellation, when it rises in the 
 
156 NOTES.— AHURA MAZDA, ETC. [parti. 
 
 east, always drives below the western horizon — i.e., 
 mythically exterminates, the last stars of the con- 
 stellation Taurus. 
 
 To Chiron, the chief Centaur, the epithet " wise " 
 is especially given, and "he was renowned for his 
 skill in hunting, medicine, music, gymnastics, and 
 the art of prophecy " ; of these not altogether con- 
 gruous attributes Rudra the Vedic god possessed 
 three of the most important. He was wise, he was 
 an archer, and he was famed as "a chief physician 
 among physicians."^ In a verse, part of which has 
 been already quoted,^ worshippers are exhorted to 
 " Praise him who has the sure arrow, the strong 
 bow, who presides over all sanitary drugs ; worship 
 Rudra for a comprehensive and sound understand- 
 ing, adore the powerful divinity with prostrations." 
 
 Apollo the far-darter, Artemis the goddess of 
 the silver bow, also shared these same attributes, 
 and Grecian legend would lead us to place them in 
 the same part of the heavens as that allotted to 
 Chiron — i.e., Sagittarius. Apollo prompted Artemis 
 to aim a shaft from her bow at a point on the 
 
 ^ Wilson, Rig Veda, Mandala ii., xxxiii., 4. 
 ^ 2b., Mandala v., x. (xlii.), ri. 
 
PARTI.] CHIRON— APOLLO— ARTEMIS 157 
 
 horizon, and this point was the head of the hunter 
 Orion. Now the constellation Orion is exactly 
 in opposition to the bow stars of Sagittarius ; 
 that the legend is astronomical is plainly to be 
 inferred from its variant form, in which Artemis 
 is represented as sending a Scorpion to sting 
 Orion to death. The stars marking the Scorpion's 
 sting are in very close proximity to the bow stars of 
 Sagittarius. 
 
 Returning to Indian myths, the name of Siva 
 does not occur in the Rig Veda ; but in later 
 Sanscrit works Siva is the representative of Rudra. 
 In a hymn to Siva,^ the following passages occur, 
 and it is difficult to read them and not be reminded 
 of the sculptured figures of Artemis, crescent- 
 crowned and leading a stag by the horns. (Allow- 
 ance must be made, however, for the tendency in 
 Hindu art to multiply the heads, arms, and features 
 of their gods.) 
 
 " I worship the great Mahesa, who shines like 
 ten million suns : who is adorned with triple eyes : 
 who is crowned with the moon : who is armed with 
 
 ^ Hymn to Siva, prefixed to "An Exposition of the Principles 
 of Sanskrit Logic," by Bodhanundanath Swami, Calcutta. 
 
 M 
 
iS8 NOTES.— AHURA MAZDA, ETC. [part i. 
 
 the trident, the bow, the mace, the discus, the 
 goad, and the noose : 
 
 Who is the eternal Lord ; 
 
 Who is bright as the snowy summit of Mount 
 Kaila9e ; whose matted hair is ablaze with the 
 crescent moon ; 
 
 Whose hands hold the head of a deer and a 
 battle-axe ; 
 
 Whose forehead is adorned with the bright half- 
 moon ; 
 
 Whose fingers are interlaced to typify a 
 deer ; 
 
 For the explanation of the Roman myths of 
 Dianus and Diana (varying forms as the dictionary 
 tells of Janus and Jana) we may naturally seek 
 for the same astronomic origin, as for those con- 
 cerning" the Grecian archer divinities. 
 
 Janus indeed has not, so far as I know, ever 
 been represented as an archer or a Centaur. The 
 attribute for which he is especially renowned is that 
 of "opener of the year," and this attribute, on the 
 astronomic theory here proposed, would furnish the 
 
PART I.] SIVA— DIANA— JANUS 159 
 
 connecting link between the varying forms of the 
 Italian deities above mentioned. 
 
 The many and still imperfectly understood 
 changes that were made in the Roman year by 
 successive rulers, have effaced the connexion of 
 that year with the stars which must have originally 
 presided over its opening. But Roman tradition 
 embodied in Virgil's lines speaks of " the bright 
 Bull " who " with his gilded horns opens the year." ^ 
 The golden star-tipped horns of the Bull are as we 
 know exactly opposed to the westernmost degrees 
 of Sagittarius ; and that constellation, in opposition 
 to the sun, would therefore have marked the open- 
 ing of just such a vernal year as that alluded to by 
 Virgil. Whether this vernal year before the Julian 
 reformation was still the calendrical year in Rome 
 is, however, very doubtful. 
 
 Janus is represented with two heads, sometimes 
 even with four, "to typify the seasons of the year." 
 The full moon in Sagittarius 4,000 b.c. marked the 
 season of the spring equinox — the sun then being 
 in conjunction with the stars marking the horn tips 
 of the Bull. The new moon in Sagittarius at the 
 ' Virgil, Georg., Lib. I., 217, 218. 
 
i6o NOTES— AHURA MAZDA, ETC. [part i. 
 
 same date marked the autumn equinox. The 
 half waning moon in Sagittarius marked the season 
 of the winter solstice : and the half moon of the 
 crescent or waxing moon marked the season of the 
 summer solstice. The four heads of Janus may 
 thus have referred to the four seasons marked by 
 the moon in Sagittarius. 
 
 The fact that the Indian archer Rudra ( = Siva) 
 and the Grecian archer Artemis, were represented 
 as crowned by the half, not the full moon, would 
 refer these myths to an I ndo- Iranian, not to a some- 
 what later Iranian source. It was not to the 
 reformed Iranian equinoctial year that they pointed, 
 but to the sun's triumph at the solstitial season. In 
 the Roman Janus myth we may rather detect the 
 later Median influence, and suppose that it referred 
 to a year beginning with the full moon in Sagit- 
 tarius, a year opening in the spring, when the sun 
 was in conjunction with the "gilded horns" of "the 
 bright Bull." 
 
 All these mythological indications, derived from 
 Median, Assyrian, Indian, and classical sources, 
 though each of them looked at separately may not 
 speak with much insistence, yet considered together 
 
PART I] THE MOON IN SAGITTARIUS i6i 
 
 seem to point us more and more clearly as we study 
 them, to the fact that about 4,000 b.c. a very im- 
 portant and authoritative observation of the colures 
 (amongst the Zodiacal constellations) was made, and 
 that upon this observation much of the mythology 
 of ancient nations was founded. 
 
VII 
 
 ANCIENT INDIAN ASTRONOMY 
 
 [Reprinted from the Proceedings of the Society of Biblical 
 Archeology, February 1900] 
 
 It is only on Talmudic authority, I think, that 
 astronomy can be denied a place, and indeed an 
 important place, in researches connected with 
 Biblical Archaeology. 
 
 On Talmudic authority we are told that, as a 
 protest against the sun-, moon-, and star-worship of 
 surrounding nations, the Hebrews were not per- 
 mitted to calculate in any way beforehand, or by 
 scientific methods based on the movements of the 
 heavenly bodies, their days, their months, or their 
 years. 
 
 The end of the day and beginning of the night 
 could only be definitely ascertained when three 
 stars were visible to the observer. The moon must 
 
 162 
 
PART I.] ASTRONOMY IN THE TALMUD 163 
 
 have shown its pale sickle to some watcher of the 
 heavens, before the first of the month could be 
 announced. The beginning of the year, we are 
 also told, was dependent on the earliness or late- 
 ness of the agricultural season, for three ears of 
 corn, in a sufficiently advanced state of growth, 
 were to be presented to the priest and waved before 
 the Lord on a fixed day of the first month of the 
 year. 
 
 This is what some passages of the Talmud ^ 
 
 1 Bible Educator, edited by Rev. E. H. Plumptre, M.A., vol. 
 iii. pp. 239 and 240. " It may have been with a view to render 
 astrology impossible, that the Jews were forbidden to keep a 
 calendar in the Holy Land, ... as the length of the lunation, 
 or lunar month, is, roughly speaking, twenty-nine days and a half, 
 it is easy to know, from month to month, when to expect the 
 crescent to become visible. Six times in the year the beginning 
 of the month was decided by observation of the new moon. . . . 
 On two months of the year the determination of the new moon 
 was of such importance, that the witnesses who observed the 
 crescent were authorized to profane the Sabbath by travelling 
 to give information at Jerusalem. These occasions were the 
 months Nisan and Tisri. . . . The Mishna records that on one 
 occasion as many as forty pairs of witnesses thus arrived on the 
 Sabbath at Lydda. Rabbi Akiba detained them, but was reproved 
 
 for so doing by Rabbi Gamaliel When the evidence was 
 
 satisfactory, the judges declared the month to be commenced, 
 and a beacon was lighted on Mount Olivet, from which the signal 
 was repeated on mountain after mountain, until the whole country 
 was aglow with fires." 
 
164 ANCIENT INDIAN ASTRONOMY [parti. 
 
 seem to teach ; but from Old Testament Scriptures, 
 it is not possible to infer these calendrical restric- 
 tions with any degree of certainty. On the con- 
 trary, there is much in the Scriptures to lead us 
 to an opposite conclusion. 
 
 On the very first page of the Bible we read of 
 " the greater and the lesser lights," and of " the stars 
 also " set in the heavens, to be "for signs, and for 
 seasons, and for days and years." And scarcely 
 have we turned this first page, when we meet the 
 statement that " in process of time it came to pass, 
 that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an 
 offering unto the Lord. And Abel, he also brought 
 of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof 
 And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his 
 offering." In the margin the words "in process 
 of time" are rendered "at the end of days." In 
 considering this passage we seem to be brought 
 into touch with a definitely established year ; 
 and at once archaeology and astronomy enter into 
 the field of Biblical research, to tell us of a remotely 
 old calendar — astronomic indications would date the 
 origin of this calendar at about 6,000 B.C. — and 
 from this calendar we learn that at "the end of 
 
PART I.] ASTRONOMY IN THE BIBLE 165 
 
 days " — the end of the dark days of the year — 
 there followed a month of ''the sacrifice of 
 righteousness " : a sacrifice, we may well suppose, 
 of the firstlings of the flock, as the stars in con- 
 junction with the sun during this first month were 
 imagined by the institutors of the calendar under 
 the form of a lamb or ram ready for sacrifice. 
 
 To this calendrical first month our attention is 
 again drawn when we read, in the book of Exodus, 
 of the institution at God's command of the Hebrew 
 festival, to be held on the 14th and 15th days of 
 the month Abib. 
 
 This month Abib, it is generally assumed, is 
 the equivalent of the month Nisan, spoken of in 
 some of the later books of the Old Testament. 
 
 Astronomy and archaeology again claim a 
 hearing on this point. The month Nisan, the 
 Semite equivalent of the Accadian month Bar zig- 
 gar (the month of the "sacrifice of righteousness "), 
 we may gather from the evidence of the cuneiform 
 tablets, had been the first month of a calendrical 
 year in Babylon for many centuries — for millenniums, 
 perhaps — before the date of Moses ; and therefore 
 archseology would teach us that the children of Israel 
 
1 66 ANCIENT INDIAN ASTRONOMY [part i. 
 
 were being recalled, from strange Egyptian modes 
 of reckoning, to the observance of an ancient and 
 patriarchal year and festival, when they were told 
 that for them Abib was to be the first month of the 
 year, and that on the 14th of that month, "a night 
 to be much observed,'' they were to sacrifice of the 
 firstlings of their flock, and were to hold the great 
 festival of the Passover on the fifteenth day. 
 
 If "Abib," " Nisan," and "Bar zig-gar" are 
 names used by various nations to designate one and 
 the same month, Abib could not have been, as has 
 very generally been supposed, a month varying 
 according to the uncertain ripening of agricultural 
 crops, and one taking its name from the ears of corn 
 presented to the priest, and waved before the Lord 
 on some fixed day of that month ; but rather it 
 must have been (as we know, from Babylonian 
 sources that Nisan was) a well calculated soli-lunar 
 and sidereal month. Now, if we adopt this view, 
 we must find some alternative derivation for the 
 month name Abib. Nor is it by any means 
 difficult so to do. 
 
 On the fourteenth night of the first month — 
 Bar zig-gar, Nisan, or Abib — " a night to be much 
 
PART I] ABIB REFERS TO SPICA 167 
 
 observed," or rather, according to the marginal 
 reading, "a night of observations" — the bright 
 star Spica, which marks the ears of corn in the 
 Virgin's hand, rose above the eastern horizon as 
 the sun set in the west, and at midnight must 
 have shone down brilHantly on the Hebrew hosts ; 
 for Spica is so bright a star, that even the beams 
 of the full moon riding close at hand could not 
 have obscured its lustre. 
 
 The Indians of to-day name their months from 
 the stars in their lunar Zodiac which are in 
 opposition to, not from those in conjunction with, 
 the sun. The close resemblance of the Arab and 
 Indian lunar Zodiacal series suggests the thought 
 that the Arabs may have followed the same 
 system of month nomenclatiLre as the Indians ; 
 and if this were the case it would furnish a reason 
 why Moses, who had so lately returned from his 
 forty years' sojourn in Arabia, should — in recalling 
 the Hebrews to the observance of such a year 
 as that which was presumably followed by their 
 forefathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob — have yet 
 spoken of the first month of the year according 
 to a non- Baby Ionian method of nomenclature, and 
 
1 68 ANCIENT INDIAN ASTRONOMY [part i. 
 
 should have called it Abib, after the star in 
 opposition to the sun. 
 
 If now we adopt the opinion that an astronomic 
 method of counting the year did in reality obtain 
 amongst the Hebrews, a great difficulty must 
 present itself to our minds in regard to the 
 generally accepted theory that only on a fixed day 
 of the first month of the year might the first 
 reaped handful of corn be waved before the 
 Lord. 
 
 The seasons in Palestine are not more punctual 
 than in other countries. To restrict a husbandman 
 to a fixed day of a year (even such a year as 
 ours) before which he might not begin to put 
 his sickle into the corn, would be felt as a hurt- 
 ful and arbitrary regulation ; but to restrict the 
 ' husbandman to a fixed day in a luni-solar year 
 would be a still more hurtful regulation. The 
 beginning of a soli-lunar, year may vary to the 
 extent of a whole month. A late beginning of 
 such a year might coincide with a very early 
 agricultural season, and vice versa an early 
 calendrical year might occur in a late agricultural 
 season. 
 
PART I.] NOT TO FIRST RIPENED CORN 169 
 
 Considerations of this nature may incline us 
 
 to inquire carefully whether the " generally accepted 
 
 theory " (concerning the waving of the ears of 
 
 corn before the Lord during the Passover week) 
 
 rests upon Scriptural authority or on Talmudic and 
 
 traditional teachinaf. As ag-ainst an almost un- 
 
 broken array of commentators, it is possible in this 
 
 connexion to quote from the work of a learned 
 
 Hebrew scholar a clearly expressed opinion that 
 
 from the Scriptures themselves, it is not possible 
 
 to infer directly a connexion in date between the 
 
 wavinsf of the first fruits and the Passover festival.^ 
 
 1 Pentateugite, Traduction Nouvelle, par Rabbi Wogue 
 (Lazare), torn. 3. Discussing an important difference of opinion 
 which exists amongst Jewish scholars and commentators as to the 
 exact day of the Passover festival, on which the priest was to wave 
 the sheaf before the Lord, the writer says : " Le texte porte : 'Le 
 Lendemain du Sabbat,' indication qui a donne lieu a une dissidence 
 importante entre les Pharisiens et les Saduceens. . . . Nous avons 
 adopts le systeme talmudique, qui a pour lui I'autorite des Septante, 
 des targoumim, de Josephe, et I'usage immemorial de la Synagogue ; 
 mais, a ne consulter que les textes sans parti pris, nous ne sousr 
 cririons a aucune des deux doctrines. Ni la ceremonie de Tomer, 
 ni le comput des semaines, ne sont mis par nos textes en rapport 
 avec la Paque, mais uniquement avec les moissons, soit ici, soit 
 dans le Deut^ronome (xvi. 9). Des la recolte de I'orge, le divin 
 L^gislateur veut qu'on lui fasse hommage des premices de cette 
 c^reale ; il n'indique point de date, parceque la moisson, pas plus 
 que la vendange, et pas plus en Palestine qu'ailleurs, ne commence 
 
170 ANCIENT INDIAN ASTRONOMY [part i 
 
 But if our enquiries should lead us to accept, 
 as at least a probability, the existence in Mosaic 
 times of an astronomically counted Hebrew year, 
 and if this admission should require us to change 
 long-held opinions regarding the right observ- 
 ance of Hebrew festivals, on the other hand, 
 the fact that we might then trace Arabian rather 
 than Babylonian influence in the name of Abib 
 would have its weight on the conservative side of 
 the controversy concerning the post or pre-exilic 
 date of the books of Exodus and Deuteronomy. 
 
 The fact that in India the months are named 
 after the stars in opposition to the sun suggested 
 the above proposed explanations of the Hebrew 
 month name Abib as that of the month when the 
 sun was in conjunction with the constellation Aries, 
 and in opposition to the star Spica, marking the 
 Zodiacal ears of corn. But there is a further point 
 
 a jour fixe. Mais une fois ouverte, elle se continue sans interrup- 
 tion ; et comme les froments, en Palestine, sent coupes sept 
 semaines apres, les pr^mices du froment doivent etre offertes au 
 bout de sept semaines. L'Omer et la Pentecote sont done mobiles 
 par exception, mais cette derniere est relativement fixe. Main- 
 tenant de quel ' Sabbat ' est il question ? Puisque tout ici est 
 subordonn^ a rouverture de la moisson, ce sera naturellement le 
 Sabbat qui suit cette ouverture." 
 
PART I.] ABIB AND CHAITRA 171 
 
 of connexion to be observed between Indian 
 astronomy and Biblical archeeology, namely, that 
 the first month of the Indian year is at the 
 present date the month during which the sun is 
 in conjunction with the constellation Aries. This 
 month is called Chaitra, which is the Sanscrit 
 name of the star Spica, and it is in fact the same 
 sidereally marked month, which, according to the 
 opinions here advocated, was the first month of 
 the ancient Accadian, Babylonian, and Hebrew 
 years. 
 
 It must, therefore, be a question of interest to 
 Biblical students to determine, if possible, whether 
 this Indian first month has only so been counted 
 (as some scholars tell us) since about 570 a.d., or 
 whether it has so been counted from the same 
 remote time as was the Accadian month Bar zig-gar, 
 that is, possibly, from about 6,000 B.C. 
 
 This question as to the month Chaitra forms 
 part only of a larger controversy which has been 
 long waged concerning the antiquity, or otherwise, 
 of the whole science of astronomy in India. 
 
 To this larger controversy I have drawn atten- 
 tion in my Paper, Astronomy in the Rig Veda, read 
 
172 ANCIENT INDIAN ASTRONOMY [part i. 
 
 before the Congress of Orientalists assembled at 
 Rome in 1899. In that Paper, arguments are put 
 forward in support of the opinion that the Vedic 
 bards possessed an acquaintance with the science 
 of astronomy, and that much of the imagery of 
 the hymns bore reference to the constellations of 
 the Zodiac. For the gods Indra, Soma, Agni, 
 and the Aswins, astronomic interpretations are 
 proposed ; and finally the question, which as it 
 seems to me is one specially deserving the attention 
 of the Society of Biblical Archaeology — the ques- 
 tion of the position of the month Chaitra as first 
 month of the Indian year in Vedic and pre- Vedic 
 times is discussed, and the claim that it was, and 
 throughout remote ages had ever been, virtually 
 the same month as the Accadian Bar zig-gar is 
 insisted upon. 
 
 Pursuing further the controversy concerning the 
 antiquity of astronomy amongst the Aryan races, in 
 the note on "Ahura Mazda" (p. 152), I proposed an 
 identification of the Vedic Rudra with the Median 
 god — the god who presided over the Median equi- 
 noctial year, marked by observation of the full moon 
 in the constellation Sagittarius. 
 
PARTI.] THE MARUTS 173 
 
 Continuing then our enquiries into the astro- 
 nomic myths of ancient India, let us turn our 
 attention to the sons of Rudra — the Maruts. 
 They are a group of gods very prominent among 
 Vedic deities, and it is to be noted that Rudra is 
 oftener alluded to in the Rig Veda as the father of 
 the Maruts than in almost any other capacity. Now 
 the Maruts — the stormy troop of Maruts — are 
 celebrated as the companions and friends of Indra. 
 They are "associated with him in innumerable 
 passages." Here, at first sight, it might seem that 
 the proposed astronomical identification of Indra 
 and Rudra as solstitial and equinoctial personifi- 
 cations must break down ; for how should the 
 sons of the equinoctial Rudra always appear as 
 the devoted companions of the solstitial Indra? 
 
 On further examination, however, a very 
 interesting explanation of this difficulty presents 
 itself. From a hymn (quoted at p. 157) to Siva, 
 the Hindu representative of the Vedic Rudra, we 
 learn that the crescent half-moon blazes on the 
 forehead of Siva. Now the crescent half-moon, in 
 the western degrees of the constellation Sagittarius, 
 would, 4,500 B.C., have marked the month of the 
 
 N 
 
174 ANCIENT INDIAN ASTRONOMY [part i. 
 
 summer solstice; for the moon, in its "first 
 quarter" in the first degrees of Sagittarius, must 
 attain to "full moon" seven days later, either in 
 the constellation Aquarius or Pisces, and the 
 full moon in one or other of those two constella- 
 tions marked the season of the summer solstice 
 somewhat earlier than 4,000 b.c. The Maruts 
 are often spoken of in the Veda as a troop, seven 
 in number, or as seven troops of seven, or as 
 three times seven in number. The astronomical 
 thought therefore suggests itself, that the seven 
 Maruts represent the seven days that elapsed 
 between the crescent half-moon, blazing on the brow 
 of Rudra, and the full moon of the summer solstice, 
 or Soma pavamana — Soma purified in the celestial 
 waters (see Plate XIII.). And this explanation of 
 the Maruts does not contradict, but rather agrees 
 with and includes the usual non-astronomic ex- 
 planations held regarding them, namely, that they 
 are storm winds; for we know that the days 
 which accompany the setting in of the solstitial 
 rainy season in India are the days in which the 
 fierce tropical hurricanes or monsoons prevail. 
 Now let us turn from the Maruts to another, as 
 
PLATE XIII. 
 
 CKXXXX] 
 
 Outer circle divided into 360 degrees. 
 
 2nd circle. The names and extent of the twenty-seven Indian 
 " Nakshatras " or divisions of the Lunar Zodiac. 
 
 3rd circle. Names and extent of the twelve Indian "Rashis" or 
 divisions of the Solar Zodiac. 
 
 4th circle. Proposed three-fold division of the Vedic Lunar Month 
 at Season of Summer Solstice. 
 
 Section of 5th circle. Proposed identification of " Maruts " with Moon's 
 course through seven " Nakshatras" at Season of Summer Solstice. 
 
 The Constellations here appear as drawn on the celestial globe ; they 
 have not been reversed as in the other illustrations, hence an apparent, 
 though not real, contradiction ensues. 
 
 [To /ace p. 174. 
 
PART I.] TRITA APTYA i;S 
 
 it seems to me, lunar and solstitial myth, namely, 
 that of Trita Aptya. 
 
 Trita Aptya is a friend of the Maruts, and is 
 said to have appeared on the same car with them. 
 He is constantly, in the hymns, associated with 
 Indra, and feats recorded in one passage as per- 
 formed by Indra, are in another passage of the 
 same hymn attributed to Trita. 
 
 Trita is also often spoken of together with 
 Soma ; and in the ninth Mandala, again and again 
 we read of the ten " maidens, or fingers," of Trita 
 preparing the Soma juice for Indra. 
 
 All these attributes of Trita, and others to be 
 mentioned later, are easily explainable on the 
 astronomic theory already propounded in the 
 identifications of Indra, of Soma, and of the 
 Maruts. 
 
 In the name Trita there is certainly a suggestion 
 of the number three, and Macdonell, in his Vedic 
 Mythology^ brings proof to show "that it was 
 felt to have the meaning of the third " — that is, in 
 order of sequence. 
 
 But though the third, in this sense, does not 
 1 P. 69. 
 
176 ANCIENT INDIAN ASTRONOMY [part i. 
 
 actually carry with it the meaning of third of a 
 whole ; yet, to any one in search of an astronomical 
 explanation of the Trita myth, the reiterated 
 mention of the ten fingers of Trita quickly sug- 
 gests the thought of a whole divided into three 
 chief parts, each part containing ten lesser divisions 
 — a whole therefore of thirty parts. 
 
 Now the lunar month — in reality consisting of 
 twenty-nine and a half solar days (with some 
 fractions over) — is in Hindu calendrical usage 
 divided into thirty equal portions of time called 
 " tithis," which are considered as lunar days ; and 
 here, as it would seem, we arrive at the physical 
 basis of the Trita myth. Trita Aptya, or Trita in 
 the waters (or of the waters), appears as the third 
 part of the lunar month — the part during which 
 the moon is to be seen in the celestial waters ; and 
 as Trita is so closely connected with Indra and 
 Soma pavamana, that third part must have been 
 the ten lunar days (five before and five after " the 
 full ") during which the moon is at its brightest, and 
 in the constellation Aquarius. 
 
 If we think of Trita Aptya as a personification 
 of the triumphant third of the moon's course through 
 
PART I.] TRITA AND FULL MOON 177 
 
 the constellations of the Zodiac at the season of the 
 summer solstice (see Plate XIII.), and if we re- 
 member that the moon during the ten lunar days 
 contained in that " third " came to its full in 
 Aquarius or in Pisces, sometimes indeed at the 
 juncture of these constellations, we shall be able 
 to understand much of the figurative language of 
 the Veda, which associates Trita with the stormy 
 Maruts, with the victories of Indra over Vritra, 
 and with the effulgence of Soma pavamana. 
 
 There is a legend concerning Trita not related 
 but alluded to in the Rig Veda. This legend tells 
 us that Trita was one of three brothers (Ekata, 
 Dvita, and Trita), and that he was pushed into a 
 well by his brothers, and over the mouth of the well 
 a circular covering was placed with intent to keep 
 Trita down and drown him. But through the 
 circular covering the ever-triumphant Trita burst. 
 Here there can be little doubt is a mythic descrip- 
 tion of the temporary disaster of eclipse overtaking 
 the full moon of the summer solstice in the celestial 
 waters of Aquarius or Pisces. The circular 
 covering can be nothing else than the circular 
 shadow of the earth covering the disc of the full 
 
178 ANCIENT INDIAN ASTRONOMY [part i. 
 
 moon, and Trita's triumph may well remind us of 
 the serene victoriousness of the moon when it has 
 emerged from eclipse and rides unharmed along the 
 sky. 
 
 In the Zend Avesta Thrita corresponds in 
 many points with the Vedic Trita. Thraetona 
 also represents Trita under some of his other 
 aspects, and mention is made of Thraetona's " two 
 brothers who seek to slay him on the way."i 
 From these facts it may be inferred that the 
 Trita myth is pre-Vedic. We need not, therefore, 
 be surprised to find traces of it in European 
 mythologies. The name of Trita, with only a 
 change of termination, appears as the Greek 
 Triton, and we may guess at an allusion in the 
 sculptured forms of Greek and Roman Tritons — 
 half men and half fish — to the two watery con- 
 stellations, Aquarius and Pisces, in which the 
 Vedic Trita Aptya (son of waters) made his abode. 
 The Roman rendering of these composite figures, 
 especially, may recall to our minds the Zodiacal 
 basis of the myth — the two fish of Pisces 
 appearing in Italian art, as the two fish-tails 
 ' Macdonell, Vedic Afythology, p. 69. 
 
PART I.] TRITA, TRITON— EKATA, HECATE 179 
 
 which terminate the human-headed figure of the 
 Triton. Again Hecate, as has been pointed out 
 by scholars, bears a close resemblance in name 
 to Ekata. Hecate was a lunar divinity ; she was 
 worshipped and sacrificed to at the close of the 
 month. We may therefore suppose she repre- 
 sented the waning moon. She is further said to 
 have been the daughter of Perseus and Asteria. 
 Looking at the figures of the celestial sphere (see 
 Plate), we may trace the third part of the moon's 
 course — the ten days of its waning appropriated to 
 Ekata — and observe how this portion of its course 
 began close to the constellation Perseus. Thus the 
 Sanscrit Trita myth may explain the name and 
 parentage of the Grecian Hecate.^ 
 
 A study of ancient European calendars may, on 
 the other hand, eke out our knowledge concerning 
 the astronomic scheme in which Trita and his 
 
 1 It is not to be supposed that only the month of the summer 
 solstice was divided into the three parts, personified by Ekata, 
 Dvita, and Trita : the legend of Trita Aptya, that is, Trita in the 
 waters (or, of the waters), is necessarily restricted to that season 
 in which the moon came to its full in the constellations Aquarius 
 or Pisces. Some interesting indications in Indian and Greek 
 mythology seem to point to a similar division of other months, 
 but the subject is surrounded with uncertainties and difficulties. 
 
i8o ANCIENT INDIAN ASTRONOMY [part i. 
 
 brothers played such important parts. We read 
 that in the Attic year " each month was divided into 
 three decades," and the statement may confirm us 
 in the opinion that, following an almost too mathe- 
 matically imagined calendrical method, the ancestors 
 of the Aryan race in remote ages counted their 
 months, not as containing twenty-nine-and-a-half 
 solar days, but as a portion of time containing three 
 great equal divisions, the first, the second, and the 
 third — Ekata, Dvita, Trita — each of these three 
 parts being again subdivided into ten equal tithis. 
 If this should have been the case, it would be 
 interesting to note that the Greeks (and the Romans 
 also, as shown by their cumbrous system of Kalends, 
 Nones, and Ides) retained the plan of a threefold 
 division of the months, but lost the originally con- 
 comitant arrangement of the ten equal divisions of 
 each part into tithis, whence much difficulty ensued 
 for Greeks and Romans alike in counting lunar 
 months of alternately thirty and twenty-nine days. 
 Indian astronomers, on the other hand, who retain 
 the accurate and elaborate division of the month 
 into equal tithis, must have long ago lost the thought 
 of its originally threefold partition, for the Indians 
 
PART I] ATRI AND THE NEW MOON 
 
 i8i 
 
 count each month as composed not of three periods 
 of time, but of a light and a dark half. ^ 
 
 To one more lunar Vedic personage let us 
 direct our attention : namely, to Atri— Atri who, 
 unlike the conquering and ever-victorious Trita, 
 is chiefly celebrated for his misfortunes. Agni, 
 Indra, and especially the Aswins, moved by his 
 misfortunes, come to the help of Atri, and by 
 means of a hundred acts, a hundred devices, they 
 extricate him from captivity, whether from a dark 
 cavern or from a burning chasm. They make the 
 time of his captivity even pleasant to him, giving 
 him refreshing drink. 
 
 One of our own poets may help us to under- 
 stand the Vedic metaphor of Atri's darksome cave. 
 In the Samson Agonistes of Milton, the hero, 
 describing his blindness, says — 
 
 " The sun to me is dark 
 And silent as the moon 
 When she deserts the night, 
 Hid in her vacant interlunar cave." 
 
 ^ " The Luni-Solar year is used for the regulation of festivals 
 and domestic arrangements ; it commences at present at the 
 instant of conjunction of the Sun and Moon in the Sidereal 
 month Chaitra. The Hindu Lunar months invariably consist of 
 
1 82 ANCIENT INDIAN ASTRONOMY [part i. 
 
 Atri is, I believe, a personification of the New 
 
 Moon, and thus we may understand how he is 
 
 sometimes described as hidden in a dark cave, 
 
 while at other times he is spoken of as in a fiery 
 
 chasm, when the uppermost thought in the Vedic 
 
 poet's mind is the close conjunction of the moon 
 
 at that time with the burning sun. From his 
 
 dark cave, or burning chasm, Atri is delivered 
 
 by the "hundred acts" of worship and sacrifice 
 
 which it was the custom in India, as in many 
 
 other countries, to offer up at the time of New 
 
 Moon, especially at the marked festivals of the 
 
 winter and summer solstice, or the beginning of 
 
 the calendrical year. On one occasion ^ we hear of 
 
 thirty Tithis, or Lunar days ; and the whole month is divided into 
 two equal parts of fifteen Tithis each, the one called Shukla or 
 Shuddh Paksha — the bright half or increase of the Moon ; the 
 other Krishna or Vadya Paksha — the dark half or decrease of the 
 Moon." (The Indian Calendar for the year 1892.) 
 
 1 Wilson's Rig Veda, vol. iii. p. 297, Mandala, V. xl. 
 " 5. When, Silrya, the son of the Asura Swarbhanu over- 
 spread thee with darkness, the worlds were beheld like 
 one bewildered, knowing not his place. 6. When, Indra, 
 thou wast dissipating those illusions of Swarbhanu which were 
 spread below the Sun, then Atri, by his fourth sacred prayer, dis- 
 covered the Sun concealed by the darkness impeding his functions. 
 7. (Siirya speaks) Let not the violator, Atri, through hunger 
 swallow with fearful (darkness) me who am thine ; thou art Mitra, 
 
PART 1.] ATRI AT THE SUN'S ECLIPSE 183 
 
 Atri coming to the assistance of the sun, which 
 
 had been hidden by the demon Swarbhanu. This 
 
 darkening of the sun is generally understood to 
 
 refer to a solar eclipse. A solar eclipse can only 
 
 take place at the time of new moon. It is a little 
 
 puzzling to find Atri, if Atri personifies the new 
 
 moon, saving the sun from eclipse instead of 
 
 being the cause of the disaster ; but as in the Rig 
 
 Veda Atri always appears as a friend, not an 
 
 enemy, of the gods of light — Agni, Indra, and 
 
 the Aswins — we may suppose that the Vedic bard 
 
 chose to represent him as being present at, rather 
 
 than causing the sun's eclipse. It may also be 
 
 that a certain number of divisions of lunar time 
 
 were considered as personified by Atri, and that 
 
 an eclipse terminated in the third or fourth of 
 
 those divisions ; so that it could be said that Atri 
 
 " by his fourth sacred prayer " discovered the 
 
 sun. The passage is no doubt a difficult one ; 
 
 whose wealth is truth ; do thou and the royal Varuna both protect 
 me. 8. Then the Brahman (Atri), applying the stones together, 
 propitiating the gods with praise, and adoring them with reverence, 
 placed the eye of Surya in the sky ; he dispersed the delusions 
 of Swarbhanu. 9. The Sun, whom the Asura, Swarbhanu, had 
 enveloped with darkness, the sons of Atri subsequently recovered ; 
 no others were able (to effect his release)." 
 
1 84 ANCIENT INDIAN ASTRONOMY [part i. 
 
 still the fact that Atri was present at the eclipse 
 of the sun seems to tell rather in favour of than 
 against the supposition that Atri was a personifi- 
 cation of the time of new moon. 
 
 The four astronomical interpretations here pro- 
 posed for Rudra, the Maruts, Trita Aptya, and 
 Atri, are all harmonious with and supplemental 
 to the four discussed in my Paper read at Rome, 
 and entitled Astronomy in the Rig Veda. They 
 must to a great extent all stand or fall together. 
 They have been very briefly stated, but if indeed 
 an astronomic basis does, as suggested, underlie 
 Vedic imagery, Sanscrit scholars, with the science 
 of etymology at their command, will easily be able 
 to follow up and pronounce upon the value of the 
 clues here hazarded. 
 
VIII 
 
 THE CHINESE CALENDAR, WITH SOME 
 REMARKS WITH REFERENCE TO 
 THAT OF THE CHALDEANS 
 
 [Reprinted from the Proceedings of the Society of Biblical 
 Arckaology, December 1901] 
 
 The Chinese Lunar Zodiac is divided into 28 
 star groups named Siou. Gustav Schlegel in his 
 Uranographie Chinoise having enumerated these 28 
 siou — or as he translates that term, "domiciles" 
 — says : " La premiere chose qui nous frappe en 
 voyant la liste des 28 domiciles, c'est quelle com- 
 mence par le domicile Kio, ou la Vierge, preuve 
 positive que c'etait avec ce domicile que I'annee a 
 du commencer primitivement," ^ and further on he 
 quotes from " le Eul-ya cette antique dictionnaire," 
 as follows : '' L' Ancien des constellations, c'est Kio et 
 
 ' Uranographie Chinoise, p. 79. 
 
 1S& 
 
1 86 THE CHINESE CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 Kang . . . ils sont les chefs des domiciles, et a 
 cause de cela on les nomme lancien des constella- 
 tions : et ' le signe d'Ancien des constellations ' est 
 exactement les domiciles J^zo et Kang."^ Schlegel 
 adds : " Ce nom de Ancien des constellations r6pond 
 exactement a celui de Princeps Signorum que les 
 astrologues remains donnerent au bdlier ; a lepoque 
 ou cette constellation etait signe de lequinoxe du 
 printemps. C'est-a-dire que le signe qui annoncait 
 le commencement de I'annee etait le premier, le 
 Princeps signorum, 1' Ancien, le Chef, des constella- 
 tions. Mais ces etoiles de la Vierge portent encore 
 d'autres noms qui tous ont rapport au fait astrono- 
 mique que I'asterisme Kio ouvrait I'ann^e. Le 
 ' Sing-king ' les nomme les Chefs des quatre 
 regions, les Legions celestes. . . . Elles president 
 aux metamorphoses de la creation : elles sont traver- 
 sdes par l^cliptique et les sept clartds (7 playlets) 
 commencent {leur revolution) par elles." 
 
 The concluding words from the Sing-king which 
 
 I have marked in italics — giving as they do the 
 
 opinions held by ancient Chinese writers respecting 
 
 the first divisions of their Lunar Zodiac — may 
 
 ^ Uranographie Chinoise, p. 87. 
 
PART I.] CHINESE AND HINDU LORE 187 
 
 remind us of the opinions held by Indian astro- 
 nomers as to their first division of the Zodiac. 
 
 In Whitney's comments on the Sdrya Siddhdnta 
 he observes : — " The initial point of the fixed Hindu 
 sphere, from which longitudes are reckoned, and at 
 which the planetary motions are held by all schools of 
 Hindu astronomy to have commenced at the creation, 
 is the end of the asterism Revati, or the beginning 
 of Acvini."! 
 
 It is impossible to read of these two traditions 
 concerning the initial point of the Chinese and of 
 the Hindu ecliptic series of constellations, without 
 suspecting some underlying cause common to both 
 traditions. 
 
 The Chinese and Hindu initial points are dia- 
 metrically opposite to each other on the ecliptic. 
 Calendrically speaking, such opposite points may be 
 taken to mark the same season and the same month 
 — as for instance, in the old Accadian calendar the 
 month names referred to the stars in conjunction 
 with the sun. The month of the sacrifice of right- 
 eousness corresponded to the month during which 
 the sun was in conjunction with the sacrificial Ram. 
 
 1 V. p. 93. 
 
1 88 THE CHINESE CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 This same month counted (theoretically) from the 
 arrival of the sun at the end of Revati and beginning 
 of AswinI— the initial point of the Indian Zodiac — 
 is in India called, after the star group in opposition, 
 Chaitra. 
 
 Spica {a Virginis) is the chief star of the Nak- 
 shatra Chaitra, and Spica also is the chief star of 
 the Chinese siou Kio, " Fastdrisme," which, according 
 to the tradition above recorded, " ouvrait I'annee," 
 and which (together with the neighbouring "siou 
 Kang), president aux metamorphoses de la creation," 
 " sont traversees par I'ecliptique, et les sept clart^s 
 commencent leur revolution par elles." 
 
 To any interested in the history of the Chinese 
 calendar, or rather to any interested in the history 
 of the human race, the question as to the reason for 
 the choice of this point and for the equal honour in 
 which it was held (as we have seen) by the Accadian, 
 the Hindu, and the Chinese nations, is a question 
 worthy of close attention. 
 
 In former Papers contributed to these Proceed- 
 ings, I have drawn attention to the many indications 
 in ancient cuneiform and Indian literature, which 
 seem to point to the conclusion that about 6,000 B.C., 
 
PART I.] KIO, CHAITRA, SriCA 189 
 
 in some part of Asia and in a latitude probably as 
 far north as 40 degrees, a calendar was instituted by 
 " some ancient race of men," that this calendar dealt 
 with a year beginning- at the season of the winter 
 solstice, and that the stars which at that date were 
 chosen to mark the solstitial year were those in the 
 first degrees of the constellation Aries in conjunction 
 with — and the bright star Spica in opposition to — 
 the sun. I suggested that the Accadians and later 
 Babylonians, as also the Aryans of India, continued 
 to follow as star-marks for their years the constella- 
 tions chosen by the institutors of this ancient 
 calendar, and that therefore in the course of ages 
 the beginning of the years of these peoples moved 
 gradually away from the season of the winter 
 solstice, approaching always nearer to the vernal 
 equinox, close to which point we find it " bound " 
 at the time of the fall of the Babylonian power ; 
 while in India, where the star-mark Spica is still 
 followed, the year now begins about twenty days 
 after the spring equinox. 
 
 Indications in Mesopotamian and Indian litera- 
 ture have seemed to me to point to the above con- 
 clusions. The opposed view, held by most writers 
 
 O 
 
I90 THE CHINESE CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 on the subject, is that only at the late date (about 
 the beginning of our era) when the stars of Aries in 
 conjunction, and the star of Spica in opposition, 
 marked the equinoctial season, were they adopted as 
 marks for the beginning of the year by Babylonians 
 and Hindus respectively. 
 
 I think that the position held by the star Spica 
 in Chinese ancient astronomical tradition may be 
 claimed as telling strongly in favour of an originally 
 solstitial as opposed to an originally equinoctial 
 beginning of the sidereal years of the Accadian, 
 Hindu, and Chinese nations, for never has the claim 
 been made that the Chinese years were counted from 
 the vernal equinox ; but on the contrary the opinion 
 has been very generally held and expressed by 
 Chinese scholars that at some remote date the new 
 year's festival was held in China at the season of 
 the winter solstice. 
 
 Gustav Schlegel, one of the latest writers on the 
 subject of Chinese astronomy, though he admits 
 that, "selon I'opinion g6n6rale I'annee chinoise 
 commence toujours avec le solstice d'hiver," has 
 put forward a view entirely opposed to this gener- 
 ally held opinion : according to his theory, the 
 
PART I.] 16,916 B.C. 191 
 
 Chinese have from the most remote times counted 
 their years, as they count them at present — i.e., 
 from the new moon nearest to the season mid-way 
 between the winter solstice and the spring equinox : 
 and as he is convinced — as we have seen — that the 
 beginning of the Chinese year was originally marked 
 by the asterism Kio, he demands as the lowest 
 possible date for this origin of the Chinese calen- 
 dar, that of 16,916 B.C., when the constellation Kio 
 marked, by its heliacal rising, the mid-season between 
 solstice and equinox. 
 
 Schlegel brings forward many learned and in- 
 genious arguments drawn from Chinese literature to 
 support this theory. It would be impossible at 
 second hand, and in a small space, to state fairly his 
 arguments with a view to rebutting them. His 
 volumes are full of valuable information concerning 
 the " Uranographie Chinoise," but it has not seemed 
 to me when reading and re-reading his work, that 
 the grounds on which he relies are sufficiently 
 established to support the high claims to antiquity 
 which he puts forward for the origin of the modern 
 Chinese method of counting the year from the mid- 
 season between solstice and equinox. 
 
192 THE CHINESE CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 It has on the contrary seemed to me that on 
 historical grounds a theory may be arrived at which 
 will furnish a reasonable explanation of the present 
 somewhat exceptional Chinese calendrical methods, 
 and which will, if it is accepted, strongly reinforce 
 the grounds for holding the already general opinion 
 that the year in ancient times in China was solstitial. 
 That opinion once established must lead us with 
 increased confidence to attribute the honour tradi- 
 tionally paid by Hindus and Chinese alike to the 
 initial point of their respective ecliptic series of star 
 groups to, as I have said, their common acquaint- 
 ance with a calendar established on high authority 
 at the date in round numbers of 6,000 b.c. 
 
 The year in China is luni-solar, and it is, as has 
 been pointed out, counted from the season exactly 
 midway between the winter solstice and the spring 
 equinox. 
 
 It is counted from this mid-season and not from 
 the sun's opposition to, or conjunction with, any 
 particular star or star group. It is therefore not 
 a sidereal but a tropical year ; and it is estimated 
 at exactly the same length as is our European 
 Gregorian year, 
 
PART I] GREGORIAN YEAR, 1582 A.D. 193 
 
 We here in Europe are not yet tired of con- 
 gratulating ourselves on the scientific success at- 
 tained by Pope Gregory XIII., when in 1582 he, 
 with the help of many learned men and astronomers, 
 established, as a reform of the earlier Julian 
 calendar, a method of securely binding all recurring 
 airniversaries — civil and ecclesiastical — to the exact 
 same season of the year. 
 
 Calculations for the arrangement of the Julian 
 calendar had strained the scientific powers of the 
 astronomers of Greece and Rome in Caesar's time, 
 but the length of the year estimated by them was 
 twelve minutes greater than that arrived at by the 
 astronomers of Gregory's later date. 
 
 To find, as we do, in the far east of Asia a 
 people counting the length of their luni-solar year 
 with the same accurate exactness as that only 
 attained to as late as 1582 a.d. in Europe, might 
 well cause us surprise, were it not that history 
 furnishes us with an easy explanation of this exact 
 identity of Chinese and European calendrical calcu- 
 lations, by teaching us that the calendar by which 
 the Chinese now count their years, and by which 
 they have counted them for nearly three hundred 
 
194 THE CHINESE CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 years, was really compiled at Peking by Roman 
 ecclesiastics, to whom the Gregorian methods were 
 well known, and for whom, indeed, the study of 
 these methods must have possessed the charm of 
 novelty added to its intrinsic utility and scientific 
 interest. 
 
 Two learned Jesuit Fathers obtained in the 
 17th century great influence at the Chinese Court. 
 In 1600 A.D., Matteo Ricci was allowed with his 
 companions to settle at Peking, where he spent the 
 remainder of his life in teaching mathematics and 
 other sciences. 
 
 In 1610, Johann Adam von Schall, another 
 learned Jesuit Father, "was sent out partly in 
 consequence of his knowledge of mathematics and 
 astronomy to China," and was ultimately " invited 
 to the Imperial Court at Peking, where he was 
 entrusted with the reformation of the calendar 
 and the direction of the public mathematical 
 school." ^ 
 
 Under these circumstances, when we read that 
 " according to the Chinese work, Wan-nian-shu, or 
 ' Ten thousand-year Calendar,' in which the ele- 
 ' Chambers's Encyclopedia, 1901. 
 
PART I.] CHINESE CALENDAR, 1624 A.D. 195 
 
 ments of the Chinese calendar from 1624 a.d. until 
 192 r A.D. are calculated by the Astronomical Board at 
 Peking, the earliest date of the Chinese New Year's 
 Day is January 21st, and the latest February 20th "^ 
 — when we read this and remember that Johann 
 Adam von Schall was in 1624 in charge of the 
 reformation of the calendar at Peking, we need feel 
 no surprise to find " the elements of the Chinese 
 calendar" calculated in advance for 279 tropical, 
 that is Gregorian, years. Indeed the influence of 
 the European ecclesiastic in these calculations is 
 clearly to be recognized in their very form, for we 
 are easily reminded by it of the " Table to find 
 Easter from the present time to — such and such a 
 year — a.d. inclusive," prefixed to our English Books 
 of Common Prayer. And we may be tempted to 
 smile when we see the jealously conservative 
 Chinese nation so peaceably — perhaps unwittingly 
 — accepting a reformation of their calendar at the 
 hands of foreigners, and contrast with this accept- 
 ance the turbulent opposition with which for so 
 
 ^ On Chronology and the Construction of the Calendar, with 
 special regard to the Chinese Compictation of Time compared with 
 the European. By Dr. K. Fritsche. 
 
196 THE CHINESE CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 long the introduction of the Gregorian calendar 
 into many European countries was resisted. 
 
 It may well be that the Jesuit Fathers to whom 
 the Emperor entrusted the reformation of the 
 calendar were themselves not aware of the magni- 
 tude of the reformation they were introducing into 
 Chinese methods, for they found the luni-solar 
 festival of the new year, as we may learn from the 
 Chinese literature of that date, occurring close to 
 that season to which they then so scientifically bound 
 it. But, according to the theory which in this Paper 
 I am anxious to advocate, this season midway be- 
 tween solstice and equinox had not been chosen 
 with definite intention as the first of the year by the 
 Chinese, but had only been arrived at, in con- 
 sequence of an age-long following on their part of 
 a star group, chosen thousands of years earlier, by 
 one of their ancient emperors, as that from which the 
 beginning of their year was to be counted. This star 
 group was the Siou (domicile) Hiu, the eleventh divi- 
 sion of their Lunar Zodiac, and it is marked by the 
 stars ^ Aquarii and a Equulei. (See diagram.) ' 
 
 ^ The 28 Siou are not of equal extent, and there are many 
 discrepancies in the Chinese tables which profess to give the 
 
PART I.] TCHUEN-HIO, 2510-2431 B.C. 197 
 
 There is in the great History of China a 
 description given of a reformation of the calendar 
 carried out by the Emperor Tchuen-Hio, whose 
 date is placed at ^2510-2431 e.g. The conjunction 
 of the sun and moon close to the Siou Hiu is in this 
 description clearly referred to as a mark given for 
 the beginning of the year. But the fact of this 
 choice of the star mark Hiu has, for European 
 scholars, been obscured by a most unfortunate 
 paraphrase made use of by Pere de Mailla, the 
 translator into French of the Histoire Gdndrale de 
 la Chine. He gives us in the passage describing 
 Tchuen-Hio's reformation the phrase, "15° du 
 Verseau," instead of the Chinese expression, " the 
 Siou Hiu."i 
 
 The Siou Hiu extends over some eisfht or ten 
 
 number of degrees attributed to each. In the diagram, therefore, 
 only the stars which compose the three adjoining domiciles, Niu, 
 Hiu, and Wei are noted, and they are connected by straight lines, 
 according to Chinese astronomical custom. 
 
 ^ The fact that P. de Mailla has so paraphrased the Chinese 
 original has thus plainly been attested by the late Professor 
 Legge. In answer to a question addressed to him on the subject, 
 he wrote, in December 1894, to Mr. H. W. Greene, Fellow of 
 Magdalen College, Oxford, as follows : " In the passage from 
 P. de Mailla's History, that writer is both translating and para- 
 phrasing 'the star group Hiu.'" 
 
PARTI.] "15° DU VERSEAU" 199 
 
 degrees of the ecliptic in the constellation Aquarius ; 
 to restrict to one degree the given star mark was an 
 inaccuracy serious enough in an astronomical state- 
 ment, but this inaccuracy is as nothing when com- 
 pared with the further entire distortion of facts 
 occasioned by P. de Mailla's use of the ambiguous 
 phrase, " 15° du Verseau," ambiguous because it can 
 be taken to refer either to the fifteenth degree of 
 the sign, or of the constellation "du Verseau" 
 (Aquarius). 
 
 The Siou Hiu is situated, as stated above, in 
 the constellation Aquarius (see diagram), but astro- 
 nomers reading P. de Mailla's translation have 
 understood the phrase in its technical sense, and 
 have therefore been led to believe that the Em- 
 peror Tchuen-Hio fixed the beginning of the 
 Chinese year to the 1 5° of the sign Aquarius ; 
 and as, astronomically and technically speaking, 
 the 15° Aquarius (sign) has no reference to any 
 star or constellation, but is only that point of 
 the ecliptic to which the sun attains exactly at the 
 mid-season between winter solstice and spring 
 equinox, they have taken for granted that 2,500 b.c. 
 the Chinese year began at that point, and therefore 
 
200 THE CHINESE CAEENDAR [part i. 
 
 at the same season as it does at the present 
 time. 
 
 But as we now learn on the high authority of 
 Professor Legge that it was to the star group Hiu 
 that Tchuen-Hio is recorded to have bound the 
 beginning of the year, we know that if the record 
 is true, the year in Tchuen-Hio's time must have 
 begun at the winter solstice, and not at the mid- 
 season, between it and the equinox. 
 
 When due correction of P. de Mailla's paraphrase 
 has been made in the passage recording Tchuen- 
 Hio's reform, there remains still a difficulty to be 
 overcome in the account of this event given in the 
 Histoire Gdn^rale de la Chine, or rather I should 
 say that it is when we have corrected P. de Mailla's 
 paraphrase that this difficulty appears. For in the 
 history it is stated that it was from the new moon at 
 the beginning of spring, and near to the star group 
 Hiu, that the year was then and henceforth to be 
 counted, and this statement contains an astronomical 
 contradiction. Our knowledge of the precession of 
 the equinoxes teaches us that the star group Hiu in 
 Tchuen-Hio's time did not mark the beginning of 
 spring, but rather the very middle of winter. 
 
PARTI] "THE STAR GROUP HIU" 201 
 
 Unless, then, we throw aside as worthless the whole 
 record of Tchuen-Hio's reform of the calendar, we 
 are driven to suppose that some Chinese historian, 
 ignorant of the precession of the equinoxes, and 
 writing at a date when, owing to that precession, 
 the first new moon of spring was indeed close to 
 the star group Hiu, and that of the winter solstice 
 far distant from it — that this historian made what 
 he may well have considered a necessary correction 
 in the record with which he was dealing, and 
 substituted the " first day of spring " for the 
 "mid-winter season." Nor need we much blame 
 him for making such a correction, when we 
 find ourselves driven by stress of modern en- 
 lightenment to correct his correction, and to read 
 " mid-winter " where he has written "beginning of 
 spring." 
 
 Let us now read with due corrections, between 
 square brackets, the record of Tchuen-Hio's reforma- 
 tion of the calendar as given in the Histoire Gdn^rale 
 de la Chine. 
 
 "Tchuen-Hio . . . profitant de la paix dont 
 jouissoit I'empire, transfera sa cour a Kao-yang, 
 Ce fut dans cette ville, que toujours passionn^ pour 
 
202 THE CHINESE CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 la connoissance des astres, il etablit une espece 
 d'acad^mie, composee des Lettr^s les plus habiles 
 en cette science. On recueillit toutes les observa- 
 tions anciennes qu'on compara avec les modernes, 
 et on poussa I'astronomie a un degre de perfection 
 surprenant. Les regies sdres qu'ils etablirent pour 
 supputer les mouvements du soleil, de la lune, des 
 pianettes, et des ^toiles fixes, acquirent a Tchuen- 
 Hio le titre glorieux de restaurateur, et meme de 
 fondateur de la vraie astronomic. C'est une perte 
 que ces regies ne soient pas venues jusqu' a 
 nous. 
 
 " Apres plusieurs anndes de travail, Tchuen-Hio 
 determina qua I'avenir I'annee commenceroit a la 
 lune la plus proche du premier jour du printems 
 [proche du solstice d'hiver] qui vient vers le 15° du 
 Verseau ; [vers le Siou Hiu] et comme il savoit par 
 le calcul qu'il en avoit fait, que dans une des annees 
 de son regne les pianettes devoient se joindre dans 
 la constellation Cke (constellation qui occupe 17° dans 
 le ciel, dont le milieu est vers le 6° des Poissons) 
 il choisit cette ann6e-la pour la premiere de son 
 calendrier, d'autant plus que cette meme annee le 
 soleil et la lune se trouvoient en conjonction, le 
 
PART I.] TCHUEN-HIO'S REFORM 203 
 
 premier jour du printems [le jour du solstice 
 d'hiver]." ' 
 
 It may, of course, be objected to the proposed 
 correction of the season in this passage as follows : 
 granting that either the star mark Hiu, or the spring 
 season said to have been chosen by Tchuen-Hio, 
 must have been erroneously recorded in the Histoire 
 Gdndrale, the probabilities are equal as to which 
 element in the statement is or is not true. Tchuen- 
 Hio may have chosen the moon nearest to the first 
 day of spring, and may have named some constella- 
 tion other than Hiu near to which this first moon 
 was in conjunction with the sun. The late Chinese 
 historian, instead of tampering as above supposed 
 with the recorded season, may have substituted the 
 name of the star group Hiu, which at his date 
 marked the beginning of spring, for that "other" 
 chosen by Tchuen-Hio. 
 
 But the probabilities on this point are in reality 
 not equally balanced. For, in the first instance, we 
 must take into consideration the very general opinion 
 that the year in China anciently began at the winter 
 solstice, and the fact that this season was in Tchuen- 
 * Vol. I. p. 33. 
 
204 THE CHINESE CALENDAR [part i, 
 
 Hio's time so accurately marked by the junction of 
 the star groups Wei and Hiu (see diagram), and 
 we must further take into consideration the many 
 references to the star group Hiu in ancient 
 Chinese hterature, which connect it very specially 
 with traditions concerning the Emperor Tchuen- 
 Hio. Many passages in the works of the Pere 
 Gaubil are to be met with to this effect, as for 
 instance where he thus quotes and comments 
 on a statement in the Eul-ya. "On designe 
 Hiuen-hiao par la Constellation Hui (sic) ; on 
 appelle encore ce Signe Tchouen-Hio." Gaubil 
 adds, " Le Signe Hiuen-Hiao est celui que nous 
 appelons Amphora. Le dictionnaire [Eul-ya] met 
 dans ce Signe la Constellation Hiu ; c'est-a-dire que 
 le Signe commen^oit par quelque d6gr6 de cette 
 Constellation. L'Histoire Chinoise asseure que 
 I'eau est le symbole du r^gne de Tchouen-Hiu {sic). 
 L'Eul-ya dit formellement que Hiuen-hiao Signe 
 Celestedu Zodiaquedesigne I'Empereur Tchouen-Hiu 
 {sic)y^ Schlegel also tells us that the Chinese placed 
 the soul of Tchuen-Hio in the constellation Hiu. 
 
 ' Observations Mathimatiques, Astronomiques, &c., redigees 
 et publiees par le P. Etienne Souciet, tome iii. pp. 31-33. 
 
PART I.] TCHUEN-HIO AND HIU 205 
 
 But not only is Hiu in Chinese literature closely 
 associated with the Emperor Tchuen-Hio : it is also 
 closely bracketed with the season of the winter sol- 
 stice. Schlegel gives many quotations to this effect 
 from Chinese authorities, but he would refer all such 
 allusions to the far back time between 14,000 and 
 13,000 B.C., when Hiu was in opposition to the sun 
 at that season, not in conjunction with it as at 
 Tchuen-Hio's date. 
 
 Of Hiu he writes : — 
 
 Hiu, ou Tertre fundraire} 
 
 " C'est cet asterisme dont la culmination a 
 I'heure tsze {\\^ de la nuit) annongait le solstice 
 d'hiver. . . . ' Au solstice d'hiver,' dit le M^moire 
 sur la divination par la tortue, ' la course du soleil 
 et des astres n'est pas encore complete, et ils sont 
 consequemment delaisses comme des orphelins [Kou) 
 et vides {Hiu).' Le solstice d'hiver dtait done 
 consider^ par les Chinois comme la position d'un 
 ' orphelin au tombeau de ses parents.' . . . Le 
 pere Noel a traduit {Hiu) par Vacuum, Vide ; mais 
 nous pref^rons traduire litdralement par Tertre 
 funeraire."^ 
 
 ^ Uranographie Chinoise, p. 214. " Ibid. p. 217. 
 
 P 
 
206 THE CHINESE CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 Taking these various passages into consideration, 
 we are, I think, led to feel that the probabilities in 
 favour of Tchuen-Hio having chosen the star group 
 Hiu to mark, in conjunction with the sun, the winter 
 solstice, are greater than those in favour of a com- 
 paratively modern choice of that star group as a 
 mark for the beginning of spring. 
 
 Reading the passage of the Histoire G^ndrale as 
 corrected above, we may assume that Tchuen-Hio 
 intended to establish sure rules by which the Chinese 
 were for the future to count their years from the 
 solstice, and from the conjunction of sun and moon 
 close to the star group Hiu. But we also know that 
 the following of these sure rules was an impossibility. 
 Either the season or the star mark must in the long 
 course of ages have been abandoned. It would 
 be a difficult, perhaps an impossible, task to ascer- 
 tain how far, or in what manner, the attempt was 
 made under successive dynasties to carry out the 
 injunctions of Tchuen-Hio. We read in the Con- 
 fucian Analects that in answer to his "disciple," 
 who had asked him, " how the government of a 
 country should be administered," the Master said — 
 as the first of five rules — "Follow the seasons of 
 
PART I.] HIU 2205 B.C.-1600 A.D. 207 
 
 Hsia." And in his note on this text the commenta- 
 tor says, "Confucius approved the rule of the Hsia 
 dynasty. His decision has been the law of all the 
 dynasties since the Ch'in." ^ During all the cen- 
 turies in which the Hea or Hsia dynasty held 
 sway, i.e., from 2205 to 1766 B.C., the sure rules 
 of Tchuen-Hio might have been carried out with- 
 out much difficulty, for at the new moon nearest to 
 the winter solstice the sun would still have been in or 
 near to the constellation Hiu (see diagram), though 
 at the date of Confucius, 551-479 b.c, this was no 
 longer the case. Judging from the final result, 
 we may, I think, take it for granted that the 
 Chinese followed the star mark and not the season 
 appointed for the beginning of the year by Tchuen- 
 Hio. And thus following the star mark, the begin- 
 ning of their year imperceptibly receded from the 
 solstice, and approached the spring equinox, so that 
 in 1600 A,D. the Jesuit fathers found the year still 
 beginning at the new moon, "vers le Siou Hiu," 
 and hence at the season midway between the winter 
 solstice and the spring equinox. 
 
 ' Legge, Chinese Classics, vol. i., Confucian Analects, book xv., 
 ch. X. 
 
2o8 THE CHINESE CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 In a former Paper contributed to these Proceed- 
 ings^ I suggested that in the inscription engraved 
 on Gudea's diorite statue we had evidence of a 
 reform of the already existing Accadian calendar — 
 in use from a date much earlier than Gudea's in the 
 neighbouring Babylonian kingdom. 
 
 Gudea's date is placed by scholars at about 2800 
 B.C.— not much earlier than at that claimed in the 
 Chinese History for Tchuen-Hio. 
 
 Much honour is given by this priestly ruler of 
 Lagash " to Ningirsu, and to the goddess Bau, his 
 beloved consort," and the concluding lines of the 
 inscription run as follows : — 
 
 " On the day of the beginning of the year, the 
 day of the festival of Bau, on which offerings were 
 made : one calf, one fat sheep, three lambs, six full 
 grown sheep, two rams, seven pat of dates, seven 
 sab of cream, seven palm buds. 
 
 " Such were the offerings made to the goddess 
 Bau, in the ancient temple on that day." 
 
 The generally received opinion as to Ningirsu 
 (Ninib) is, that he was the god of the "southern 
 sun"; and, as I contended in my Paper, the southern 
 1 February 1896, V. p. 54, 
 
PART I.] GUDEA AND TCHIIEN-HIO 209 
 
 sun, if we think of the sun in its yearly, not merely 
 in its daily course, may fitly represent the sun of the 
 winter solstice, while the goddess Bau = Gula is the 
 goddess by whose very name the constellation 
 Aquarius, as we may assume, was designated in the 
 Accadian astrological texts. 
 
 If from Gudea's inscription concerning the new 
 year's festival a reform in the calendar of Lagash 
 may be inferred, by which the beginning of the year 
 was transferred from the stars of Aries to those of 
 Aquarius, we should find that the Lagash inscrip- 
 tion, and the great History of China, tell us the 
 same story — the Lagash inscription supplementing 
 the Chinese History in this important point — that 
 whereas the account of Tchuen-Hio's reform has 
 been manifestly more or less garbled in its long 
 descent through human hands : that of Gudea's new 
 year's festival is a contemporaneous and utterly 
 untampered - with account. It is also of some 
 moment to note one curious point of resemblance in 
 the idea connected with the stars of Aquarius, by 
 the astronomers of countries so far distant from each 
 other as China and Mesopotamia. Hiu, as we have 
 learnt, may be translated as " Vacuum," and the 
 
210 THE CHINESE CALENDAR [part i. 
 
 name of the goddess Bau or Bahu bears the same 
 signification as the Hebrew word translated in 
 Genesis i. 2 by " void."^ 
 
 If we now accept Tchuen-Hio's reformation as a 
 re-adjustment of a previously-existing sidereal and 
 originally solstitial calendar, we are at once given 
 the clue to the two so similar Hindu and Chinese 
 traditions quoted above, concerning the initial point 
 of their Lunar Zodiacs : and we shall recognise that 
 Kio — containing the star Spica — in opposition to, 
 and the first degrees of Aswini, z« conjunction with, 
 the sun, obtained the posts of leaders of the lunar 
 series for the same reason — namely, that they marked 
 the beginning of the year at the winter solstice 6000 
 
 B.C. 
 
 To this same cause I have here, and elsewhere, 
 attributed the fact that in the Accadian calendar the 
 stars of Aries held the same position, and marked 
 the first month of the year, as the month of the 
 "sacrifice of righteousness." 
 
 In thus tracing back the history of the calendars 
 of the ancient nations of the East, in observing the 
 
 ' Sayce, Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archceology, 
 February 1874. 
 
PARTI.] "BEHOLD THE PEOPLE IS ONE" 211 
 
 identity of their earliest astronomical traditions, and 
 noting the curious points of contact and divergence 
 in their later scientific and mythological ideas, the 
 impression seqms to force itself upon us more and 
 more definitely, that before the races of mankind 
 were " scattered abroad upon the face of the whole 
 earth," their ancestors were capable of great scientific 
 achievements, and possessed in common high intel- 
 lectual aspirations. 
 
 We in these later days, so picturing to ourselves 
 the past, may be freshly struck by the words of the 
 ancient history, which tell us of the time when "the 
 whole earth was of one language and of one 
 speech," 
 
PART II 
 
 PLATES. 
 
PART II. 
 
 PLATES XV., XVI., XVII., and XVIII. 
 
 In the foregoing pages arguments have been urged in support 
 of the view that the ecliptic circle, at the remote date 
 (speaking in round numbers) of 6000 B.C., had been portioned 
 by some "ancient race of men" into twelve divisions; and 
 that the twelve constellational figures of the Zodiac had then 
 also been imagined under forms more or less closely resem- 
 bling those which we recognize in the heavens at the present day. 
 
 Most of the arguments in favour of this opinion are neces- 
 sarily based on considerations connected with the phenomena of 
 the heavens, effected in the long course of ages by a slow revolu- 
 tion of the earth's axis. Astronomers during the last two 
 thousand years have carefully observed the effects and studied 
 the causes of this slow terrestrial movement, and they can now 
 tell us with confidence and exactness that the space of 25,868 
 years is required for the accomplishment of one such revolution 
 of the earth's axis. 
 
 In our enquiry into the astronomy of the ancients we need 
 not at all turn our minds to the difficult subject of the causes, or 
 indeed even to the fact, of this slow movement of the earth's 
 axis, further than to realize fully that its effects have been to pro- 
 duce a slow but continuous change in the apparent position of the 
 fixed stars, a change not in their position relatively to each other, 
 but in their distances from the heavenly equator and its poles. 
 
 The effort to fully realize these effects by means of careful 
 calculations and measurements must prove to any but an 
 astronomer a most arduous task ; but, by aid of the mechanical 
 contrivance called a " precessional globe," much of the difficulty 
 
 215 
 
2i6 PLATES XV, XVI, XVII, XVIII. 
 
 of the task may be overcome. The accompanying diagrams 
 have been drawn from a precessional globe, which can be 
 adjusted so as to show the position of the poles and equator 
 amongst the fixed stars, at dates distant from each other by 
 intervals of 538 years.^ 
 
 I have shown in continuous outline those constellations for 
 whose first imagining it seemed to me as early a date might be 
 claimed as that referred to in each diagram ; all others are given 
 in dotted outline. The strange figures of the " ancient constella- 
 tions " are here drawn as they are represented on the globe ; but 
 the fixed stars which mark these figures for observers of the 
 heavens, I have not ventured to indicate, as to do so would 
 have required great accuracy of drawing and measurement. 
 It is not for a moment to be contended that all the ancient 
 constellations were imagined exactly under the forms by which 
 we have learnt to know them from classic representations, from 
 the poem of Aratos, and from the star list of Ptolemy. Variants 
 of many of the figures are to be met with in astronomical 
 atlases and on the celestial globes in use to-day ; and to estab- 
 lish the relative claims concerning the antiquity of these variant 
 forms is a branch to itself of research. 
 
 That these constellations have indeed been well denominated 
 " ancient " is scarcely to be denied, and our only wonder, when 
 studying the subject, must be, not that some differences are to be 
 met with as to the exact form under which, at different dates and 
 by different nations, these figures were delineated in the heavens, 
 but rather the wonder must be that (as archaeological research 
 is always more and more clearly establishing) through many 
 thousands of years, and by nations long and widely separated, 
 the stars, which to an unaccustomed observer seem to be 
 scattered in wild and random profusion on the sky, should have 
 
 ^ 1800 A.D. is the date to which the globe in question originally refers ; the 
 intervals of 538 years can be reckoned backwards or forwards from this date. 
 
ANTIQUITY OF CONSTELLATIONS 217 
 
 been divided into the same distinct groups, and thought of as 
 representing the same mysterious beings. 
 
 But though it may be impossible to maintain that the Grecians 
 have handed down to us in an absolutely unchanged form the 
 figures of the ancient constellations as they were first imagined 
 in remote ages, yet many proofs may be cited in favour of the 
 opinion, that not lightly or arbitrarily did astronomical artists 
 venture to tamper with the Zodiacal and extra-Zodiacal figures. 
 
 Some of these proofs have already been pointed out in the 
 foregoing Papers. Attention will be drawn to others in the con- 
 sideration of the diagrams here given. 
 
 In Plates XV., XVI., XVII., and XVIII., the positions of the 
 solstitial and equinoctial colures amongst the constellations are 
 given at the date 5744 B.C. Had it been possible, I should have 
 liked to have drawn these diagrams as at 6000 b.c. — not only 
 because it is easier to deal with and to remember a round number 
 such as that, but also because at that date the solstitial colure 
 passed through the ecliptic only one degree distant from the initial 
 point of the Indian Zodiac — a point which there seems good 
 reason to believe was the initial point of many, other than Indian, 
 ancient Zodiacs. 
 
 Owing to the mechanical restrictions of the precessional globe, 
 it was not possible to adjust it to any more accurate date than 
 that of 5744 b.c. 
 
 It will not be necessary here to reiterate the considerations 
 in favour of the opinion already advanced that the calendrical 
 importance of the constellation Aries in some nations, and its 
 symbolical importance in the mythology of others, may best be 
 explained by the supposition that the choice of this constellation 
 as " Prince and Leader " of the signs was made not when its stars 
 marked the spring equinox, but when they marked the winter 
 solstice. 
 
 Let us rather take this opmion as a working hypothesis, and 
 
2i8 PLATES XV., XVI., XVII., XVIII. 
 
 turn our attention to the importance, in ancient symbolism, of 
 the four constellations— Aries, Cancer, Libra, and Capricornus — 
 which, according to this hypothesis, marked \\i<tfour seasons, and 
 the cardinal points 6000 B.C. 
 
 Next in this order to Aries comes Cancer, The Crab (see 
 Plate XVI.). In Babylonia, it seems to be established that a 
 tortoise, not a crab, represented the fourth constellation of the 
 Zodiac. In Egypt, as we learn from the Zodiacs of Esneh and 
 Denderah, it was the scarabaus beetle that held the place given 
 to the crab in the Grecian sphere. 
 
 There is a sort of outward resemblance between these three 
 creatures, wide apart as they are anatomically from each other. 
 They are all hard-shelled, creeping, and insignificant-looking 
 animals. Why under any of these three forms a constellation of 
 the Zodiac should have been depicted, it is difficult to conjecture; 
 but if we have to admit that in Egyptian astronomy the beetle 
 played the important part of marking as a constellation one of the 
 quarters of the ecliptic circle, this admission will furnish us with 
 an adequate reason for the extraordinary honour paid in Egyptian 
 symbolic art to this lowly, and in itself unattractive, insect. 
 
 The scarabKus, according to our hypothesis, marked in ancient 
 calendrical tradition the spring equinox when in conjunction with 
 the sun, and the autumn equinox in opposition to it. And it was 
 as presiding visibly in opposition that we may reasonably suppose 
 it gained such honour in Egypt. For the autumn, not the spring, 
 is in that land the time when vegetation begins to burst into hfe, 
 and when all Egypt rejoices. I think, moreover, that facts con- 
 nected with the worship of the Apis Bull will further strengthen 
 the opinion that the Egyptians considered the constellations in 
 opposition to the sun to be those which presided over particular 
 seasons and months.' 
 
 To trace allusions in the symbolic art of Egypt to Libra — the 
 ' See below, pp. 234, 235. 
 
CRAB = SCARAB^US, SCALES = PLUMES 219 
 
 third in order of the constellations we are now discussing (see 
 Plate XVII.) — is, it must be confessed, not so simple a matter, 
 and it is with some diffidence that I put forward the following 
 suggestion — i.e., that we may perhaps find in the "two feathers," 
 so prominent in Egyptian mythologic imagery, a reference to the 
 two scales of the Balance (Libra). 
 
 In allegorical language ive speak often of 
 the even scales of Justice, and in art the god- 
 dess is always represented with the Balance 
 in her hand. In Egyptian symbolism and 
 art, I think the two feathers represented the 
 equal weights of the scales of Justice. In 
 the great judgment hall of Osiris, the souls 
 of men were weighed in the balance. The 
 soul, or heart, of the dead Egyptian was 
 placed in one scale, while a feather — or the 
 figure of the goddess Mait, wearing on her 
 head a single plume or feather — occupied 
 the other. Mait was the goddess of Justice, 
 and we often read also of '• the two Maits 
 who preside over Justice and Truth.'' 
 
 There is a woodcut in Prof. Maspero's 
 Dawn of Civilization, p. 130, in which 
 the head-dress — the symbolic head-dress — 
 so often to be met with in Egyptian mytho- 
 logic representations, is very clearly drawn. 
 It was in studying this woodcut that the idea 
 first suggested itself to my mind, that in this head-dress we may 
 find a reference to the four constellations which, when the 
 Zodiac was first imagined, marked the four colures — the four 
 quarters of the heavens — that it was in fact an astronomic 
 monogram, combining four figures in one. 
 
 In this head-dress very plainly are to be seen the horns of a 
 
 The Didu dressed. 
 
220 PLATES XV., XVI, XVII., XVIII. 
 
 ram, and those of a goat. Less convincingly, perhaps, the disc 
 from which spring the goat's horns suggests " the disc enclosing 
 a scarabeus," ' under which form the sun as Khophri — " He who 
 is "^ — was sometimes represented by the Egyptians. 
 
 The two feathers in outline clearly show themselves, but to 
 connect these two feathers with the scales of Libra is only adven- 
 tured as a possible means of giving an astronomic value to the so 
 often repeated combination of the forms in this head-dress. 
 
 As to Capricornus (the fourth of the constellations which 
 marked the colures 6000 B.C.), (see Plate XVIII.), we do not 
 meet with any representations, so far as I know, of a goat-fish 
 on Egyptian monuments, but on Babylonian boundary stones and 
 engraved gems this monster is often to be seen, exactly repre- 
 sented in form and attitude as on the Grecian sphere. The goat's 
 horns are all we find portrayed in ancient Egyptian art, and when 
 they are portrayed they appear together with the ratn's horns, and 
 often springing out of a ram's head. For this curt reference to the 
 goat (Capricornus) a reason may be found by remembering that 
 this constellation, in opposition, presided — traditionally — over the 
 least honoured season of the Egyptian year — the arid season 
 preceding the inundations. 
 
 It should be borne in mind that all the Egyptian mythologic 
 symbolism we have been considering must necessarily have only 
 embodied traditions already even under the earliest dynasties 
 extremely ancient ; for it was, as may be seen in the Plates, about 
 6000 B.C. that the colures touched the extreme western degrees of 
 the constellations Aries, Cancer, and Libra — and a point some 
 degrees to the west of Capricornus, as it is now drawn. In each 
 succeeding century the colures moved still more to the west, 
 through the stars, and from 6000 down to 4000 B.C. they were no 
 longer to be observed in the four already named constellations, 
 but in Pisces, Gemini, Virgo, and Sagittarius. 
 
 ' Maspero, p. 139. " Ibid. p. 138. 
 
TWINS— EQUAL DAY AND NIGHT 221 
 
 It is curious to note that there seems to be no pronounced 
 allusion in Egyptian art or literature to these four constellations, 
 though there are indications (see pp. 230-238) which may lead us 
 to believe that the astronomical phenomena of the later date, 4000 
 B.C., were closely observed, and seem to have formed the basis of 
 much of the mythology of Egypt. 
 
 These facts tend to confirm the conclusion — so often advo- 
 cated in this book — that the ancestors of the Egyptians, as also of 
 all the great civilized nations of antiquity, followed through many 
 long ages the same sidereal calendar — one based on the observa- 
 tion of the colures amongst the fixed stars 6000 B.C. And it 
 would seem that not till about 4000 B.C., when the colures had 
 traversed, from east to west, the constellations Pisces, Gemini, 
 Virgo, and Sagittarius, and had arrived at the eastern degrees of 
 Aquarius, Taurus, Leo, and Scorpio, did astronomic authorities in 
 Egypt direct their attention to a reform of the calendar and intro- 
 duce into it, and into religious observances, references to these 
 four last-named constellations. 
 
 Turning to Plate XVI. we may notice that the equinoctial 
 colure, marking out as it does the extreme western limits of the 
 constellation Cancer, passes also through a part of the constella- 
 tion Gemini. This fact may, I think, help to explain some of the 
 legends connected with the twins Castor and Pollux in ancient 
 lore. 
 
 A very brilliant star glitters on the head of each twin. These 
 stars are of almost equal lustre and well deserve the name of twin 
 stars ; and so we can easily suppose how it was that the imagina- 
 tive astronomers who, at the early date in question, mapped out 
 the figures of the Zodiac, noticing that the equinoctial colure 
 passed between these two bright stars, should have elected to 
 represent them as marking the heads of twin figures, which they 
 determined should symbolize the equal day and night of the 
 season over which they presided. 
 
 Q 
 
222 PLATES XV., XVI., XVII, XVIII. 
 
 These two stars, thousands of years after they had ceased to 
 mark the equinox, were still associated by the Greeks with the 
 twin heroes — Castor and Pollux — brothers who, according to the 
 legend, were " possessed of an immortality of existence so divided 
 among them, that as one dies, the other revives." The learned 
 Dr Barrett has pointed out that " this furnishes a complete de- 
 scription of Day and Night.'' This remark of Dr Barrett's becomes 
 especially interesting if we attribute the first symbolizing of day and 
 night by these stars to the work of astronomers at a date when 
 the day and night these stars symbolized were of exactly equal 
 length, and when, therefore, the equal stars and equal alternation 
 of light and darkness might both be fitly symbolized as twins. 
 
 At Plate XVIII. it is to be observed that the equinoctial 
 colure, instead of adjoining Capricornus, occupies an almost 
 central position in the preceding constellation, Sagittarius. This 
 fact, together with other considerations, has led me to think that 
 originally only the bow and arrow of Sagittarius were imagined for 
 that division of the ecliptic ; and that the huge composite figure of 
 the archer — half man and half horse — was added to the original 
 design in later ages, by astronomers who chose the spring equinox 
 instead of the winter solstice for the beginning of the year. 
 
 In discussing the Median calendar, the importance which 
 seems to have been given by the ancestors of the Medes to the 
 constellation Sagittarius, at a date when it marked the spring 
 equinox, was dwelt upon. It will, I think, appear likely, when we 
 come to study Plates XIX. and XX., that as early as 4600 B.C. 
 constellations were imagined to honour and mark the equinoctial 
 as well as the solstitial seasons. 
 
 Perhaps then, at that date the constellation Sagittarius was 
 extended to its present dimensions ; and it may be that some 
 centuries later, when the colure of the winter solstice had passed 
 into the constellation Aquarius, some astronomers desired — 
 like Gudea of Lagash and Tchuen-Hio in China— to honour that 
 
DRACO Ai\D BOOTES 223 
 
 season, and to make it the beginning of the year. It may be that 
 such astronomers dealt with the eleventh constellation of the 
 Zodiac, as earlier ones had dealt with Sagittarius, and that they 
 added to what was possibly originally only a water jar, Amphora, 
 the figure of the water potcrer Aquarius. 
 
 These ideas are put forward very speculatively. They were 
 partly suggested by noticing that in the Indian Zodiac the name of 
 the constellation Sagittarius is merely Dhanus (arrow), and the 
 name of Aquarius is Kumbha (water jar). 
 
 In the diagrams which we have been discussing, it will be 
 observed that only the twelve figures of the Zodiac, and two of the 
 extra-Zodiacal constellations, are given in continuous outline, one 
 of these two is Draco — the dragon or serpent whose folds surround 
 the Pole of the Ecliptic — the central point of the circle of the 
 Zodiac. 
 
 That the astronomers who traced out the circle of the Zodiac 
 on the heavens, and imagined its twelve strange figures, should 
 also have devoted attention to, and marked out, its central point, 
 is not improbable. The Pole of the Ecliptic, unlike the Pole of 
 the Heavens, is immoveable amongst the fixed stars. At 6000 B.C., 
 as at the present date, the stars of Draco surrounded this point — 
 a point not itself marked by any conspicuous star. We have not, 
 however, I think, at present sufficient grounds for deciding at what 
 exact date the constellation Draco was imagined under the form 
 it now holds. But that it is very ancient there is no doubt. 
 
 For the first depicting on the vault of heaven of the figure of 
 Bootes, I claim with much stronger conviction the date of 6000 
 B.C., and the latitude of 45" north. For then and there Bootes 
 might be seen at midnight of the summer solstice, standing up- 
 right on the northern horizon, his head reaching nearly to the 
 Pole of the Heavens. Never since that date has he held so com- 
 manding a position in the sky, nor at any more southern latitude 
 could his whole figure have been represented as standing on the 
 horizon. 
 
224 PLATES XV., XVI, XVII., XVIII. 
 
 One further suggestion as to this constellation I am tempted 
 to make. Not, it is true, on the same firm astronomical grounds 
 as those put forward for the date of the first imagining of the 
 figure, but a suggestion based on the Greek name of the con- 
 stellation. 
 
 The name Bootes has been translated as ox-driver, and of 
 him Aratos says : — 
 
 " The Bear-ward, whom mankind the Ploughman call, 
 Because he seems to touch the wain-like Bear.'''' ' 
 
 The seven bright stars which mark the tail and part of the 
 body of the Great Bear are often spoken of as " the Plough," and 
 in the large remaining space allotted on the sphere to the con- 
 stellation Ursa jMajor, it would not be difficult to include oxen 
 harnessed to the brightly marked celestial plough. 
 
 I have said that at midnight of the summer solstice the con- 
 stellation Bootes — if we suppose it to have been imagined at 
 6000 B.C. — presided visibly over the northern sky. But we have 
 learnt from the month names in the Accadian calendar that the 
 astronomers who instituted it always directed attention to the 
 constellations which invisibly accompanied the sun in his daily 
 journeyings from east to west, rather than to those which (in opposi- 
 tion) were visible through the hours of the night. For example- 
 all through the mid-winter month of the sacrifice of righteousness, 
 the stars of the Ram — the celestial symbol of that sacrifice — were 
 invisible, hidden in the overpowering light of the sun. In like 
 manner, I think, we may assume that at the close of the Accadian 
 year — in the "month of the sowing of seed" or in "the dark 
 month of sowing," when mortal husbandmen were following on 
 earth their ox-drawn ploughs, Bootes, the ox-driver, though invis- 
 ible to the bodily eye, appeared to the mental vision of the 
 
 1 The Phainomena or " Heavenly Display " of Aratos, done into English 
 verse by Robert Brown, Jun., F.S.A., line 92. 
 
BOOTES THE PLOUGHMAN 225 
 
 astronomer, following unweariedly the ox-drawn plough in the 
 sky. 
 
 The various suppositions here put forward will lead those who 
 accept them as probably correct, to picture to themselves the 
 existence, at the early date of 6000 B.C., in latitude 45° N., of a 
 race of men — not savages, and not merely pastoral nomads — but 
 a race of agriculturists who tilled the ground and reaped its fruits 
 — a race possessed of high intellectual power — who respected law 
 and justice, and whose religion taught them to offer to their god 
 " sacrifices of righteousness." 
 
PLATES XIX. AND XX. 
 
 In Plate XIX., fig. i, it is the constellation known in the Grecian 
 sphere as Hercules that claims our attention. At the date and 
 latitude above named, this constellation, if then it had already 
 been imagined, culminated gloriously on the northern meridian at 
 midnight of the spring equinox. The head of the hero, or demi- 
 god, touched the very zenith, and with his club brandished aloft 
 he must have seemed well fitted to triumph over, not only the 
 dragon coiled beneath his feet, but over every opposing power. 
 
 As was said at p. 223 about Bootes, 6000 B.C., so it may here 
 be repeated of Hercules, 4667 B.C., "never since that date has he 
 held so commanding a position in the sky." 
 
 At the present date of writing, and in our English latitudes, 
 Hercules " will ever rise reversed," ^ and through the summer 
 and autumn months his kneeling figure is always to be seen 
 hanging head downwards in the southern quarter of the sky. 
 
 Grecian writers, some centuries B.C., were already puzzled to 
 account for this "reversed" position of "the Kneeler." Aratos, 
 from whom I have quoted above, thus further wonders as to this 
 constellation. At line 63 we read : — 
 
 " . . . . like a toiling man, revolves 
 A form. Of it can no one clearly speak, 
 Nor to what toil he is attached ; but, simply, 
 Kneeler they call him. Labouring on his knees, 
 Like one who sinks he seems ; " 
 
 and again at line 614 — 
 
 " The Kneeler 
 
 He who is ne'er far distant from the Lyre, 
 Whoe'er this stranger of the heavenly forms 
 May be." ' 
 
 1 The Phainomena or " Heavenly Display '' of Aratos, done into English 
 verse by Robert Brown, Jun., F.S.A., line 669. 
 226 
 
HERCULES, CORONA, HYDRA, ORION 227 
 
 4600 B.C. no such difficult speculations could have presented 
 themselves to the minds of those who, in the joyous springtime 
 of the year, beheld in imagination, night after night, the grand 
 and conquering figure of this god or hero, typifying for them, as 
 we may easily suppose, the ever-increasing triumph at that season 
 of the power of light over darkness. 
 
 Plate XIX., fig. 2. It was perhaps at this same date that the 
 cluster of stars " led round in circle " '■ close to the bow of Sagit- 
 tarius, and exactly marking the equinoctial colure, was figured as a 
 crown, and that so depicted, as I have contended at page 76, this 
 constellation suggested the symbolic circle, crown, or wreath 
 which sometimes takes the place of the bow in Assur's hand, and 
 which almost always is present in the hand of Ahura Mazda in 
 Median representations of that figure. 
 
 At Plate XX., fig. i, I have drawn the constellation Hydra 
 as it would have appeared at the date 4667 B.C. Atpagesri7, 118, 
 the reasons which led me to suppose that this constellation was 
 then first imagined have been given. 
 
 At Plate XX., fig. 2, it may be seen how 4667 B.C. the figure 
 of Orion very accurately marked the equinoctial colure, and this 
 fact may incline us to suppose that the giant hunter — so often, 
 according to Grecian legend, in conflict with the powers of high 
 Heaven — was depicted about this date by ancient astronomers 
 to represent the strength of the adverse powers which, at the 
 autumnal season in the mythologies of northern nations, appear in 
 combat with, and temporarily triumphant over, the powers of light. 
 
 In favour of the high date here claimed for the imagining of 
 Orion's figure under very much the same form as that still 
 depicted on our globes, there are some indications to be observed 
 in the Sanscrit names of the Nakshatra, which contains the stars, 
 \ <Pi p2 Orionis — i.e., the stars marking the head of Orion. 
 
 ^ The Phainomena or " Heavenly Display " of Aratos, done into English 
 verse by Robert Brown, Jun., F.S.A., line 401. 
 
228 PLATES XIX, XX. 
 
 This Nakshatra is known in Hindu astronomy under two quite 
 different names — viz, Mrigasliirsha and Agrahayani. The Sans- 
 crit word, Mrigashirsha, means literally "Wild beast's head," and 
 B. G. Tilak, in his work. The Orion; or, Researches into the 
 Antiquity of the Vedas, basing his opinion upon many ingenious 
 and recondite arguments, supposes that ancient Indian astrono- 
 mers gave the name of Mrigashiras to the stars of Orion, which 
 they imagined portrayed in the sky an "Antelope's head" trans- 
 fixed by an arrow — the arrow being marked by the three bright 
 stars so well known to us as Orion's Belt. 
 
 Mriga, there can be no doubt, carries often with it in Sanscrit 
 literature the meaning of "antelope": but Tilak expressly says 
 at p. 97, "Though I have translated the word Mrigashiras by 
 'Antelope's head,' I do not mean to imply that Mriga necessarily 
 meant 'an antelope' in the Vedic literature." Again, at p. 151, 
 he says : "The word Mriga in the Rigveda, means according to 
 Sayana both a lion and a deer." 
 
 Again, as to the other name of the Nakshatra— Agrahayani — it 
 has the meaning of "first-going" (of the sun) understood. In a 
 long dissertation on this name, Tilak contends that it marked an 
 important point in the annual course of the sun, and then further 
 seeks to derive the Greek name Orion from the Sanscrit word, 
 Agrahayani. Of the value of the etymological arguments advanced, 
 I am quite unable to judge, but on astronomic grounds it would 
 not seem an improbable derivation. 
 
 But the acceptance of Tilak's contention as to the derivation 
 of the name Orion would make it reasonable to suppose that not 
 only the name but also the configuration of the constellation 
 might, in the astronomy of the Greek and Indian nations, 
 resemble each other; and thus we should be more ready to 
 beheve that Mrigashirsha referred to the lion's head on Orion's 
 arm, and not to an "antelope's head" — a head which, as depicted 
 by Tilak at p. 100, would alone have filled nearly all the space in 
 
ORION, MRIGASHIRAS, AGRAHAYANI 229 
 
 the heavens occupied in the Grecian sphere by the huge figure of 
 the giant hunter known to us as Orion. 
 
 The indications furnished by these two Sanscrit Nakshatra 
 names, if they are followed, must lead us to attribute the imagin- 
 ing and naming of the constellation Orion to a time before that 
 when the ancestors of the Greeks and Indians went their separate 
 ways to the west and to the east, and so will strengthen the claim 
 here made for the depicting of the constellation on the sky as 
 early as 4600 B.C. 
 
 It will be noted that in the suggestions here offered concern- 
 ing Hercules, Corona Australis, Hydra, and Orion, a change in 
 the symbolic methods followed by earlier astronomers, 6000 B.C., 
 must be supposed. 
 
 It was to the constellations invisibly accompanying the sun 
 that the originators of the Zodiac appear to have directed their 
 attention. But the symbolic figures we have now been studying 
 — there can, it seems to me, be little doubt — were designed to 
 mark visibly, and, therefore, in opposition to the sun, the various 
 seasons of the year. 
 
 A great astronomic activity, a sort of astronomic renaissance, 
 in fact, seems to manifest itself as we study the celestial globe at 
 4600 B.C., and to this date I would attribute the origin of the 
 astronomic myths of many nations. 
 
PLATE XXI.^ 
 
 In The Median Calendar and the Constellation Taurus I have 
 put forward considerations drawn from Median and Assyrian 
 sources, which seemed to me to lead to the conclusion that at 
 about the date 4000 b.c. very close attention was given to the 
 position of the colures amongst the fixed stars, and that at that 
 date very special honour was given by the ancestors of the Medes 
 to the constellation Sagittarius — the constellation which at the 
 spring equinox was in opposition to the sun, and therefore visible 
 all through the night. I need not here reiterate what was there 
 advanced on this point concerning Median and Assyrian sym- 
 bolism, but rather I now desire to draw attention to the existence 
 in Egyptian art and mythologic teaching of what I cannot but 
 think is very constant reference to the position of the colures, as 
 they might have been observed — speaking in round numbers — 
 from 4000 down to 2000 B.C. 
 
 It will be seen at Fig. 4 that the equinoctial colure, at the 
 earher of these dates, touched the confines of the constellation 
 Sagittarius, and might even then, with almost equal right, have 
 been claimed as adjoining those of Scorpio. We can well imagine 
 that the astronomic school which carried out the reformation in 
 method discussed above (pp. 222,227), which resulted in the imagin- 
 ing of the constellations Hercules and Corona Australis, and in 
 the extension, as I suggested, of the boundaries of Sagittarius — 
 we can well imagine that this school would with reluctance 
 admit the baleful image of Scorpio to take the post of leader 
 of the year, so long held by Sagittarius. But from 4000 B.C. 
 onwards to 2000 B.C. the constellations that did actually mark 
 
 1 The figures in this Plate have been drawn from the globe adjusted to the 
 date, 4128 B.C., Lat. 40° N. 
 230 
 
BULL, SCORPION, LION, WATER-MAN 231 
 
 the equinoctial and solstitial colures, were Taurus, Scorpio, Leo, 
 and Aquarius. 
 
 Volumes of controversy have been written concerning the 
 astronomic teachings of the ceilings of the temples of Denderah 
 and Edfu, as to the position of the colures amongst the fixed 
 stars, suggested by the arrangement of the figures of the Zodiac 
 in both these temples. The date astronomically referred to in 
 these designs was claimed by some to be about 4000 b.c, but 
 when it was proved that these temples had been restored in 
 Ptolemaic times, and the ceilings probably redecorated then, the 
 high claims put forward for the first imagining of these astro- 
 nomic designs could no longer with certainty be upheld. A strong 
 reaction in opinion then took place, and it was again and again 
 asserted that the Egyptians were probably not even acquainted 
 with the so-called Grecian twelve-fold division of the ecliptic 
 till after the introduction of European culture into Egypt. To 
 seek for allusions in ancient Egyptian mythology or art to any of 
 the twelve Zodiacal constellations was, therefore, a much dis- 
 couraged attempt. 
 
 But if the testimony of the ceilings of the Denderah and Edfu 
 temples is rendered suspect by their Ptolemaic restoration, the 
 same objection cannot be raised against the evidence borne by 
 the ceiling of an ancient Egyptian building, which has certainly 
 not been restored in Ptolemaic times. In the Description de 
 rEgypte^ we find a careful drawing of a " Tableau astronomique 
 au Plafond de I'un des tombeaux des rois." In the central portion 
 on either side of this ceiling a monstrous hippopotamus and croco- 
 dile are represented, together with various beings depicted on a 
 much smaller scale. In the drawing here given, of one of these 
 central groups, we find, as it seems to me, very clear refer- 
 
 * Description de r Egypte, lo vols., Paris, MDCCCXII.-XXIII., Vol. I., 
 Antiquites, planche 95. 
 
THE BULL APIS 
 
 233 
 
 BULL APIS 
 
 ence to the four figures — Taurus, Scorpio, Leo, and Aquarius 
 ( = Amphora). 
 
 The monstrous hippopotamus and crocodile here depicted 
 are, I am strongly inclined 
 to believe, representations, 
 not of any particular con- 
 stellation, but rather of 
 the solstitial and equinoctial 
 colures ; and the four not at 
 all, except astronomically, re- 
 lated figures of the Bull, 
 Scorpion, Lion, and Water- 
 jar, are here very clearly in 
 evidence. 
 
 In Egyptian mythology the 
 Apis Bull held a very important place. " It was regarded as a 
 symbol and incarnation of Osiris, the husband of Isis, and next to 
 Ra, the great divinity of Egypt." Grecian authorities tell us that 
 the Apis Bull was black, with some distinctive white markings ; 
 and on its back (or tongue, according to variant accounts) the 
 figure of a scarabseus was to be observed. From a drawing in 
 Ebers' Egypt, Vol. I., p. 121, we may, however, gather, as I think 
 I have seen it elsewhere stated, that the Apis Bull was marked by 
 equal areas of black and white. Such equal areas would fitly 
 symbolize the equal day and night of the equinoctial season, and 
 the presence of the scarabaeus on the back or tongue of the Bull — 
 if the suggestion made at p. 218 should prove to be correct — 
 would point to the traditional connexion of that creature with the 
 same equinoctial season. 
 
 It has often been assumed that the golden calf set up and 
 worshipped in the wilderness by the Israelites was a representa- 
 tion of the Apis god of Egypt ; and that so also were the calves 
 set up by Jeroboam in Bethel and in Dan on his return from 
 
234 PLATE XXI. 
 
 Egypt. We read in i Kings xii. 32, "And Jeroboam ordained a 
 feast in the eighth month, on the fifteenth day of the month." 
 . . . Ver. 33, " So he offered upon the altar which he had made 
 in Bethel the fifteenth day of the eighth month, even in the 
 month which he had devised of his own heart ; and ordained a 
 feast unto the children of Israel : and he offered upon the altar, 
 and burnt incense." 
 
 Now, from our knowledge of the Babylonian calendar, and 
 its correspondence with that in use in Palestine, we may conclude 
 that the "eighth month" (Marchesvan), devised by Jeroboam, 
 was that during which the sun traversed the constellation Scorpio, 
 and during which Taurus was dominantly visible all night ; 
 and when in this constellation the full moon of the fifteenth or 
 festival day was to be observed. This mention of the eighth 
 month in connexion with the worship of the golden calves — a 
 worship, as has been supposed, copied from Egyptian practice — 
 greatly strengthens the opinion that the Apis Bull was in Egypt 
 looked upon as a living representative of the Zodiacal Bull — the 
 constellation which in the time of the early dynasties marked, in 
 opposition to the sun, the autumnal equinox. 
 
 In Median mythology and art we have seen the great import- 
 ance of Tauric symbolism : but there is a wide difference between 
 the Tauric symbolism of the Medes and the Egyptians. Mithras, 
 the Median sun-god, again and again triumphs over and slays the 
 Bull. In Egypt, on the contrary, the Sacred Bull is honoured 
 and worshipped during its lifetime, and reverently embalmed, 
 and with all pomp and glory buried after its death. 
 
 This difference in the mythologic conceptions of Media and 
 Egypt may be attributed, I think, to the diff"erence of chmatic 
 conditions in the two countries. 
 
 In Media, spring— m Egypt, autumn— is the joyous and 
 fruitful season of the year. In the early ages, when Median and 
 Egyptian mythologies took their rise, Taurus was at the spring 
 
THE BULL IN EGYPT AND IN MEDIA 235 
 
 equinox in conjunction with the sun, and was, therefore, slain by 
 its overwhelming brightness; but at the autumn equinox that 
 same constellation, in opposition, rose when the sun set, and all 
 night long was visible. In Median art, it is the Bull immolated 
 by the sun in springtime that is represented. In Egyptian sym- 
 bolism, it is to the Bull triumphantly traversing the sky by night, 
 in the autumn season, that attention is directed. 
 
 In the light of these astronomic considerations, it is interesting 
 to think of the fanatical act of Cambyses in slaying the Apis Bull, 
 as one prompted not only by fury at seeing the high honour paid 
 to the Egyptian god, but also by an insane pride, which made 
 him desire to imitate the triumph of Mithras — the Persian sun- 
 god — over the Bull in the heavens, by killing its earthly represen- 
 tative, the Apis Bull. 
 
 In the days of Cambyses, when Apis worship prevailed in 
 Egypt, and even still earlier when the children of Israel, in 
 imitation of this worship, set up the golden calf in the wilderness, 
 the raison d'itre for the honour paid to Taurus as a star mark of 
 the autumnal season no longer existed ; for we know that about 
 1800 B.C., the equinoctial colure had left that constellation, and 
 had entered the eastern degrees of the constellation Aries. 
 Egyptian history assures us, however, that the institution of the 
 Apis worship was effected by some king of the iirst dynasty 
 in the far back ages when Taurus, Scorpio, Leo, and Aquarius 
 did actually preside over the four seasons of the year. More- 
 over, the recent discoveries of the tombs of kings and other 
 personages, in the first Egyptian dynasty, lead us back to the 
 remote date of 4000 B.C., when the very earliest observa- 
 tions of the colures in the four above-named constellations could 
 have been made. 
 
 In these ancient tombs, amongst other objects, have been 
 found slate slabs of various shapes— some of them, in their 
 general outline, as it appears to me, representing in the flat the 
 
236 PLATE XXI. 
 
 form of a jar or vase. In the accompanying cuts, a proposed 
 restoration of the broken-ofif top of one of the slates is given, and is 
 distinguished from the existing portion of the slate by being drawn 
 in dotted lines. Both sides of these slabs are covered by finely 
 executed carvings, not incised but in relief. The subjects of the 
 reliefs are very varied, but prominent amongst them, and exactly 
 repeated more than once, is the figure of a bull trampling under 
 his feet, and preparing to gore with his horns, a fallen human foe. 
 Lions are also portrayed in many attitudes, and on one slate, 
 where in the upper register this triumphing bull is represented, 
 below it in a crenellated cartouche a lion and an urn or jar are to 
 be seen in close proximity to each other. On another slate, a 
 scorpion is delineated above a crenellated cartouche; and repre- 
 sentations of scorpions carved in relief on mace-heads and on 
 jars, and scorpions carved in the round, have been met with in 
 great numbers in the excavations at Hierakonpolis — the site also 
 of the discovery of one of the most important of the carved slates 
 here described. 
 
 It is difficult, I think, to resist the conclusion that we have in 
 the carvings on these ancient slate objects references not to merely 
 terrestrial bulls, lions, scorpions, and water jars, but rather to the 
 constellations, already imagined under those forms, whose stars, at 
 the date when these carvings were made, marked in conjunction 
 with, and in opposition to, the sun, the four seasons of the 
 year.' 
 
 1 In the centre of many, if not of all, of the slates under our notice, there is 
 carved on the obverse a ring surrounding a depression. "Mr Quibell's 
 theory, which is still adhered to by Professor Petrie, is that this ring was 
 intended to receive the green paint with which it is supposed the earhest 
 Egyptians painted their faces," but Mr Legge in his Paper, from which I have 
 here quoted (contributed to the Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archtt- 
 ology. May 1900, pp. 137, 138), puts forward a different view, which, if it is 
 correct, would lend support to the astronomic interpretation above proposed 
 for some of the carved representations. Mr Legge considers that the rings 
 
CARVED SLATES 
 
 237 
 
 
 
 ><> 
 
 en (5,"^ 
 
 o 
 
 T3 
 
 lU 
 
 T3 
 
 > 
 
 
 ^ 
 
 3 
 
 o 
 
 R 
 
238 PLATE XXI. 
 
 represented the sun, and that " it is quite possible that this significance was 
 heightened by the introduction of some bright substance, such as gold foil." 
 He points out that the composite monsters of the slates, all of which are repre- 
 sented on certain ivories, which he names, are always associated with the sun- 
 disk. He believes these figures to have a symbolic meaning, though he does 
 not in his Paper claim the especial astronomic interpretations I have above 
 advocated. 
 
PLATE XXII.i 
 
 In Grecian legend Cepheus, Cassiopeia, Andromeda, the sea- 
 monster (Cetus), and Perseus are associated together, and on the 
 Grecian sphere five neighbouring constellations represent the 
 actors of the legend. 
 
 Studying these constellations as they must have appeared to 
 observers of the heavens at different dates, we shall, I think, see 
 some reason to attribute the imagining of the figure of the hero 
 Perseus to a later age than that of the other members of the 
 group, and, on the other hand, there are considerations which may 
 make us hesitate whether we should not place the origin of the 
 constellation Andromeda at an even earlier date than those of 
 Cepheus, Cassiopeia, and the sea-monster. ° One point in the 
 legend, however, finds strong astronomic support from a study of 
 the precessional globe — namely, the fact that Cepheus and Cassio- 
 peia were personages of Ethiopian — i.e., of tropical provenance. 
 
 It will be seen in Plate XXII., fig. i, that only in a latitude 
 as far South as i8° N. could the figure of Cassiopeia — even at the 
 early date of 6000 b.c. — have been imagined as that of a queen 
 seated in royal dignity, and visible in the northern quarter of the 
 heavens. 
 
 By referring to Plate XV., we may learn that in Lat. 45° N, at 
 that date, Cassiopeia would have appeared in the southern quarter 
 of the sphere, head downwards, while the figure of Cepheus could 
 only have been observed by turning first to one and then to the 
 other quarter of the sky. As, however, the head of Cepheus would 
 have marked so exactly the solstitial colure 6000 B.C., it seemed 
 
 1 This plate has been drawn from the globe adjusted to the dates and 
 latitudes of 5744 B.C. Lat. 18° N., and of 3588 B.C., Lat. 23° N. 
 ^ See below at p. 246, and pp. 242, 243. 
 
 239 
 
240 PLATE XXII. 
 
 to me only right to seek for a latitude in which his figure and that 
 of his queen should appear upright and in the same quarter of the 
 heavens — a latitude, therefore, in which it might be possible to 
 suppose these constellations had been originated as star-marks of 
 the solstitial season. To attain this object it was necessary to 
 set the globe to the very low latitude of i8° N. 
 
 To suppose at 6000 b.c. so wide a diffusion, not only of the 
 human race, but also of astronomical science and authority, 
 seemed to involve an historical unlikelihood. Moreover, even 
 if for the sake of suitably establishing the dignity of this regal pair 
 one were tempted to suppose the great improbability of schools of 
 astronomy existing, and with equal authority instituting constella- 
 tions as star-marks for the year, in regions as far north as Lat. 
 45° N. and as far south as 18° N.— even so, I do not think the 
 position of the constellations themselves in relation to the solstitial 
 colure as shown in the diagram is by any means so convincingly 
 symmetrical as to force us to accept the date 6000 B.C. for their 
 origin. The head only of Cepheus appears on the meridian, his 
 figure and the whole constellation of Cassiopeia lie considerably 
 to the east of that line. 
 
 Under these circumstances it is satisfactory to find at a later, 
 and therefore at a more historically probable date, and still in an 
 Ethiopian (tropical) latitude, a meridian line on and about which 
 the constellations Cepheus, Cassiopeia, Andromeda, and Cetus 
 form a well-balanced group. 
 
 This meridian, it is true, is not that of a solstice or an equinox ; 
 but it is one which marked a very important astronomical moment 
 — namely, the commencement of the calendrical year — the year 
 counted from the entry of the sun into the constellation Aries. 
 (See Plate XXII. , fig. 2.) 
 
 Of the high calendrical importance attached through thousands 
 of years to this point in the sun's annual course by the Accadian 
 and Babylonian nations and by the Hindus down to the present 
 
CASSIOPEIA AND SEA-NYMPHS 241 
 
 day, astronomic records testify. Egyptian mythology and Chinese 
 traditions also, as I have claimed, refer to it : it need not, there- 
 fore, surprise us to find constellations imagined to mark the 
 beginning of a year counted from that point, even at a date virhen 
 this beginning did not coincide either with solstice or equinox. 
 
 3500 B.C. is the approximate date I would suggest in a latitude 
 not far from 23° N. for the origin of the constellations Cepheus, 
 Cassiopeia, and probably also for that of Cetus. 
 
 The legend tells us that Cassiopeia by boasting of her own or 
 of her daughter's surpassing beauty incurred the enmity of the 
 nereids. She is 
 
 "... that starr'd Ethiop queen that strove 
 To set her beauty's praise above 
 The sea-n)Tnphs, and their power offended." ' 
 
 It seems to me that for this legend, as for many others, an 
 astronomic basis may be assigned. 3500 b.c. the solstitial colure 
 passed through the constellation Aquarius. The stars of that 
 constellation might then not unfitly have been likened to sea 
 divinities, and rival schools of astronomers and calendar keepers 
 may have exalted the praise, on the one hand, of the stars that 
 marked a calendrical, and, on the other hand, of those that 
 marked a solstitial year. 
 
 A curious fact as to the lines in which Aratos refers to the 
 constellation Cassiopeia must here be noted. 
 
 Aratos versified " the Fhainotne?ia of the astronomer Eudoxos, 
 who lived cir. B.C. 403-350." It has often been pointed out that 
 the facts concerning the constellations which Aratos and Eudoxos 
 record " are to a great extent traditional and archaic, and belong 
 to another and far earlier epoch." What is said of Cassiopeia is a 
 case in point ; for thus the poet deplores her pride and its punish- 
 ment at line 654 et seq. — 
 
 1 Mihon, // Penseroso. 
 
242 PLATE XXn. 
 
 " And now she, too, her daughter's form pursues, 
 Sad Kassiepeia ; nor seemly still 
 Show from her seat her feet and knees above ; 
 But she head foremost like a tumbler sits : 
 With knees divided : since a doom must fall 
 On boasts to equal Panope and Doris." ^ 
 Now in Eudoxos' time and in his latitude, though Cassiopeia's 
 head did by a few degrees extend into the southern heavens, yet 
 her position was not so deplorably ignominious as the poem would 
 suggest. Three thousand years earlier the pity for her expressed 
 by Aratos would have been more appropriate, for then her whole 
 figure for observers in lat. 35° N. would have been visible in the 
 southern quarter of the sky, and her feet, not her head (as at 
 Lat. 23° N.), would have been on the zenith. 
 
 These considerations may lead us to suppose that the idea of 
 Cassiopeia's pride, and the fit punishment of it — i.e., her reversed 
 position in the heavens, must have assumed form in northern 
 latitudes almost at as early a date as the constellation figures were 
 first imagined in tropical latitudes. 
 
 If this be so, it is indeed curious to find a legend which em- 
 bodied the atiimus of astronomic rivalry 3500 B.C. handed down for 
 thousands of years, and repeated in what professed to be a somewhat 
 scientific treatise at a date between 400 and 300 B.C., when the 
 astronomic facts no longer tallied with those narrated in the legend. 
 As to Andromeda, the classic story describes her as the 
 daughter of Cepheus and Cassiopeia ; but the constellation itself 
 — except on legendary grounds — might equally well have naarked 
 the beginning of a solstitial year 6000 B.C., or of a non-solstitial 
 and calendrical year 3500 B.C. 
 
 The terrible prevalence of human sacrifices in ancient times, 
 and at the solstices especially, may make us almost fear that the 
 representation of a chained human victim had its place in the 
 sphere at the earlier (solstitial) date. 
 
 ^ The Phainomena or " Heavenly Display " of Aratos, ub, supr. 
 
ANDROMEDA 6000 OR 3500 B.C. 243 
 
 The chains which bind Andromeda's arms are fastened by 
 staples to the sky. They appear (at fig. i) at 6000 B.C. as though 
 driven into two important astronomic lines — i.e., one of them into 
 the line of the equator, the other into that of the solstitial colure. 
 This may, of course, be a mere coincidence, and should not be 
 allowed to weigh at all heavily in the almost evenly adjusted 
 balance of probabilities regarding the date of the origin of the 
 constellation Andromeda. Her story is so interwoven, not only 
 with that of Cepheus and Cassiopeia, but also with that of the sea- 
 monster Cetus, that we should not hastily attempt to dissociate 
 the members of this group. 
 
 The very interesting question as to what southern people first 
 depicted the Ethiopic king and queen on the sphere cannot be 
 answered on astronomic grounds. AVe know that the latitude in 
 which these figures were imagined must have been tropical, if the 
 date of their imagining was as early as 3500 B.C. But we cannot 
 learn from the celestial globe what was the longitude of the land 
 in which they were so imagined. Ethiopia proper, and parts of 
 Arabia and India, lie within the tropics, and the term Ethiopia, 
 in classic writings, embraces all these countries. 
 
 Etymologists are, I beUeve, divided in opinion as to what 
 language the rather un-Grecian names, Cepheus and Cassiopeia, 
 were derived from. Some writers have suggested for their origin 
 the Sanscrit names Capuja and Cassyape : and if, as I have 
 already urged, the Aries-year was followed in ancient Vedic times 
 in India, the Sanscrit derivation suggested will seem not an un- 
 likely one. Nor under these suppositions would it be difficult to 
 propose a possible Sanscrit origin for the name Andromeda, 
 though for this purpose we should have to deprive the legend of 
 all its classic and romantic charm. Cassyape, in Sanscrit story, is 
 not the name of a gloriously beautiful queen, but of a " sage," and 
 it might be that the constellation Andromeda also, for ancient 
 Indian astronomers, represented merely a human sacrifice, not that 
 
244 PLATE XXII. 
 
 of the beautiful daughter of a beautiful mother. Though in the 
 Rig Veda there is no legend of the sacrifice of a woman, yet in it 
 we meet with seven consecutive hymns referring to the sacrifice, 
 real or symbolical, of Sunahsepas, the son of a rishi or sage, who, 
 according to the commentators, had consented to yield his son up 
 to this cruel fate. The prayers of the victim, addressed to many 
 gods, at last result in his deliverance. 
 
 Two other hymns in the Rig Veda relate to the great ceremony 
 of the sacrifice, real or symbolical, of a horse. I give at p. 252 
 some of the considerations which have convinced me that the 
 praises of the winged steed — i.e., of the constellation Pegasus, 
 and not merely the praises of an earthly horse, are the subject of 
 these two hymns. The ceremony in question bore the name of 
 Aswamedha, literally Horse-Sacrifice. 
 
 In reading and comparing these two series of sacrificial 
 hymns, some points of contact present themselves, and, observing 
 this, it occurred to me that some Sanscrit word ending in Mcdha 
 — i.e., sacrifice, and conveying the meaning of huma?i sacrifice, 
 might by ancient Indian astronomers have been attached to the 
 constellation, which for us represents the hapless Andromeda : 
 for if we suppose that the constellations Cassiopeia and Cepheus 
 were imagined in India, but adopted with an appropriate legend 
 into the Grecian sphere — the names of the personages in the 
 legend at the same time suffering a Grecian change — it would be 
 easy further to suppose that the Indian name of the constellation 
 near to them, transformed and misunderstood, came to represent 
 in Grecian story not merely a human sacrifice, but that of the 
 much-to-be-pitied daughter of the proud Cassiopeia. 
 
 Whether these fanciful speculations concerning the names of 
 the actors in the ancient legend be adopted or not need not affect 
 our judgment as to the reasonableness, or otherwise, of the date, 
 3500 B.C., and of Lat. 23° N. for the origin of the constellational 
 group here discussed. 
 
PLATE XXIII.i 
 
 The probable dates for the first imagining of four constellations 
 are here given — namely, for the Centaur, Ophiuchus, Auriga, 
 and Perseus. 
 
 For the Centaur the date in round numbers of 3500 B.C. (fig. 
 i) is suggested: at that date his huge figure would have well 
 marked, in opposition, the beginning of the calendrical Aries- 
 year ; or, in conjunction with the sun, the beginning of the seventh 
 month of the same year. It is not necessary, at that date, to 
 attribute a low latitude to the astronomers who designed this 
 figure : in that of 35° N., as shown in the diagram, the whole 
 constellation would then have been well above the horizon. The 
 much earlier epoch of 6000 B.C. might perhaps be claimed for the 
 Centaur. At that date, as I have assumed, the calendrical and 
 the solstitial year coincided. (Compare Plate XVII. and Plate 
 IX.) As between 6000 and 3500 B.C. I have often hesitated, but 
 on the whole I have come to think the later date, as here given, 
 the more probable. 
 
 Fig. 2. — Again at the date 3500 B.C. and in the latitude 
 35° N. I have drawn the constellation Ophiuchus as it would have 
 appeared in opposition to the sun at the season of the spring 
 equinox ; triumphing over the powers of darkness — namely, the 
 scorpion on which he treads and the serpent which he crushes 
 with his hands. Although at the date in question Hercules' posi- 
 tion in the northern heavens was not quite so commanding and 
 symmetrical as it was a thousand years earlier (see Plate XIX.), yet 
 in the lower latitude given here (Plate XXIII., fig. 2) the heads of 
 
 ^ The figures in this plate have been drawn from the globe adjusted to the 
 following dates and latitudes. Figs, l and 2, 3589 B.C., Lat. 35° N. Fig. 3, 
 3050 B.C., Lat. 35° N. Fig. 4, 1443 b.c, Lat. 40° N. 
 
 245 
 
246 PLATE XXIII. 
 
 Hercules and of Ophiuchus would have been on the zenith, and 
 these brothers might have been seen, one of them in the northern 
 and the other in the southern quarter of the sky, strongly combat- 
 ing and conquering the forces of winter and darkness at the 
 season of the spring equinox. 
 
 Fig. 3. — For Auriga, I have suggested the later date of 3000 
 B.C., for then the bright star Capella, the most important star in 
 the constellation and one of the brightest in that part of the sky, 
 was on the meridian in conjunction with the sun at noon of the 
 spring equinox — and in opposition at mid-night of the autumn 
 equinox. 
 
 The star Capella has, by several writers, been identified with 
 the star " Icu of Babylon " mentioned in many of the Babylonian 
 astrological texts. If this identification of Capella and " Icu 
 of Babylon " should be estabfished as correct, we ought, I suppose, 
 to credit Babylo7iian astronomers with the delineation of the figure 
 Auriga. 
 
 Fig. 4. — Unless we adopt on the authority of the Cepheus, 
 Cassiopeia, and Andromeda legend the date 3500 for Perseus, it 
 will seem, I think, almost necessary to attribute the much later 
 one of 1433 B.C. for the designing of this constellation. At the 
 earlier date the position of Perseus — see Plate XXII., fig. 2 — 
 mihtates against the likelihood of its having then been imagined ; 
 as part of the figure of Perseus would have been visible in the 
 northern and part in the southern hemisphere. 
 
 In favour of the later date we may note the way in which the 
 figure of Perseus has been fitted in, as it were, between already- 
 named constellations, so that though restricted to a small space it 
 still retains heroic proportions. 
 
 The star Algol, whose strange alternations of magnitude may 
 well have suggested to the ancients the winking of the eye of some 
 malignant monster, was imagined by the astronomers who drew 
 the figure of Perseus, as on the brow of the Gorgon Medusa. It 
 
CENTAUR, OPHIUCHUS, AURIGA, PERSEUS 247 
 
 will be seen in the Plate how, at the date there given, this mysteri- 
 ous star exactly marked the equinoctial meridian. 
 
 The northern latitude 40° N., suitable for the imagining of this 
 constellation, and its name Perseus, seem to point to an Iranian 
 school of astronomers as the probable originators of this figure. 
 
PLATE XXIV. 
 
 It will be seen that by consulting the precessional globe it has 
 been possible to suggest dates at which the various simple and 
 composite human figures, represented on the (Grecian) sphere 
 could have been originally imagined in an upright position, either 
 on the northern or southern meridian at some well-marked time 
 of the year — that is of either a cosmical or a calendrical year. 
 
 That many other of the remaining ancient constellations — 
 Canis Major and Canis Minor, Aquila, Cygnus, &c., were depicted 
 and named at very remote dates, there can, I think, be little doubt. 
 The wide-spread traditions connected with these figures demand 
 an early origin for them. It is probable that the heliacal rising of 
 certain bright stars in these constellations at some special season 
 of the year, rather than their culmination at ?ioo?i or at mid- 
 night, may have been the occasion for the interest taken in 
 them. 
 
 A further study of the precessional globe with this thought 
 present would probably suggest approximate dates for the imagin- 
 ing of some of these constellations, small in extent but marked by 
 bright stars. 
 
 I will now only allude to the two remaining ancient constella- 
 tions of wide extent — namely, to Argo and Pegasus. 
 
 Glancing at Plate X. (Astronomy in the Rig Veda) the 
 almost upright and symmetrical position of Argo 3000 B.C. may 
 suggest the likelihood that at that date or perhaps a few hundred 
 years later, and in a latitude about 12° higher than that given in 
 the diagram, this constellation was imagined. It will be observed 
 that all the stars of Argo, even the bright and southern Canopus 
 at 35° N. would have been above the horizon and visible at mid- 
 night of the winter solstice. At noon of the summer solstice 
 248 
 
ARGO AND PEGASUS 249 
 
 they would have been above the horizon, but invisible in conjunc- 
 tion with the sun. 
 
 But now turning our thoughts to the constellation Pegasus, a 
 difficulty confronts us at every date from 6000 b.c. downwards 
 even to this present a.d. 1903 : Pegasus as depicted on the globe 
 has held and still holds a reversed position in the heavens. The 
 very fact that for all the other ancient constellations which repre- 
 sent living beings, it has been possible to find some season and 
 some date at which they could have been observed upright in the 
 sky, makes it a more imperative need to seek for some explanation 
 of the anomalous treatment meted out by astronomers of old to 
 the winged steed. 
 
 In this stress of difficulty, I venture to make a suggestion 
 which will, I fear, at first sight, appear far-fetched and fanciful, 
 and quite out of line with other suppositions put forward in this 
 book. 
 
 My suggestion is that an error concerning the right depicting 
 of this constellation was fallen into by some astronomers of old, 
 and that this error was handed down to us through the Grecian 
 school. 
 
 If on some clear autumnal or winter night we search for the 
 constellation Pegasus, not on a globe or map but in the southern 
 quarter of the actual sky, we may quickly recognise it by four 
 very bright stars which mark the corners of an almost exact and 
 very extensive square on the vault of heaven. Then stretching 
 away from the lower and western corner of this square still farther 
 towards the horizon and to the west, we may trace the faint stars 
 which mark the neck, and the somewhat brighter star which marks 
 the head of the Demi-Horse : while starting from the upper western 
 corner of the square and stretching still higher towards the zenith, 
 and to the west we detect the lines of fainter stars which mark the 
 fore legs and the hoofs of Pegasus. If we allow the four stars of 
 the " square of Pegasus " still to mark the body of the horse, and 
 
250 
 
 PLATE XXIV. 
 
 think of the upper lines of faint stars as marking its neck and head 
 and of the lower ones as marking its fore legs and hoofs, the 
 figure exactly reversed will still fit within the hmiting lines of the 
 constellation, with the satisfactory result that the winged steed, 
 not miserably floundering on its back but upright and alert, will 
 be seen in our mental vision night after night pursuing its course 
 from east to west across the heavens. 
 
 rORE LEGS 
 
 THE SQUARE 
 
 OF 
 PEGASUS 
 
 ^^< 
 
 <> 
 
 WEST. 
 
 AQUARIUS 
 
 But even to arrive at so satisfactory a result, we might scarcely 
 dare to propose without some other plea than its mere desirabihty, 
 so arbitrary a method of dealing with the reversed position of 
 Pegasus, as that of thus correcting a supposed error on the part of 
 early astronomers. 
 
 There is, however, I think, in Grecian and in Vedic legend 
 some support to be found for the opinion that the original position 
 of Pegasus was upright and not reversed. 
 
PEGASUS ALWAYS REVERSED 251 
 
 Though on the Grecian astronomic sphere Pegasus appears 
 reversed, on no artistic monument, vase, or coin is he thus repre- 
 sented, and in Grecian legend he is ever a glorious and highly-prized 
 friend and helper of gods and heroes. Amongst other achieve- 
 ments, we read of him that he produced with a blow of his hoof 
 the inspiring fountain Hippocrene. 
 
 In the Rig Veda we read of a swift horse, belonging to the 
 Aswins, who from his hoof filled a hundred vases of sweet liquor. 
 
 Max Miiller has pointed out that the Aswins possessed a horse 
 called Pagas. The stars a and /3 Arietis are in Hindu astro- 
 nomy called the "Aswins," and at p. 137 I have contended that 
 these stars in Vedic times symbohsed the twin heroes, the Aswins, 
 the possessors, according to Max Miiller, of the horse Pagas. If 
 we look at Pegasus in the sky, and observe how closely following 
 that constellation the bright stars that mark the head of Aries 
 appear, we shall easily understand how these Aswins might have 
 by Vedic bards been imagined as possessing and driving in front 
 of them the swift steed Pegasus. 
 
 In two hymns addressed to the Aswins we read as follows :^ — 
 
 Mandala I. — Svikta cxvi. and verse 7. 
 
 " You filled from the hoof of your vigorous steed, as if from a 
 cask, a hundred jars of wine." 
 
 And again in the next hymn, cxvii. verse 6 — 
 
 " You filled for the (expectant) man a hundred vases of sweet 
 (liquors) from the hoof of your fleet horse." 
 
 As Pegasus is now represented his hoofs touch no well or 
 fountain, cask or vase. But if we depict him as suggested above 
 (see Plate XXIV.), his hoof would indeed appear as almost in the 
 act of striking the vase in the constellation Aquarius, from which 
 the abundant waters gush forth. 
 
 1 Wilson's Uanslation of the Rig Veda. 
 
252 PLATE XXIV. 
 
 I have already alluded to the Aswamedha hymns in the Rig 
 Veda as probably referring not merely to the sacrifice of an actual 
 horse, but rather to a symbolic sacrifice of the winged horse of 
 the constellation Pegasus. In support of this opinion I will quote 
 from the hymns in question : — 
 
 Mandala I, — Sukta clxii. 
 
 " I. Let neither MITRA nor VARUNA, ARYAMAN, AYU, 
 INDRA, RIBHUKSHIN, nor the Manits censure us : when 
 we proclaim in the sacrifice the virtues of the swift horse sprung 
 from the gods. 
 
 " 2. When they, (the priests), bring the prepared offering to 
 the presence (of the horse), who has been bathed and decorated 
 with rich (trappings), the various - coloured goat going before 
 him, bleating, becomes an acceptable offering to INDRA and 
 PtlSHAN. 
 
 " 3. This goat, the portion of PUSHAN, fit for all the gods, is 
 brought first with the fleet courser, so that TWASHTRI may 
 prepare him along with the horse, as an acceptable preliminary 
 offering for the (sacrificial) food." 
 
 Looking at Plate XXIV., Figs, i, 2, we may observe how the 
 constellation Capricornus " goes before " that of Pegasus, and we 
 may understand the aspiration that Twashtri may prepare him 
 along with the horse as an acceptable preliminary offering. 
 
 After many verses entering into minute and rather horrible 
 details of the "immolation" and even of the cooking of the 
 sacrificial horse the 19th verse adds — 
 
 " There is one immolator of the radiant horse, which is 
 Time " ; and these words seem to carry us back from thoughts of 
 an actual to a, in some way, symboHcal sacrifice, especially when 
 at verse 2 1 we read : 
 
PEGASUS AND ASWAMEDHA 253 
 
 " Verily at this moment thou dost not die ; nor art thou 
 harmed ; for thou goest by auspicious paths to the gods. The 
 horses of INDRA, the steeds of the Maruts shall be yoked (to 
 their cars), and a courser shall be placed in the shaft of the ass of 
 the ASWINS (to bear thee to heaven)." 
 
 The following hymn (Ixiii.) I give in extenso : — 
 
 Mandala I. — Sukta clxiii. 
 
 1. Thy great birth, O Horse, is to be glorified; whether 
 first springing from the firmament or from the water, inasmuch 
 as thou hast neighed (auspiciously), for thou hast the wings of 
 the falcon and the limbs of the deer. 
 
 2. TRITA harnessed the horse which was given by YAM A : 
 INDRA first mounted him, and GANDHARBA seized his 
 reins. Vasus, you fabricated the horse from the sun. 
 
 3. Thou, horse, art YAMA : thou art A'DITYA : thou art 
 TRITA by a mysterious act : thou art associated with SOMA. 
 The sages have said there are three bindings of thee in heaven. 
 
 4. They have said that three are thy bindings in heaven ; 
 three upon earth ; and three in the firmament. Thou declarest to 
 me, Horse, who art (one with) VARUNA, that which they have 
 called thy most excellent birth. 
 
 5. I have beheld, Horse, these thy purifying (regions) ; these 
 impressions of the feet of thee, who sharest in the sacrifice ; and 
 here thy auspicious reins, which are the protectors of the rite that 
 preserve it. 
 
 6. I recognise in my mind thy form afar off, going from 
 (the earth) below, by way of heaven, to the sun. I behold thy 
 head soaring aloft, and mounting quickly by unobstructed paths, 
 unsullied by dust. 
 
 7. I behold thy most excellent form coming eagerly to 
 (receive) thy food in thy (holy) place of earth ; when thy attend- 
 
 S 
 
254 PLATE XXIV. 
 
 ant brings thee nigh to the enjoyment (of the provender), there- 
 fore greedy, thou devourest the fodder. 
 
 8. The car follows thee, O Horse : men attend thee ; cattle 
 follow thee ; the loveliness of maidens (waits) upon thee ; troops 
 of demi-gods following thee have sought thy friendship; the 
 gods themselves have been admirers of thy vigour. 
 
 9. His mane is of gold ; his feet are of iron ; and fleet as 
 thought, INDRA is his inferior (in speed). The gods have come 
 to partake of his (being offered as) oblation; the first who 
 mounted the horse was INDRA. 
 
 10. The full-haunched, slender-waisted, high-spirited, and 
 celestial coursers (of the sun), gallop along like swans in rows, 
 when the horses spread along the heavenly path. 
 
 11. Thy body, horse, is made for motion; thy mind is rapid 
 (in intention) as the wind ; the hairs (of thy mane) are tossed in 
 manifold directions ; and spread beautiful in the forests. 
 
 12. The swift horse approaches the place of immolation, 
 meditating with mind intent upon the gods ; the goat bound to 
 him is led before him ; after him follow the priests and the 
 singers. 
 
 13. The horse proceeds to that assembly which is most 
 excellent : to the presence of his father and his mother (heaven 
 and earth). Go, (Horse), to-day rejoicing to the gods, that (the 
 sacrifice) may yield blessings to the donor. 
 
 Many passages in this hymn, such as those in verse 3 
 referring to Trita and Soma, may suggest corroborative astronomic 
 observations,^ but I would here especially refer to the description, 
 verse i, of the horse possessing "the wings of the falcon," and in 
 verse 6 to the words, "I behold thy head soaring aloft, and 
 mounting quickly by unobstructed paths, unsullied by dust." 
 
 As I read these hymns I cannot think merely of an actual 
 
 ' V. pp. 176, 177. 
 
PEGASUS ERECT IN THE SKY 255 
 
 horse led to sacrifice, but of the winged celestial Pegasus ; nor is 
 it easy to think of that celestial horse as it is at present depicted, 
 reversed in the sky. 
 
 The Vedic poet beheld his head soaring aloft, but in the 
 previous verse he has said, " I have beheld Horse, . . . those 
 impressions of the feet of thee " ; and if these " impressions " 
 were the stars which, on the Grecian sphere, marked the horse's 
 head, but, as I have contended, originally marked his hoof, then 
 we shall understand how, associated with Soma, and identical 
 with Trita by a mysterious act — i.e., at the season of the summer 
 solstice, and when the moon was at its full in the constellation 
 Aquarius, ancient astronomers imagined to themselves the horse 
 Pegasus producing with his hoof the sweet exhilarating waters of 
 the fountain Hippocrene. 
 
 The date of this particular legend concerning the hoof of 
 Pegasus I should be inclined to place at about 3000 B.C., when 
 the solstitial colure was so closely marked by " those impres- 
 sions of the feet" of the "swift horse sprung from the gods." 
 For the first imagining of the constellation I think that of 4000 
 B.C. is more probable (see Plate XXIV., Figs, i, 2). 
 
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INDEX 
 
 Ab AB-GAR, 4 
 
 Abba uddu, 4 
 
 Abel, 164 
 
 Abhra, 113 
 
 Abib, 165, 166, 168, 170 
 
 Aboo Simbel, 39, 40, 41 
 
 Abraham, 167 
 
 Abu, 2, 4 
 
 Accad, 6, 52-57, 80. Set Calendar 
 
 AchEemenid Idngs, 60, 73 
 
 Afvini. See Aswini 
 
 Adar, Adaru, 2-6, 69 
 
 A'ditya, 253 
 
 Agane, 151 
 
 Agni, 125-131, 138, 140, 153, 172, 
 
 181, 183 
 Agrahayani, 228 
 Ahi, III. See Vritra 
 Ahura Mazda, 60, 64, 65, 73-76, 81- 
 
 83, 149-155. 172, 227 
 Airu, 2, 4, II 
 Aitareya Brahmana, 140 
 Akiba, Rabbi, 163 
 Albumassar, 17, 18 
 Alexander, 25, gi, 103 
 Algol, 246 
 Alphonsus, 23 
 Altair, 67 
 Amen, 32-41 
 Amen-Ra, 32-34, 39-41 
 Amon. See Amen 
 Amphora, 44, 45, 67, 79, 204, 223, 
 
 233> 236 
 Andromeda, 239-244, 246 
 Anna, 48 
 
 Apam Napat, 126 
 
 Apin-am-a, 4 
 
 Apis Bull, 218, 233-235 
 
 Apollo, 156 
 
 Apollonius of Tyana, 97 
 
 Aptya. See Trita 
 
 Aquarii ;8, 196 
 
 Aquarius, 9, 40, 44-47, 51-57, 66-70, 
 79, 80, 83, 123, 124, 129-132, 144, 
 174-179, 197, 199, 202, 209, 221- 
 223, 232-235, 241, 250, 251, 255 
 
 Aqrabu, 44 
 
 Aquila, 66-70, 80, 124, 248 
 
 Arakh-makru, 4 
 
 Arakh-samna, 2, 4 
 
 Aratos, 216, 224-227, 241, 242 
 
 Archer. See Sagittarius 
 
 Arcitenens, 44 
 
 Argo, 248 
 
 Aries, 1-19, 24-44, 53-57, 92, 94, 
 104, 145-147, 170, 171, 186-190, 
 209, 210, 217, 218, 220, 224, 235, 
 
 245. 251 
 Arietis a and /3, 94, 137, 142, 143, 
 
 251. 
 Arsacidse, 4 
 Artemis, 156, 157, 160 
 Aru, 44 
 Aryaman, 252 
 As a-an, 4 
 
 Assara Mazas, 149, 150 
 Assur, 74-79, 83, 84, 86, 150-155, 
 
 227 
 Assurbanipal, 6, 69 
 Assyrian Standard, 77-80, 83, 86 
 267 
 
258 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Asteria, 179 
 
 Asura, 81,82,85,86, 112, 150-153, 
 
 182, 183 
 Asura maha, 153 
 Aswamedha, 244, 251 
 Aswini, 92-94, 104, 132, 134, 136- 
 
 148, 172, 181, 183, 187, 188, 210, 
 
 251. 253 
 Aswins, the. See Aswin! 
 Atharva Veda, 94, 133, 136 
 Atri, 141, 181-184 
 Attic year, 180 
 Auriga, 245, 246 
 Ava, 85 
 
 Avesta. See Zend Avesta 
 Ayu, 252 
 
 Babylonia. See Calendar 
 
 Bahu. See Bau 
 
 Bailly, Jean Silvain, 17, 20, 26, 27, 
 
 29 
 Barrett, Dr, 222 
 Bar zig-gar, 4, 7, lo, 13-15, 53, 104, 
 
 165, 166, 171, 172 
 Bau, 47-55, 57, 69, 210-212 
 Bel, 16, 81 
 Bel-Merodach, 69 
 Bi^lier. See Aries 
 Beltis, 16 
 Bentley, Mr, 100 
 Bergaigne, 140, 143 
 Berosus, 18, 83 
 Bethel, 233 
 
 Bible, the, 21, 84, 164-170 
 Bodhanunddnath Swami, 157 
 Bootes, 223-226 
 British Museum, 3, 8 
 Brown, Robert, 224, 226, 247 
 Browne, Bishop, 21 
 Brugsch, 33 
 Bull. See Taurus 
 Bulls, Assyrian, 87 
 Burgess, 90, 93, 98 
 
 Cain, 164 
 
 Calendar, Accadian, 1-23, 57-58, 103, 
 145-147, 187, 208-210, 224 
 
 Babylonian, 1-3, 103, 165, 234 
 
 Chinese, 185-211 
 
 Calendar, Egyptian, 31, 34, 3S, 39 
 
 Grecian, 180 
 
 Gregorian, 193-196 
 
 Hebrew, 162-170, 234 
 
 Indian, 88, 92, 96, 104, 132-148, 
 
 167,171,176,181-184, 188,217 
 
 Lagash, 54, 57 
 
 Median, 56-87, 222, 229 
 
 Persian, 58-61 
 
 Roman, II, 159, 180, 193 
 
 Cambyses, 235 
 
 Cancer, 8, 36, 44, 218-221 
 
 Canis Major, 248 
 
 Canis Minor, 248 
 
 Canopus, 248 
 
 Capella, 246 
 
 Caper, 44 
 
 Capricornus, 52, 218, 220, 222, 252 
 
 Capuja, 243 
 
 Cassiopeia, 239-244, 246 
 
 Cassyape, 243 
 
 Castor, 221, 222 
 
 Centaur, 155-158, 245 
 
 Cepheus, 239-244, 246 
 
 Cetus, 239-243 
 
 Chaitra, 134-138, 171, 172, 181, 188 
 
 Che, 202 
 
 Chevreau, 23 
 
 Ch'in, 207 
 
 China, History of, 197-209 
 
 Chipiez. See Perrot 
 
 Chiron, 155, 156 
 
 Choris, 32, 33 
 
 Cisilivu, 4 
 
 Claudius Ptolemy, 17, 216 
 
 Clemens Alexandrinus, 23 
 
 Confucius, 206, 207 
 
 Cook, 21 
 
 Corona Australis, 77, 229, 230 
 
 Crab. See Cancer 
 
 Cumont, 61 
 
 Cuthah, 85 
 
 Cuzallu, 4 
 
 Cygnus, 248 
 
 Cyrannid books, 17 
 
 Dan, 233 
 Darmesteter, 60 
 Denderah, 218, 232 
 
INDEX 
 
 259 
 
 Deuteronomy, 169, 170 
 Devas, 82 
 Dhanus, 223 
 Dharbitu, 4 
 D'Herbelot, 18 
 Diana, 158 
 Dianus, 158 
 Doris, 242 
 Draco, 223 
 Dupuis, 27-29 
 Duzu, 2, 4 
 Dvita, 177-180 
 
 Eagle, 64. See Aquila 
 
 Ebers, 35, 233 
 
 Eden, 21, 22 
 
 Edfu, 232 
 
 Ekashtaka, 1 34 
 
 Ekata,' 177-180 
 
 Ekhud, 48 
 
 Elam, 81 
 
 ElUlla, 48 
 
 Elul, 2, S 
 
 Eninnu, 48 
 
 Enzu, 44 
 
 Epping and Strassmaier, I- 10, 44, 
 
 45. 1.02 
 Equulei, <x, 196 
 Esneh, 218 
 Eudoxos, 241, 242 
 Eul-ya, 185, 204 
 Eusebius, 17 
 Evetts, 48 
 Exodus, 165, 170 
 
 Fasti Siculi, 23 
 Fomalhaut, 67 
 Freya, 96 
 
 Gamaliel, Rabbi, 163 
 
 Gandharba, 253 
 
 Gan-ganna, 4 
 
 Ganymede, 70 
 
 Garga, 97 
 
 GatMs, 153 
 
 Gaubil, 204 
 
 Gemini, 10, 44, 77, 146, 220, 221 
 
 Genesis, 21, 210 
 
 Genica, 17 
 
 Gir-tab, 8 
 
 Go, 113 
 
 Goat-fish, 8, 220 
 
 Golden calf, 233, 235 
 
 Gregory XIII., II, 193 
 
 Griffin, 68 
 
 Griffiths, 31 
 
 Gu, 9, 44-47 
 
 Gudea, 48-57, 208, 209, 222 
 
 Gula, 9, 46-57. 69, 209 
 
 Gutiura, 81 
 
 Hamath, 85 
 
 gammurabi, 3, 4, 6, 12, 83-85 
 
 Heb en-ant, 35 
 
 Hecate, 179 
 
 Hermes, 17 
 
 Hercules, 226, 229, 230, 245, 246 
 
 Herodotus, 81 
 
 Hierakonpolis, 236 
 
 Hillebrandt, 122 
 
 Hippocrene, 251, 255 
 
 Hiu, 196-209 
 
 Hommel, 149- 151 
 
 Horus, 33, 40 
 
 Hsia, 207 
 
 Hvarya, 1 50 
 
 Hydra, 1 17-123, 132, 227, 229 
 
 Icu, 246 
 
 Indra, 111-124, 130, 131, 138, 148, 
 
 172-183, 252-254 
 Innanna, 6 
 Innannanki, 5 
 Isaac, 167 
 
 Isis, 33 „ 
 
 Istar, 4, 10, 84 
 
 Jacob, 167 
 
 Jana, 158 
 
 Janus, 158-160 
 
 Jemsheed, 58 
 
 Jensen, 45, 49, 5°, 68, 102 
 
 Jeroboam, 233, 234 
 
 Jerusalem, 163 
 
 Jesuits, 194-196. 207 
 
 Tohnston, 40 
 
 Jones, Sir William, 89, 9°, 95, 96 
 
 Josephus, 20, 169 
 
 Jupiter, 47, 103 
 
26o 
 
 INDEX 
 
 KailA^e, 158 
 
 Kaiomurs, 58 
 
 Kang, 186, 188 
 
 Kao-yang, 201 
 
 Karnak, 35, 36, 39 
 
 Kas, 4, 10 
 
 Ker Porter, 58, 65 
 
 Khar-sidi, 4, 10 
 
 Khophri, 220 
 
 Ki Gingirna, 4, 10 
 
 Kimta-rapaStu, 6 
 
 Kio, 185, 186, 188, 191, 210 
 
 Kis, 69 
 
 Kislimu, 2, 4 
 
 Kneeler, The, 226 
 
 Kou, 205 
 
 Kris£nu, 125 
 
 Krishna, 182 
 
 Krittika, 94, 134, 136 
 
 Ku (sarikku), 44 
 
 Kumbha, 223 
 
 Lactantius, 23 
 
 Lagash, 4B-57, 68, 69, 208, 209, 222 
 
 Lajard, 63, 66 
 
 Latadeva, 98 
 
 Layard, 74, 77 
 
 Legge, Mr, 234 
 
 Legge, Professor, 197, 200, 207 
 
 Lehmann, 102 
 
 Leo, 44, 64-70, 79, 80, 83, 221, 232, 
 
 233, 235, 236 
 Libra, 44, 218-220 
 Lion. See Leo. 
 Lugal-ki-uluna, 6 
 Lydda, 163 
 Lyra, 226 
 
 Macdonell, 111-128, 153, 175 
 
 Magan, 49 
 
 Magha, 134, 135 
 
 Mahesa, 157 
 
 Mahler, 102 
 
 Mailla, Pere de, 197-200 
 
 Mait, 219 
 
 Manda. See Umman Manda 
 
 Mangala, 96 
 
 Marchesvan, 234 
 
 Marduk, 5 
 
 Mars, 103 
 
 Maruts, I73-I75> '84, 252, 253 
 
 Maspero, 33, 49, 68, 69, 219 
 
 Ma^u, 44 
 
 Maut, 32, 33 
 
 Mayer, 102 
 
 Medusa, 246 
 
 Memnonium, 35 
 
 Memphian Triad, The, 33 
 
 Mercury, 9, 103 
 
 Merodach, 68 
 
 Mesopotamia, 8, 49, 80, 83-86, 209 
 
 Mills, 153 
 
 Milton, 181, 241 
 
 Mishna, 163 
 
 Mithraeum, 62 
 
 Mithras, 60-65, 74) 81, 234, 235 
 
 Mitra, 81, 252 
 
 Mlechchas, 95, 97 
 
 Moguls, 95 
 
 Montucla, 89 
 
 Moses, 165, 167 
 
 Mriga, 228 
 
 Mrigasbirsha, 228 
 
 Miiller, Max, 251 
 
 Muna-xa, 8 
 
 Munga, 4 
 
 Muradi, 17 
 
 Nakshatra, 92, 94, 104, 132, 133, 
 
 136, 142, 188, 227-229 
 Nana, 6 
 
 Nekropolis, 35-37 
 Nicephorus, 23 
 Nile, 32, 35, 36, 37 
 Nineveh, 73, 74, 84, 86 
 Ningirsu, 48-51, 208 
 Ningiszida, 48 
 Ninib, 49-53, 208 
 Nisan, 2-19, 53, 69, 163-166 
 Nisannu. See Nisan 
 Noah, 58 
 Noel, 205 
 Nowroose, 58-60 
 
 Oldenburg, 151, 152 
 Olivet, 163 
 
 Onuphrius Panvinius, 23 
 Ophiuchus, 245, 246 
 
INDEX 
 
 261 
 
 Oppert, 102 
 Orion, 157, 227-229 
 Ormuzd, 65 
 Osiride pillars, 40 
 Osiris, 33, 219 
 Ostia, 62 
 
 Pa, 44 
 
 Pagas, 251 
 
 Paitamaha, 98 
 
 Panchasiddhantika, 98 
 
 Pafii, 112 
 
 Panope, 242 
 
 Panvinius, Onuphrius, 23 
 
 Passover, The, 169, 170 
 
 Paulisa, 98 
 
 Pavamana. See Soma 
 
 Pegasus, 244, 24S-255 
 
 Peking, 194, 195 
 
 Perrot and Chipiez, 64, 71, 73 
 
 Persepolis, 64, 70, 72-74, 86, 87 
 
 Perseus, 179, 239, 245-247 
 
 Petrie, 236 
 
 Phalguni, 134, 135 
 
 Pharisees, 169 
 
 Philastrius, 23 
 
 Philostratus, 97 
 
 Phoenicians, 81 
 
 Pisces, 44, 80, 174, 177-179, 202, 
 
 220, 221 
 Piscium f, 93 
 Pleiades, 94 
 Plumptre, 163 
 Poissons, Les. See Pisces 
 Pollux. See Castor 
 Ptah, 40 
 
 Ptolemy, 17, 216 
 Pulukku, 44 
 Punjaub, 128 
 Pushan, 252 
 
 QuiBELL, 236 
 
 Ram. See Aries 
 Rameses II., 35-40 
 Ramessides, 33 
 Rashis, 92 
 Ravi, 96 
 
 Revati, 92, 93, 104, 132, 138, 143, 
 
 187, 188 
 Ribhukshin, 252 
 Ricci, Matteo, 194 
 Rig Veda, 92, 105-148, 153, 171- 
 
 184, 228, 244, 251-255 
 Rim-sin, 3, 4 
 
 Rishis, 97, 106, 108, 123, 130, 133 
 Romaka, 98 
 Roman year, 180 
 Rome, 61, 172, 193 
 Rudra, 152-160, 172-174, 184 
 Rsis, 141. See Rishis 
 
 Sabahu, 4 
 
 Sabatu, 2 
 
 Sabbath, 163, 169, 170 
 
 Sadducees, 169 
 
 Sagitta, 125 
 
 Sagittarius, 8, 76-83, 147, 150-160, 
 
 172-174, 220-223, 227, 230 
 Sam, 36 
 Samaria, 84, 85 
 Samaritan Pentateuch, 22 
 Samson Agonistes, 181 
 Samsu-iluna, 3, 4 
 Sani, 96 
 
 Sara zig-gar, 4. See Bar zig-gar 
 Sargon I., 6, 7, 10, 12, 13, 16, 80, 
 
 81, 83, 151 
 Sargon II., 78 
 Sassinide dynasty, 60 
 Satapatha Brahmana, 141 
 Sater, 96 
 Saturn, 103 
 Saura, 98 
 Savitr, 140 
 Savitra, 98 
 Sayana, 228 
 
 Sayce, 7, 9, 46, 69, 81, 102 
 Scarabseus, 218, 220 
 Schall, J. A. von, 194, 195 
 Schlegel, Gustav, 185, 186, 190, 191, 
 
 204, 205 
 Scorpio, 8, 44, 63-67, 80, 221, 231- 
 
 236 
 Se-dir, 4, 13, 14, 146, 147 
 Se-ki-sil, 4, 13, 14, 146, I47 
 Seleucidte, 4 
 
262 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Semites, 83-85 
 
 Sepharvaim, 85 
 
 Septuagint, 22 
 
 Seth, 20 
 
 Seti, 36, 39 
 
 Shou, 33 
 
 Shuddh Paksha, 182 
 
 Shukia, 182 
 
 Siddhantas, The, 98. See Surya 
 
 Siddhanta 
 Simannu, 2, 4 
 Sing-king, 186 
 
 Siou, 185, 188, 196, 197, 202, 207 
 Sirius, 31, 38 
 Siva, 157, 173 
 Slates, 235-238 
 Soma, 96 
 Soma, 107, 108, ni, 121-125, 131, 
 
 138, 172-177. 253-255 
 Souciet, 204 
 Southern Crown, 77 
 Sphinxes, 32, 34 
 Spica, 28, 167, 170, 171, 1S8-190, 
 
 210 
 Standard, Assyrian, 77-80, 83, 86 
 Strassmaier. See Epping 
 Strauchius, 23 
 Sucra, 96 
 Suidas, 23 
 Su-kul-na, 4 
 Sunahsepas, 244 
 Suria, 150 
 Surias, 1 50 
 Surya, 182, 183 
 
 Surya Siddhanta, 90, 93, 98, 187 
 Susa, 70-73, 87 
 Swarbhanu, 182, 183 
 Syncellus, 17 
 
 Taittiriya Brahmana, 136 
 
 Taittiriya Sanhita, 134-136, 139 
 
 Talmud, 162, 163, 169 
 
 Tasritu, 4 
 
 Taurus, 8, n, 44, 56-87, 146, 154, 
 
 156, 159, 160, 221, 232-236 
 Tchuen-Hio, 197-210, 222 
 Tebitu, 2, 4 
 Telloh, 48, 49 
 Te (mennu), 44 
 
 Theban Triad, The, 32, 33 
 
 Thebes, 34 
 
 Thibaut, 98 
 
 Thor, 96 
 
 Thoth, 38, 39 
 
 Thraetona, 178 
 
 Thrita, 178 
 
 Tilak, B. G., 134, 135, 228 
 
 Tischritu, 2, 4 
 
 Tisri, 163 
 
 Tithis, 176, 180, 182 
 
 Tortoise, 8, 218 
 
 Trita Aptya, 175-181, 184, 253-255 
 
 Triton, 178, 179 
 
 Tsivan, 4 
 
 Tuisco, 96 
 
 Tul-cu, 4 
 
 Twashtfi, 252 
 
 Twins. See Gemini 
 
 Tyana, 97 
 
 Udhar, 113 
 
 Ululu, 2, 4 
 
 Umman Manda, 81-86, 151 
 
 Unger, 27 
 
 Universal History, 21 
 
 Ursa Major, 224 
 
 Usas, 139, 140 
 
 Usher, Archbishop, 21, 22 
 
 Utu, 5 
 
 Vadya Paksha, 182 
 
 Vala, 112 
 
 Valley, Feast of the, 36, 38 
 
 Varaha, 97-99 
 
 Varahamihira. See Varaha 
 
 Varuna, 152-154, 252, 253 
 
 Vasistha, 98 
 
 Vasus, 253 
 
 Vedas, 95, 106, 128. See Atharva 
 
 Veda, Rig Veda, Yajur Veda 
 Venus, 103 
 Verethraghna, 114 
 Verseau. See Aquarius 
 Vierge. See Virgo 
 Virgil, 159 
 Virginis a, 188 
 Virgo, 10, 28, 44, 80, 185, 186, 220, 
 
 221 
 
INDEX 
 
 263 
 
 Vossius, Isaac, 23 
 Vrihaspati, 96 
 Vritra, 111-123, 14S, 177 
 Vrtrahan, 114 
 
 Wan-nian-shu, 194 
 
 Water-jar. See Amphora 
 
 Water-man. See Aquarius 
 
 Week, Days of, 96 
 
 Whitney, 93, 187 
 
 Wilson, 112, 124-127, 153, 182, 251 
 
 Woden, 96 
 
 Wogue, 169 
 
 Yajur Veda, 94, 133-135 
 Yama, 253 
 Yaska, 141 
 Yavan, 95, 97 
 Yoga stars, 142 
 
 Zamama, 69 
 
 Zend Avesta, 60, 113, 114, 178 
 
 Zeus, 70 
 
 Zib, 44 
 
 Zibanitu, 44 
 
 Zodiac, 2 et passim 
 
 Zu, 69 
 
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