The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, Medes and Persians, Grecians and Macedonians Volume 8 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1844 Excerpt: ...and days of the week admit: that is to say, at the end of twenty-eight years the first seven letters of the alphabet, which are used in the calendar for noting the day of the week, and which are called Dominical letters, return in the same order in which they were at first. To understand what I have now said, it must be observed, that if the year had only fifty-two weeks, there would be no change in the order of the Dominical letters. But as it has a day more, and two in leap-year, that produces some variations, which are all included in the space of twenty-eight years, of which the solar cycle consists. The Lunar cycle, called also the Golden Number, is the revolution of nineteen years, at the end of which the moon returns, within an hour and a half, to the same point with the sun, and begins its lunations again in the same order as at first. We are indebted for the invention of this cycle to Meto, a famous Athenian astronomer. Before the invention of the epacts, it was used for marking the days of the new moon in the calenr. Besides these two cycles, chronologers admit a third also, called Indiction. This is a revolution of fifteen years, of which the first ia called the first indiction, the second the second indiction, and so on to the fifteenth, after which they begin again to count the first indiction, &c. The first indiction is generally supposed to have begun three years before the birth of Christ. If these three cycles, that is to say, 28_. 19, and 15, are multiplied by each other, the product will be 7980, which is what is called the Julian period. One of the properties of this period, is, to give the three characteristic cycles of each year, that is to say, the current year of each of the three cycles:, for example, every body knows that the v...