48 UNIVERSAL ERUDITION. 



adopted the lunar aftronomic year of 354 days, 7 

 8 hours, 48 minutes, they fometimes inferred a 

 day at the end of the year, ib that in the fpace 

 of 29 years, the 2, 5, 7, 10, 13, 15, 18, 21, 24, 

 26, and 29th years were Biflextiles. Their 

 months were alternately of 29 and 30 days ; and 

 in the hi/Textile years the lafl month, Dulheggia, 

 was alfo of 30 days. The firft year of this pe- 

 riod began on the i5th July of the Julian ca- 

 lendar. 



XVIII. The year of the modern Jews is alfo 

 a lunar year of 354 days, and has twelve months 

 that confift alternately of 29 and 30 days. They 

 fometimes added to the month Odar, or March, 

 another entire month of 30 days, which they 

 called Veodar, or more than March. Their in* 

 tercalary years are, in 19 years, the 3, 6, 8, u, 

 17, and 1 9th. The Jewifh year begins on the day 

 of chat new moon, which, according to the 

 moon's mean motion, is neareH to the autumnal^ 

 equinox. Sometimes they refcind from the com-^ 

 mon year, as well as from the biflextile, a day 

 of the month Kiftow, or December j fo that the 

 common year then confifls of 353 days only, and 

 the biflextile of 383. Sometimes alfo they add 

 a day to each of thefe forts of years, and then 

 the former is of 355, and the latter of 385 days; 

 the reafon of which is, becaufe they muft not ce- 

 lebrate the new moon of the month Tifchri 

 or Oftober, on the j, 4, or 6th days of 

 the week, or begin the new year on thole days, 



as 



