ITS EARLIEST STAGES. 115 



were included in the interval through which the scrutiny extended, 

 the knowledge of the length of the year so acquired would be pro- 

 portionally more exact. 



Besides those notices of the sun which offered exact indications of 

 the seasons, other more indefinite natural occurrences were used : as 

 the arrival of the swallow (^e/Udwv) and the kite (Itcrcv). The birds, 

 in Aristophanes' play of that name, mention it as one of their offices 

 to mark the seasons ; Hesiod similarly notices the cry of the crane as 

 an indication of the departure of winter. 5 



Among the Greeks the seasons were at first only summer and 

 winter (depoc and ^;e^c5v), the latter including all the rainy and cold 

 portion of the year. The winter was then subdivided into the xeLjiuv 

 and lap (winter proper and spring), and the summer, less definitely, 

 into Ospog and ondpa (summer and autumn). Tacitus says that the 

 Germans knew neither the blessings nor the name of autumn, " An- 

 tumni perinde nomen ac bona ignorantur." Yet harvest, hcrbst, is 

 certainly an old German word. 6 



In the same period in which the sun goes through his cycle of posi- 

 tions, the stars also go through a cycle of appearances belonging to 

 them ; and these appearances were perhaps employed at as early a 

 period as those of the sun, in determining the exact length of the year. 

 Many of the groups of fixed stars arc readily recognized, as exhibiting 

 always the same configuration; and particular bright stars are singled 

 out as objects of attention. These are observed, at particular seasons, 

 to appear in the west after sunset; but it is noted that when they do 

 this, they are found nearer and nearer to the sun every successive 

 evening, and at last disappear in his light. It is observed also, that at 

 a certain interval after this, they rise visibly before the dawn of day 

 renders the stars invisible; and after they are seen to do this, they 

 rise every day at a longer interval before the sun. The risings and 

 settings of the stars under these circumstances, or under others which 

 are easily recognized, were, in countries where the sky is usually 

 clear, employed at an early period to mark the seasons of the year. 

 Eschylus 7 makes Prometheus mention this among the benefits of which 



Meier, i. 240. • lb. i. 243. 



' OJfC rjv yap avro'i; ours x t 'f aro i TtK/iap, 

 OJV avOcfitliovs tjpos, ovSc Kapni/iov 

 6/{)ous ffiflaioV aW artp yvwptis rd irdv 

 Eirpoirffov, lart c>) otpiv avaroXa; iy£} 

 Karpuiv c8ii£a. rds re Svokoitovs Siaci;. — Prom. V. 454. 



