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268 ON THE ASTRONOMICAL COMPUTATIONS 



" found by the shadow, the ayanansu must be added. 



** In the present time the ayanansa is added. Ac- 



I* cording to the author of the Varasanluta, it was 



" said to have been formerly deducted * ; and the 



tc southern ayana of Surya to have been in the first 



" half of the nacshatra Aslesha \ ; and the northern 



'.' ayana in the beginning of Dhanishia : that in his 



(t time the southern ayana was in the beginning of 



" Cacara, or Cancer ; and the northern in the be- 



" ginning of Macara, or Capricorn. 



" The bhaganasoi the ayanansa in a Ma ha Yug are 

 " 600, the saura years in the same period 4,320,000 ; 

 one bhagana of the ayanansa therefore contains 

 7,200 years. Of a bhagana there are four padas. 

 First pada, when there was no ayanansa j but the 

 ayanansa beginning from that time and increasing, 

 it was added. It continued increasing 1800 years; 

 when it became at its utmost, or twenty-seven de- 

 " grees. Second pada : — After this it diminished; 



* " It was said to have been formerly rina." In the Hindu 

 specious arithmetic, or algebra, dhana signifies affirmation or ad- 

 dition, and rina negation or subtraction : the sign of the latter i3 

 a point placed over the figure, or the quantity noted <!own ; thus, 

 four added to seven, is equal to three. See the bija ganita, where 

 the mode of computation is explained thus: " When a man has 

 four pieces of money, and owes seven of the same value, his cir- 

 cumstances reduced to the form of an equation, or his books 

 balanced, show a deficiency of three pieces." 



f Thif describes the place of the solstitial eolure ; and, accord- 

 ing to this account of the ayanansa, the equinoctial eolure must 

 then have passed through the tenth degree of the nacshatra Bba- 

 rani and the 3° 20' of Visac'ba. The circumstance, as it is men- 

 tioned in the Vara Sanbita, is curious and deserving of notice. I 

 shall only observe here, that, although it does not disagree with 

 the present system of the Hindus in regard to the motion of the 

 equinoctial points, yet the commentator on the Varasanbita sup- 

 poses that it must have been owing to some preternatural cause. 

 The place here described of the eolure, is on comparison of the 

 Hindu and European spheres about 3 40' eastward of the position, 

 which it is supposed by Sir Isaac Neivton, on the authority of 

 Eudoxusy to have had in the "primitive sphere at the time of the 

 Argonautic expedition. 



