﻿2 28 ON THE ASTRONOMICAL COMPUTATIONS 



" by set forms, couched in enigmatical verses,*" Sec, 

 So far are they Irom deserving the reproach of igno- 

 rance which Mons. Sonnerat has implied, that on in- 

 quiry, I believe, the Hindu science of astronomy will 

 be found as well known now as it ever was among 

 them, although, perhaps, not so generally, by reason 

 of the little encouragement men of science at present 

 meet with, compared with what they formerly did un- 

 der their native princes. 



It has been common with astronomers to fix on some 

 epoch, from which, as from a radix, to compute the 

 planetary motions ; and the ancient Hindus chose that 

 point of time counted back when, according to their 

 motions as they had determined them, they must have 

 been in conjunction in the beginning of Mesha, or 

 Aries ; and coeval with which circumstance they sup- 

 posed the creation. This, as it concerned the planets 

 only, would have produced a moderate term of years 

 compared with the enormous antiquity, that will be 

 hereafter stated; but, having discovered a slow mo- 

 tion of the nodes and apsides also, and taking it into 

 the computation, they found it would require a length 

 of time corresponding with 1955884890 years now 

 expired, when they were so situated, and 2364 [ 151 io 

 years more, before they would return to the same si- 

 tuation again, forming together the grand anomalistic 

 period denominated a Calpa, and fancifully assigned as 

 the day of Brahma. The Culpa they divided intc* 

 Manwantsras, and greater and less Yugas. The use 

 ot' the ManivcJ/i/ era is not stated in the Surya Suldhan- 

 ta\ but that of the Maha, or greater Yug, is sufficiently 

 evident, as being an anomalistic period of the sun and 

 moon, at the end of which the latter, with her apogee 

 and ascending node, is found, together with the sun, 



* See the trmslation of Bfuns. Sonnerafn VoyagM 



