See also:

• HINDU

We will treat the solar year first, because it governs the lunisolar system, and the explanation of it will greatly simplify the See also:

• PROCESS

A See also:

• DEDUCTION (from Lat. deducere, to take or lead from or out of, derive)

598) and attributed to See also:

• KING
• KING (O. Eng. cyning, abbreviated into cyng, cing; cf. O. H. G. chun- kuning, chun- kunig, M.H.G. kiinic, kiinec, kiinc, Mod. Ger. Konig, O. Norse konungr, kongr, Swed. konung, kung)
• KING [OF OCKHAM], PETER KING, 1ST BARON (1669-1734)
• KING, CHARLES WILLIAM (1818-1888)
• KING, CLARENCE (1842–1901)
• KING, EDWARD (1612–1637)
• KING, EDWARD (1829–1910)
• KING, HENRY (1591-1669)
• KING, RUFUS (1755–1827)
• KING, THOMAS (1730–1805)
• KING, WILLIAM (1650-1729)
• KING, WILLIAM (1663–1712)

This amounts to exactly one See also:

• DAY (O. Eng. dreg, Ger. Tag; according to the New English Dictionary, " in no way related to the Lat. dies")
• DAY, JOHN (1574-1640?)
• DAY, THOMAS (1748-1789)

The civil solar year exists in more varieties than one. The See also:

• PRINCIPAL

Accordingly, an See also:

• ATTEMPT (Lat. adtemptare, attentare, to try)

Originally, this See also:

• SCHEME (Lat. schema, Gr. oxfjya, figure, form, from the root axe, seen in exeiv, to have, hold, to be of such shape, form, &c.)

The divisions of the civil day, as far as we need See also:

• NOTE
• NOTE (Lat. nota, mark, sign, from noscere, to know)

sometimes as twenty-seven in number, sometimes as twenty-eight, and are grouped in twelve sets of two or three each, beginning, according to the earlier arrangement of the See also:

• LIST (O.E. lisle, a Teutonic word, cf. Dut. lust, Ger. Leiste, adapted in Ital. lista and Fr. lisle)
• LIST, FRIEDRICH (1789-1846)

48 min. 34 sec. ; and one Hindu solar year measures 365 days 6 hrs. 12 min. 30 sec. according to Aryabhata, or slightly more according to the other two authorities. Consequently, the beginning of a, lunar year pure and See also:

• SIMPLE

30 min. down to about 29 days 7 hrs. 20 min. Consequently, it happens from time to time that there are two new-moon conjunctions, so that two lunations begin, in one astronomical solar month, between two sariskrantis of the sun, while the sun is in one and the same sign of the zodiac, and there is no samkranti in the lunation ending with the second new-moon: when this is the case, there are two lunations to which the same name is applicable, and so there is an additional or intercalated month, in the sense that a name is repeated: thus, when two new-moons occur while the sun is in Mesha, the lunation ending with the first of them, during which 'the sun has entered Mesha, is Chaitra; the next lunation, in which there is no samkranti, is Vaisakha, because it begins when the sun is in Mesha; and the next lunation after that is again Vaisakha, for the same reason, and also because the sun enters Vrishabha in the course of it: in these circumstances, the first of the two Vaisakhas.is called Adhika-Vaisakha, " the additional or intercalated Vaisakha," and the second is called simply Vaisakha, or sometimes Nija-Vaisakha, " the natural Vaisakha." On the other hand, it occasionally happens, in an autumn or winter month, that there are two saritkrdntis of the sun in one and the same amanta or synodic lunar month, between two new-moon conjunctions, so that no lunation begins between the two samkrantis: when this is the case, there is one lunation to which two names are applicable, and there is a suppressed month, in the sense that a name is omitted: thus, if the sun enters both Dhanus and Makara during one synodic lunation, that lunation is Margasira, because the sun was in Vrischika at the first moment of it and enters Dhanus in the course of it;' the next lunation is Magha, because the sun is in Makara by the time when it begins and will enter Kumbha in the course of it; and the name Pausha, between Margasira and Magha, is omitted. When a month is thus suppressed, there is always one intercalated month, and sometimes two, in the same Chaitradi lunar year, so that the lunar year never contains less than twelve months, and from time to time consists of thirteen months. There are normally seven intercalated months, rising to eight when a month is suppressed, in 19 solar years, which equal very nearly 235 lunations;2 and there is never less than one year without an intercalated month between two years with intercalated months, except when there is only one such month in a year in which a month is suppressed; then there is always an intercalated month in the next year also. The suppression of a month takes place at intervals of 19 years and upwards, regarding which no definite statement can conveniently be made here. It may be added that an intercalated Chaitra or Karttika takes the place of the See also:

• ORDINARY (med. Lat. ordinarius, Fr. ordinaire)

solar year, may be illustrated as follows. In A.D. 1815 the Meshasarhkranti occurred on i ith April ; and the first civil day of the Chaitradi year was ioth April. In A.D. 1816 and 1817 the first civil day of the Chaitradi year See also:

• FELL
• FELL, JOHN (1625-1686)

The lunar month is divided into two fortnights (paksha), called bright and dark, or, in See also:

• INDIAN

The first tithi of the year is styled Sarhvatsara-pratipada, which term answers closely to our " New Year's Day." The civil days of the lunar month begin, like those of the solar month, at sunrise, and See also:

• BEAR
• BEAR, BLACK
• BEAR, BROWN
• BEAR, GRIZZLY
• BEAR, ISABELLINE
• BEAR, WHITE

But the tithi must not be confused with the lunar day of western astronomy, which is the See also:

• INTERVAL

Different almanacs are prepared and published for places of leading importance; details for See also:

• MINOR
• MINOR (Lat. for smaller, lesser)
• MINOR, ROBERT CRANNELL (1839-1904)

We may add here that it was only in advanced stages that any of the Hindu eras assumed specific names: during the earlier period of each of them, the years were simply cited by the term sa iivatsara or varsha, " the year (bearing suchand-such a number)," or by the abbreviations samvat and stint, without any appellative designation. The Hindus have had two religious reckonings, which it will be convenient to notice first. Certain. statements in the Ceylonese See also:

• CHRONICLES, BOOKS OF

But the earliest known synchronous date in it—by which we mean a date given by a writer who recorded the year in which he himself was See also:

• WRITING
• WRITING (the verbal noun of " to write," O. Eng. writan, to inscribe)

It is traced back there to A.D. 457, at which time there was reigning a Traiketaka king named Dahrasena. Beyond that point, we have at present no certain knowledge about it. But it seems probable that the founder of it may be recognized in an Abhira king Isvarasena, or else in his See also:

• FATHER

But no other evidence of the existence of this era has been obtained. The records of the Gahga kings of Kalinganagara, which is the modern Mukhalingam-Nagarikatakam in the See also:

• GANJAM

There is a difference of See also:

• OPINION (Lat. opinio, from opinari, to think)

But it seems more probable that it is a purely fictitious date, set up by an attempt to evolve an early See also:

• HISTORY

The years are cited sometimes as " the Kollam year (of such-and-such a number)," sometimes as " the year (so-and-so) after Kollam appeared;" and this suggests that the reckoning may possibly owe its origin to some event, occurring in A.D. 825, connected with one or other of the towns and ports named Kollam, on the Malabar See also:

• COAST (from Lat. costa, a rib, side)

Inscriptions disclose the use in Kathiawar and Gujarat, in the 12th and 13th centuries, of a reckoning, commencing in A.D. 1114, which is known as the Sithha-sarhvat. No historical occurrence is known, on which it can have been based ; and the origin of it is obscure. Three great Eras in general use. The Kaliyuga Era of 3102 E. C. The eras mentioned above have for the most See also:

• PART

634, one of A.D. 770, three of the loth century, and then, from the 12th century onwards, but more particularly from the 14th, a certain number of instances, not exactly very small in itself, but extremely so in comparison with the number of cases of the use of the Vikrama and Saka eras and other reckonings: from Northern India the earliest known instance of is A.D. 1169 or 1170, and the later ones number only four. Its years are by nature sidereal solar years, commencing with the Mesha-sainkranti, the entrance of the sun into the Hindu constellation and sign Mesha, i.e. Aries (for this and other technical details, see above, under the Calendar) ;1 but they were probably cited as lunar years in the inscriptional records which present the reckoning; and the almanacs appear to treat them either as Meshadi civil solar years with solar months, or as Chaitradi lunar years with lunar months amanta (ending with the new-moon) or purnimanta (ending with the full-moon) as the case may be, according to the locality. Its initial point lies in 3102 B.c.; and the year 5002 began in A.D. 19002 This reckoning is not an historical era, actually running from 3102 B.C. It was devised for astronomical purposes at some time about A.D. 400, when the Hindu astronomers, having taken over the principles of the Greek astronomy, recognized that they required for purposes of computation a specific reckoning with a definite initial occasion. They found that occasion in a conjunction of the sun, the moon, and the five planets which were then known, at the first point of their sign Mesha. There was not really such a See also:

• CON

And, partly from the reckoning which has come down to us, partly from the astronomical hooks, we know that the moment assigned to the assumed conjunction was according to one school the midnight between Thursday the 17th, and Friday the 18th, February, 3102 B.C., and according to another school the sunrise on the Friday. The reckoning thus devised was subsequently identified with the Kaliyuga as the iron age, the last and shortest, with a duration of 432,000 years, of the four ages in each cycle of ages in the Hindu system of cosmical periods. Also, traditional history was fitted to it by one school, represented notably by the Puranas, which, referring the great See also:

• WAR
• WAR (O. Eng. werre, Fr. guerre, of Teutonic origin; cf. O.H.G. werran, to confound)

1900-1901. And, for the same reason, this reckoning has often been called the Kaliyuga era of 3101 B.C. There is, perhaps, no particular objection to that, provided that we then deal with the Vikrama and Saka eras on the same lines, and bear in mind that in each case the initial point of the reckoning really lies in the preceding year. But we prefer to treat these reckonings with exact correctness.497 north and the south. The Vikrama era has never been used for astronomical purposes. Its years are lunar, with lunar months, but seem liable to be sometimes regarded as solar, with solar months, when they are cited in almanacs of Southern India which present the solar calendar. Originally they were Karttikadi, with purrcimanta months (ending with the full-moon). They now exist in the following three varieties: in Kathiawar and Gujarat, they are chiefly Karttikadi, with amanta months (ending with the new-moon); and they are shown in this form in almanacs for the other parts of the Bombay Presidency: but there is also found in Kathiawar and that neighbourhood an Ashadhadi variety, commencing with Ashadha sukla 1, similarly with manta months; in the rest of Northern India, they are Chaitradi, with purnimanta. months. The era has its initial point in 58 B.C., and its first civil day, Karttika sukla 1, is 19th See also:

• SEPTEMBER (Lat. septem, seven)

Modern research, however, based largely on the inscriptional re-cords, has shown that there was no such king, and that the real facts are very different. The era owes its existence to the Kushan king See also:

• KANISHKA

It has its initial point in A.D. 78; and its first civil day, Chaitra §ukla 1, is 3rd March 3 It may be remarked that there are about twelve different views regarding the date of Kanishka and the origin of the Vikrama era. Some writers hold that Kanishka began to reign in A.D. 78, and founded the so-called Saka era beginning in that year; one writer would place his initial date about A.D. 123, others would place it in A.D. 278. The view maintained by the present writer was held at one time by See also:

• SIR

The See also:

• STORY, JOHN (c. 1510-1571)
• STORY, JOSEPH (1779-1845)
• STORY, ROBERT HERBERT (1835-1907)
• STORY, WILLIAM WETMORE (1819—1895)

And we find it first called Sakakala, " the time or era of the Sakas," in an epochal date, the end of the year 427, falling in A.D. 505, which was used by the astronomer Varahamihira (d. A.D. 587) in his Panchasiddhantika. That this name came to be attached to it appears to be due to the points that, along with some of the Pahlavas or Palhavas and the Yavanas or descendants of the See also:

• ASIATIC

578, " when there had elapsed five centuries of the years of the anointment of the Saka king to the sovereignty." And from this date onwards the records of a large part of Southern India are mostly dated in this era, by various expressions all of which include tie(' the preceding note.the term Saka or Saka. In Northern India the case is very different. We have a record dated in the month Karttika, the Saka year 631 (expired), falling in A.D. 709: it comes from Mahal in the Betfil district, Central Provinces, that is, from the south of the Narbada; but it belongs to Gujarat (Bombay), and perhaps to the north, though more probably to the south, of that province. But, setting that aside, the earliest inscriptional instance of the use of this era in Northern India, outside Kathiawar and Gujarat, is found in a record of A.D. 862 at See also:

• DEOGARH

We come now to certain reckonings consisting of cycles, and will take first the cycles of Guru or See also:

• BRIHASPATI, or BRAHMANASPATI (" god of strength ")

575. The 12-years mean-sign cycle seems to be still used in some parts. And the heliacal risings of Jupiter, as also, indeed, those of the other planets, are shown in almanacs for astrological purposes. In either variety, however, the 12-years cycle is now chiefly of antiquarian interest. The cycle of Jupiter now in general use is a cycle of sixty years, the samvatsaras of which bear certain special names, Prabhava, Vibhava, Sukla, Pramoda, &c., again in accordance with certain rules which we need not explairt here. This cycle exists in three varieties. According to the original constitution of this cycle, the saritvatsaras are determined as in the second or mean-sign variety of the 12-years cycle: each sarimvatsara commences when Jupiter enters a sign of the zodiac with reference to his mean motion and longitude; and it lasts for slightly more than 361.02 days. This variety is traced back in inscriptional records to A.D. 602, and is still used in Northern India. Now, the samvatsaras are calculated by means of the astronomical solar year commencing with the Mesha-sarilkranti, the entrance of the sun into the sign Mesha (Aries). The process gives the number of the samvatsara last expired before any particular Meesha-sathkranti, with a remainder denoting the portion of the current samvatsara elapsed up to the same time; and the remainder, reduced to months, &c., gives the moment of the commencement of the current samvatsara, by reckoning back from the Mesha-sarhkranti. As the result, apparently, of unwillingness to take the trouble to work out the full details, at some time about A.D.

800 a practice arose, in some quarters, according to which that sarizvatsara of the 6o-years cycle which was current at any particular Mesha-sathkranti was taken as coinciding with the astronomical solar year beginning at that sathkrknti, and with the Chaitradi lunar year belonging to that same solar year. And this practice set up a lunisolar variety of the cycle, in connexion with which we have to notice the following point. While the duration of a mean-sign sarnvatsara is closely about 361.02 days, the length of the Hindu astronomical solar year is closely about 365.258 days. It consequently happens, after every 85 or 86 years, that a mean-sign samvatsara begins and ends between two successive Mesha-sarhkrantis. In the mean-sign cycle, such a sarilvatsara retains its existence unaffected; and the names Prabhava, Vibhava, &c., run on without any interruption. Ac-cording to the lunisolar system, however, the position is different; the saritvatsara beginning and eliding between the two Meshasarirkrantis is expunged or suppressed, in the sense that its name is omitted and is replaced by the next name on the list. The second variety of the 6o-years cycle, thus started, ran on alongside of the mean-sign variety, and, being eventually transferred, with that variety, to Northern India, is now known as the northern lunisolar variety. It preserves a connexion between the samvatsaras and the movements of Jupiter: but the connexion is an imperfect one; and both in this variety, and still more markedly in the remaining one still to be described, the samvatsaras practically became See also:

• MERE
• MERE, ADALBERT (1838-1909)

908 there was current, by the mean-sign system, the samvatsara No. 2, Vibhava: but No. 4, Pramoda, was current by the same system at the Mesha-sathleranti in A.D. 909; and No. 3, Sukla, began and ended between the two Mesha-sarhkrantis. Accordingly, No. 2, Vibhava, was the lunisolar samvatsara for the Meshadi solar year and the Chaitradi lunar year commencing in A.D. 908; and by the strict lunisolar system, which was adhered to by some people and is now known as the northern lunisolar system, it was followed in A.D. 909 by No. 4, Pramoda, the name of the intermediate samvatsara, No. 3, Sukla, being passed over. On the other hand, whether through oversight, or whatever the reason may have been, by other people the name of No.

3, Sukla, was not passed over, but that satilvatsara was taken as the lunisolar samvatsara for the Meshadi solar year and the Chaitradi lunar year beginning in A.D. 909, and No. 4, Pramoda, followed it in A.D. qlo. On subsequent similar occasions, also, there was, inthe same quarters, no passing over of the name of any samvatsara. And this practice established itself in Southern India, to the exclusion there of the mean-sign and the northern lunisolar varieties; the discrepancy between the last-mentioned variety and the variety thus set up continuing, of course, to increase by one samvatsara after every 85 or 86 years. In this variety, the southern lunisolar variety, all connexion between the samvatsaras and the movements of Jupiter has now been lost. The present position of the 6o-years cycle in its three varieties may be illustrated thus. In Northern India, by the mean-sign system the samvatsara No. 46, Paridhavin, began, according to different authorities, in See also:

• AUGUST (originally Sextilis)

1900. But by the southern or non-expunging lunisolar system those same solar and lunar years were No. 34, Sarvarin. The treatment of the cycles of Jupiter in the Sanskrit books shows that it was primarily from the astrological point of view that they appealed to the Hindus; it was only as a secondary consideration that they acquired anything of a chronological nature. For the practical application of any of them to historical purposes, it is, of course, necessary that, along with the mention of a samvatsara, there should always be given the year of some known era, or some other specific guide to the exact period to which that samvatsara is to be referred. But it is fortunately the case that the saricvatsaras have been but "rarely cited in the inscriptional records without such a guide, of some kind or another. The Saptarshi reckoning is used in See also:

• KASHMIR, or CASHMERE

The idea at the bottom of this reckoning is a belief that the Saptarshis, " the Seven Rishis or See also:

• SAINTS, BATTLE OF THE

Essentially, therefore, the Saptarshi reckoning is a centennial reckoning, by suppressed or omitted hundreds, with its earlier centuries commencing in 3076, 2976 B.C., and so on, and its later centuries commencing in A.D. 25, 125, 225, &C.; on precisely the same lines with those according to which we may use, e.g. 98 to mean A.D. 1798, and 57 to mean A.D. 1857, and 9 to mean A.D. 1909. And the practical difficulties attending the use of such a system for chronological purposes are obvious; isolated dates recorded in such a fashion cannot be allocated without some explicit See also:

• CLUE

813-814, given by Kalhana. It was introduced into India between A.D. 925 and 1025. The Grahaparivritti is a reckoning which is used in the southernmost parts of Madras, particularly in the See also:

• MADURA
• MADURA (Dutch Madoera)

967 and at each subsequent 18oth year. In part of the Ganjam district, Madras, there is a reckoning, known as the Oflko or Anita, i.e. literally " the number or numbers," consisting of lunar years, each commencing with Bhadrapadasukla 12, which run theoretically in cycles of 59 years. But the reckoning has the peculiarity that, whether the explanation is to be found in a superstition about certain numbers or in some other reason, the year 6, and any year the number of which ends with 6 or o (except the year to), is omitted from the numbering; so that, for instawe, the year 7 follows next after the year 5. The origin of the reckoning is not known. But the use of it seems to be traceable in records of the Ganga kings who reigned in that part of the country and in Orissa in the 12th and following centuries. And the initial day, Bhadrapadasukla 12, which figures again in the Vilayati and Amli reckoning of Orissa (see farther on), is perhaps to be accounted for on the view that this day was the day of the anointment, in the 7th century, of the first Ganga king, Rajasirhha-Indravarman I. In the See also:

• CHITTAGONG

638. The Hijra (Hegira) era, the reckoning from the See also:

• FLIGHT

And one step taken in that direction was to assign to the Hindu year the same number with the Hijra year. It is believed that this was first done by the See also:

• PERSIAN
• PERSIAN, SYRIAN, EGYPTIAN AND TURKISH

According to one account, the term Amli-See also:

• SAN

The system of Fasli reckonings was introduced into Southern India under the emperor Shah Jahan, at some time in the Hijrayear 1046, which ran from 26th May, A.D. 1636, to 15th The Feel, May, A.D. 1637. But the numbering which was current ofBom- in Northern India was not taken over. A new start was See also:

• HAY
• HAY (a word common in various forms to Teutonic languages; cf. Ger. Heu, Dutch hooi; the root from which it is derived, meaning " to cut," is also seen in " to hew "; cf. " hoe ")
• HAY, GEORGE (1729—1811)
• HAY, GILBERT
• HAY, JOHN (1838–1905)

Y 745, which ran from 15th May, A. D. 1344, to 3rd May, A.D. 1345; but the exact circumstance in which it originated is not known. The years of this reckoning begin, like those of the Bombay Fasli, with the entrance of the sun into the nakshatra Mrigasiras, which now occurs on 6th or 7th June; but the months and days are those of the Hijra year. The Sur-san year 1301 began in A.D. 1900; and so the reckoning has an apparent initial point in A.D. 600. A peculiarity attending this reckoning is that, whatever may be the vernacular of a clerk, he uses the Arabic See also:

• NUMERAL (from Lat. numerus, a number)