1057 



ZODIAC. 



ZODIAC. 



1053 



Cancer from the crab being an animal which is said to have a backward 

 movement. Bishop Warburton in this country, and M. Pluche' in 

 France, carrying out the same idea, have imagined that the constella- 

 tions Aries, Taurus, and Gemini received their names from the young 

 of animals being brought to the fields in the spring ; that Leo indi- 

 cates the violent heats of summer, and Virgo, presumed to be a 

 gleaner, denotes the time of harvest, and so on. M. Dupuis, assuming 

 that the zodiacal constellations were first imagined in Egypt, and that 

 they indicated circumstances connected with the labours of husbandry 

 in the different months of the year, endeavoured to ascertain at what 

 epoch, in the climate of Egypt, the symbols would be in accordance 

 with the circumstances which they were supposed to represent ; and 

 the result of his inquiry was, that the agreement could have subsisted 

 only when the vernal equinox was in the constellation Libra. At 

 present it is in the constellation Pisces ; and computing the time 

 during which, by the effect of precession, the equinoctial points would 

 move over about half the circumference of the ecliptic, he assigned 

 15.UOO years before the Christian era for the time of the invention of 

 the zodiac. This extravagant epoch he afterwards reduced to about 

 4000 years before Christ. (' Origiue des Cultes,' 1796.) 



M. Fourier, in his ' Recherches sur les Sciences et le Gouvernement 

 de 1'Egypte,' assumes that the representation of the head of Isis partly 

 plunged in the solar rays near the figure of Cancer, among the sculp- 

 tures in the portico of the temple at Denderah, is an emblem of the 

 heliacal rising of Sirius when the sun was in the sign, or in the con- 

 stellation Cancer ; and observing that Cancer is the last of the figures 

 which appear to enter the portico of that temple, while in the zodiacs 

 at Esne the lion is the last which enters, he conceives that the latter 

 circumstance is an indication of the sun being in Leo when Sirius rose 

 heliacally. Supposing, then, that the epochs of the zodiacs at Denderah 

 and Esne are such as the positions of the sun denote, he determines, by 

 computation founded on the progressive displacement of the point of 

 the heliacal rising, that the interval between them is 1800 years, the 

 sculptures at Esne referring to the more ancient period. This result 

 must, however, be considered as overthrown by the calculations of MM. 

 Ideler and Biot, who have determined the longitudes of the sun at the 

 terminations of three sothiac or canicular periods of 1460 years, within 

 which the heliacal risings of Sirius return to the time of the summer 

 solstice; and have found that between the year 2782 B.C. and 139 A.C. 

 the sun was in the constellation Leo and in the sign Cancer at all the 

 three epochs. M. Biot concludes therefore that the zodiacs at Den- 

 derah and Esne do not indicate that the sun had passed from one con- 

 stellation to the next in the interval between the epochs to which they 

 are supposed to refer. 



In the temple at Denderah, according to Dr. Young, Leo may be 

 intended to represent the leading sign of the zodiac, or the sign pre- 

 ceding that in which the sun was on the first day of the annua vayut 

 (year of 365 days); and on this supposition it would follow, from the 

 known rate at which the place occupied by the sun in the ecliptic at 

 the commencement of such year retrogrades, and also from the fact 

 that the year of 365 days began on the day of the vernal equinox in the 

 year 130 B.C., that the epoch of the planisphere is between 11 B.C. and 

 108 B.C., or in an age earlier by 1500 years. If Virgo were the 

 leading sign, as it may be supposed to be in the small temple at Esne, 

 the epoch of the zodiac would be the year 900 B.C., or 1500 years 

 earlier. 



It has been ascertained by MM. Champollion and Letronne from the 

 Greek inscriptions on the temples of Denderah and Esne, that those 

 edifices were constructed, or finished, during the times of the Roman 

 emperore (' Pre'cis du Systeme Hieroglyphique, Recherches, &c.'); yet, 

 as it is known that during the reigns of the Ptolemies, and even after 

 the conquest of the country by the Romans, the Egyptians continued 

 to build temples, which they consecrated to their deities, with decora- 

 tions similar to those which were executed in more ancient times, it 

 may be presumed that the present sculptured zodiacs are copies of 

 others which were the works of the earliest artists ; so that though 

 they determine nothing respecting the time of the construction of the 

 temples, they may still serve as indications of the manner in which the 

 heavens were represented in the East in the infancy of astronomical 

 science. The circular planisphere which once adorned the interior of 

 the temple at Denderah was removed to France in 1821. 



The country from whence the Greeks derived the figures of the con- 

 stellations is not with certainty known : that all the extra-zodiacal 

 rigns in their descriptions of the heavens did not, from the first, receive 

 their designations from subjects connected with the Greek mythology 

 is evident, since in the notices given by the earliest writers on astro- 

 nomy, two of them, which subsequently received the appellations of 

 Hercules and Cygnus, have the general names ir yivaair, a kncding 

 fyitrc, and tpvis, a bird; and that some of the figures were borrowed 

 from the Chaldjeans is probable, since in the time of Herodotus it was 

 sunpoted that the Greeks acquired from the Babylonians the know- 

 ledge of the polia (ir<$Aos), the gnomon or style, and the division of the 

 day into twelve parts. (Herod., ii c. 109.) It may be imagined that, 

 from the intercourse between the Egyptians and Greeks in very early 

 timed, a great resemblance should be found among the figures employed 

 by the two people to represent the groups of stars ; but that thy differed 

 in some respects from one another may be inferred from the testimony 

 nf Achilles Tatius, who states that the Egyptians had not the constel- 



ARTS AND SCI. DIV. VOL. VIII. 



lations Draco, Cepheus, and Cassiopeia ; and it follows that these must 

 have been introduced by the Greeks, or at least that the latter people 

 substituted them for corresponding figures in the Egyptian sphere. It 

 maybe remarked, however, that in the oldest descriptions of the Greek 

 zodiac (T/copin'os and ^7j\ot, the xcarpion and the dates, make one con- 

 stellation ; whereas, in the Egyptian zodiacs the corresponding part of 

 the heavens is divided between the scorpion and the balance, the latter 

 occupying the place of the claws. Now in a work on the " constellations," 

 ascribed to Eratosthenes, who lived in the time of Ptolemy Euergetes, 

 it is stated that the great length of the constellation caused astrono- 

 mers to divide it into two parts ; and in a poem attributed to a certain 

 Manetho, supposed to be the priest of that name, and dedicated to one 

 of the Ptolemies, it is expressly stated that " the claws of Scorpio ' 

 were by the priests changed into " the balance." It would seem there- 

 fore that the Egyptians, in or before the time of Manetho, adopted in 

 their zodiac a name which had been given by the Greeks : yet as an 

 argument in favour of the great antiquity of the sign it may be observed 

 that, according to Ptolemy, the Chaldacans designated by a word signi- 

 fying a balance the constellation called by the Greeks xi* a ' : it 

 may be, however, that he alluded then to the Chaldicans of his own 

 time. 



The designations which are given to the constellations in the writings 

 of the Greeks apparently indicate persons or objects connected with 

 the Argonautic expedition ; and it is reasonable to suppose that, about 

 the epoch of that expedition, the Greeks, having acquired a knowledge 

 of the manner in which the Chaldaeans or Egyptians represented the 

 visible heavens, transformed such of the figures as they did not reject 

 into others having relation to the actions of their own heroes. On this 

 hypothesis it has been assumed that Aries represents the ram whose 

 golden fleece was the object of the expedition ; Taurus, the bull or 

 bulls which were tamed by Jason ; Gemini, Castor and Pollux, and so 

 on. The ship, among the southern constellations, is supposed to be 

 the Argo ; and Ursa Major, the nymph Callisto. The history of Perseus 

 is imagined to be represented by Perseus, Andromeda, Cepheus, Cas- 

 siopeia, and Cetus ; and the labours of Hercules, by Draco, Leo, and 

 the constellation bearing the name of that hero. Newton, in his 

 ' Chronology,' appears however to assume too much when he considers 

 that Chiron, whom he supposes to have given the names to the con- 

 stellations, disposed Aries, Cancer, Libra, and Capricornus so that the 

 equinoctial and solsticial colures passed through their middle points : 

 the precise determination of these points was beyond the science of the 

 Greeks long subsequently to the age of Chiron. 



Hesiod mentions ('Opera et Dies') the Pleiades, Arcturus, and 

 Orion, stating that land should be ploughed at the heliacal setting, and 

 corn reaped at the heliacal rising of the Pleiades (about the middle of 

 April); he directs also that corn should be threshed at the rising of 

 Orion, and vines primed when Arcturus rises in the evening. Homer 

 also mentions the Pleiades, Hyades, the Bear or Waggon, 



&PKTOV ff ^fv Kol jua|ap ^Tr'iK\r]ffiv KO\Ouffif f 



and Orion in the description of the shield of Achilles (' II.,' xviii., 487) ; 

 it is evident therefore that already in the time of Homer those constel- 

 lations were introduced in the sphere of the Greeks. Plutarch asserts 

 that Anaximander (probably about 600 B.C.) constructed a dial ; and 

 that representations of the clusters of stars, together with figures of 

 the constellations, were frequently executed in Greece in the time of 

 Hipparchus, is evident from a passage in the commentary of that 

 astronomer on the poem of Aratus : planispheres, he observes, are con- 

 structed for men's use, and therefore the figures on them are traced 

 just as they appear in the heavens to the view of the spectator. 



In the work of Autolycus, entitled ' On Risings and Settings ' of the 

 Stars (ictpl 'EirtTo\ui> KOI Ai'/ircwp), and in the ' Phenomena ' ('I'ai!,u> J'a) 

 of Euclid, the signs of the zodiac are mentioned, and the parts into 

 which that band of the heavens was divided are called dodecatemories, 

 or twelfths ; but it is in the astronomical poem of Aratus that the most 

 complete knowledge of the celestial sphere of the Greeks is to be ob- 

 tained. This writer lived about 270 years before the Christian era, 

 and his poem is a paraphrase of two works which were composed by 

 Eudoxus of Cnidus, who lived 100 years previously, that is, in the age 

 of Autolycus and Euclid. 



In describing the constellations, Aratus begins with those imme- 

 diately about the north pole of the equator, and proceeds from thence 

 to the zodiac, nearly in the directions of the declination or hour-circles 

 of the sphere. He mentions Ursa Major and Ursa Minor, observing 

 that they are placed so that the tail of one corresponds to the shoulders 

 of the other, and he adds that the constellation Draco winds between 

 them. Near the head of Draco he places the figure of a man, who is 

 said to be on his knees (Hercules, whose attitude has since been 

 changed), and behind him the northern crown. Near the kneeling 

 figure is Ophiuchus, the serpent-carrier, and uuder the latter are the 

 great claws (of Scorpio). Behind Ursa Major is Arctophylax (Bootes), 

 with the star Arcturus below his girdle ; and under his feet is the con- 

 stellation Virgo. Near the head of Ursa Major are Gemini (A(5t^oi) ; 

 under his body is Cancer, and under his feet Leo. Auriga and the 

 star Capella are said to be on the left of Gemini, opposite Ursa Major ; 

 and at the foot of Auriga are the horns of Taurus, whose head is indi- 

 cated by a cluster of stars (the Hyades). Cepheus is behind Ursa 

 Minor, auc'. v.:-.r him is Cassiopeia, the stars of which are said to be 



3 Y 



