254 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1792. 



Tlie names of the months are the same as those of the lunar months in the 

 Benares patra, Visakha being the first, or that which corresponds with the sign 

 Mesha. The lunar months begin, not at the full, as in the Benares patra, but 

 at the new moon, and are called by the name of that solar month which ends 

 during the course of them; for example, the lunar month, during which the 

 solar month Visakha ends, is calleil Chandra (or lunar) Visakha, so that each 

 month begins a fortnight later than by the Benares patra. The teethees do not 

 recommence at the full moon, but are continued to the end of the month, or to 

 the 30th. In other respects they are counted as in the Benares patra; that is, 

 the same notation is used whenever a day occurs in wliich no teethee ends, or 

 when 1 teethees end on the same day. Unluckily no intercalary month occurred 

 in the year for which this almanac was computed, so that it gives us no informa- 

 tion about the melliod ot intercalation; but from analogy we may conclude, that 

 those lunar montiis in which the sun enters no sign are intercalary, and are 

 called by the name of either the preceding or following month, with the ad- 

 dition of some word to denote that they are intercalary*. 



As the Nadeea almanac begins with the day after the commencement of the 

 solar year, and gives the day of the solar month, which the Benares patra does 

 not, it affords reason to think that the custom of that part of India in which it 

 is used, is to date by the solar month, and begin the year on the next day to the 



that the Hindoos count by years complete, not by years current: for example, the year 1000 of tlie 

 Kalee Yug begins at the time when 1000 years are completed from the Kalee Yug ; and it is likely 

 tliat the same manner of counting is adopted with regard to days, so that tlie day of the month marked 

 1, does not signify the first day, but the day which begins at the expiration of the first day, and con- 

 sequently that the civil montli begins at the sun-rise of the day on which the astronomical month begins. 

 I however have chosen to say that it begins at the day after, partly because I am not sure that the 

 foregoing is the true meaning of the Hindoos, and partly because it would have been ditlicult to ex- 

 press myself in such manner as not to run great risk of being misunderstood, if I had done otherwise. 

 What is here said applies equally to the lunar month in this and the Benares almanacs. 



Though it is foreign to the subject of this paper, I cannot refrain from taking notice of an error, 

 which 1 apprehend many European astronomers have fallen into, from not distinguishing between days 

 current and days complete. It is coiuraon to say that tlie astronomical day begins I' hours later than 

 the civil day, and the nautical day 12 hours sooner; and it is true tliat the hour which, according to 

 tlie civil account, is called 1 in the afternoon of the first of January, is written by astronomers 

 January 1'' l*", but this I apprehend ought not to be read 1" on tlie 1st of January, but 1'' and 1" fi-om 

 the beginning of January, so that in leality the astronomical and nautical day botli begin 12" before 

 die civil. A proof of the truth of this is, that in astronomical tables tlie place of tlie heavenly bodies 

 set down for the beginning of the year, is tlie place for noon of the last civil day of the preceding year; 

 and furllier, in Halley's tables this place is said to be annis Julianis ineuntibus, which shows that he 

 thought that tliis was not luerely a practice used for tlie sake of convenience, but that the year ac- 

 tually begins at this time. — Orig. 



* The Chinese, who, like the Hindoos, consider that lunar montli as intercalary in which the sun 

 enters no sign, call it by the same name as the preceding montli ; and it is likely tliat the Bengalese 

 do so too. — Orig. 



