used by the Ancient Egyptians. 173 



the introduction of a 366th day into any year would not only leave a day in that 

 year without any religious rites properly belonging to it, but would throw all the 

 religious rites of subsequent years from those days to which they would be popu- 

 larly regarded as pertaining of right. Enough, however, has been said on this 

 subject, which is rather a matter of curiosity than of importance. I proceed to 

 explain the nature of the Egyptian year, which was first used, and to which the 

 hieroglyphic notation was originally adapted, more fully than I have yet done. 



The commencement of the year was originally fixed, and continued for many 

 centuries, at the period when the fall of the Nile allowed the first operations of 

 agriculture to commence. This may have been ascertained in the first instance 

 by some kind of nllometer, which would mark the time when the Nile in its 

 descent reached some standard height. It is not necessary to suppose that the 

 year consisted, at the first introduction of this system, of months of thirty days, 

 with additional days in the end. The division into three seasons probably pre- 

 ceded the division into months ; and I think there is reason to suppose that these 

 seasons were equal ; or rather that two of them, probably the first and third, con- 

 tained 122 days each, while the middle one contained 121 in ordinary years, and 

 in what we should call leap years 122. My reason for this conjecture is, that in 

 the final result, to which my researches have conducted me, I find the solstice to 

 have occurred on the 244th, and not on the 241st day of the year. This might 

 have been occasioned by an inaccurate observation, i. e. a late inundation, in the 

 year, which happened to be selected as the standard one ; but it appears more 

 probable that the three seasons were for a time as nearly as possible of the same 

 length ; and consequently that the solstice was properly placed on the 244th 

 day of the year, that being the first day of the third of the seasons. The deter- 

 mination of the commencement of the year by a nilometer was objectionable, as 

 it would not give years of the same length. A year so determined might perhaps 

 contain 370 days, or it might contain no more than 360 ; but, on an average, 

 it is evident that the length of such a year must have been that of the true solar 

 or tropical year. To avoid this inconvenience, another mode of determining the 

 first day of the year was adopted, probably at a very remote period, very little 

 subsequent to the colonization of Egypt. This method consisted in observing 

 the meridian shadow cast by the sun on the first day of the year. The length of 

 that shadow was measujred in some one year on its first day, determined either 



