420 TRANS. ST. LOUIS ACAD SCIENCE. 



means of these Greek seasons many epochs of Greek and Roman 

 history are fixed. For instance, the consuls yEm. Paullus 11. and 

 Lie. Crassus must have ruled in — 166, and not, as Petavius 

 imagined, in — 167 ; because the battle near Pydna being fought 

 during the same consulate, happened, as we have seen, in — 166. 

 This date confirms the aforesaid result, that, down to Julius Cae- 

 sar, all events of Roman history, as determined by Petavius, have 

 to move down one year. — Again, the eye-witness Thucydides (ii. 

 28) testifies that the solar eclipse observed in Athens in the course 

 of the first year of the Peloponnesian war, Arch. Pythador I., 

 happened in d^ifw^ soon after noon. About that time only one 

 eclipse agrees with Thucydides, viz. that in — 429, Jan. 22, 22h. 

 P. T. Petavius, on the contrary, recurred to the eclipse in — 430, 

 Aug. 3, 5h. 30m. after noon ; but, alas ! this eclipse belongs to 

 ■)^£c/uou, and not to &£()0^. — The eye-witness Aristophanes (Nub. 

 580) testifies that, in the course of the loth year of the Pelopon- 

 nesian war, on occasion of Cleon's election as strategus, during 

 the early spring, a partial eclipse of the sun and a total one of the 

 moon happened ; of which, the former, according to the scholiast 

 in Scaliger's Synage, took place on Jan. i8th (Anthesterion i6th). 

 These two facts demonstrate that the events of the Peloponnesian 

 war narrated by Thucydides happened oq^ year later than Peta- 

 vius made out. — Xenophon (Hell. ii. 3, 4) bears witness, that, 

 during d^epo^ of the last year of the Peloponnesian war, an eclipse 

 of the sun was perceived which Petavius referred to — 403, Sept. 

 2d. But, alas ! this eclipse of Sept. 2d belonged to yec[xcov, and not 

 to ^spoi;. The eclipse under consideration happened two years 

 later, viz. in — 401, Jan. 18, 9 o'clock a.m. Thus the seasons of 

 the Greeks, apart from all other arguments, evince that the Pelo- 

 ponnesian war commenced in — 429, and ended in — 401 ; that 

 the same lasted 28 full years, as Thucydides and Xenophon tes- 

 tify ; that all events narrated by Thucydides come down by one 

 year ; that the first part of Xenophon's Hellenica is, at present, 

 missing ; and that all events narrated by Xenophon, all Greek 

 archons and Olympian games subsequent to the year — 407, are 

 to be postdated by two years. 



6. Greek and Roman Inscriptions and Coins. — Subsequent 

 to Petavius's "Doctrina Temporum," 1627, many Greek and Ro- 



