VOL. LXXX.J PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 749 



translators. SalaMn, who is said to have reigned many years over the ancient 

 kingdom of Narsinga, in the northern part of the peninsula, is described as a 

 liberal encourager of the sciences. There is reason to think, that astronomy 

 experienced a reformation and considerable improvements under his auspices; 

 and the professors appear to have attached the celebrity of an era to his death^ 

 in respect for his talents and gratitude for his protection. 



As the era of Bikramajit prevails chiefly in the higher or northern provinces 

 of India, so does that of Salab^n in the southern, but more exclusively. In 

 their current transactions, however, the inhabitants of the peninsula employ a 

 mode of computation of a different nature, which, though not unknown in 

 other parts of the world, is confined to these people among the Hindoos. This 

 is a cycle, or revolving period, of 6 solar years, which has no further corres- 

 pondence with the eras above-mentioned than that of their years respectively 

 commencing on the same day. Those that constitute the cycle, instead of being 

 numerically counted, are distinguished from each other by appropriate names, 

 which, in their epistles, bills, and the like, are inserted as dates, with the months, 

 and perhaps the age of the moon annexed; but, in their writings of importance 

 and record, the year of Salabdn, often called the Saka year, is super-added; and 

 this is the more essential, as it is not customary to number the cycles by any 

 progressive reckoning. In their astronomical calculations, they sometimes com- 

 pute the year of their era by multiplying the number of cycles elapsed, and add- 

 ing the complement of the cycle in which it commenced, as well as the years 

 of the current cycle; but from hence we are led to no satisfactory conclusion res- 

 pecting the origin of this popular mode of estimating time. The presumption 

 is in favour of its being more ancient than their historical epochs. The present 

 cycle, of which 43 complete years were expired in April 17C)0, began in the 

 year 1747, with the year of Salaban 1669, and of the grand era 4848. M. Le 

 Gentil, to whom Europe is chiefly indebted for what is known of Hindoo astro- 

 nomy, has fallen into an unaccountable error with regard to the years of this 

 cycle, and their correspondence with those of the Kalee Yoog, as appears by the 

 comparative table he has given of them, and other passages of his work. He 

 seems to have taken it for granted, without due examination, that the year 36oo 

 of the latter must have been produced by the multiplication of the cycle of 60 

 into itself, and consequently that the first year of this grand era must also have 

 been the first of the cycle; but this is totally inconsistent with the fact; the 

 Kalee Yoog began with the 13th year of the cycle of 60, ar)d all the reasoning 

 founded on the self-production and harmony of these periods must fall to the 

 ground. 



It now remains to take notice of a mode of reckoning peculiar to the province 

 of Bengal, and thence denominated the Bengal era. The circumstances of its 



