Rest Days; A Sociological Study 91 



and full moon form the most conspicnous lunar phases it has 

 been a common practice among peoples, some of whom have no 

 regular civil weeks, nevertheless to recognize two periods in the 

 lunar month as marked by the waxing and by the waning moon 

 Such a two-fold division was familiar to the ancient Hindus and 

 Persians, to the oldest Greeks and Romans.-" /\mong the Ger- 

 mans the new and full moon appear as the most prominent lunar 

 phases.-- The division of the lunation into two parts, the one 

 of 15 days, the other of 14 or 15 days, according as the month 

 had 29 or 30 days, is clearly indicated for the Celtic peoples.'^^ 



of thirteen visible phases of the moon's increase (Mex. vicxto::oUztH, the 

 moon's waxing) and thirteen phases of her decrease (mecochilistli, the 

 moon's sleep). "From employing the 13 seasonal names of moons to 

 denote the series of days thus enumerated it is an easy transition to a 

 continuous reckoning by cycles of 13 days perpetually denoted in the same 

 way ; and a perpetual cycle thus established formed a true calendar " 

 (op. cit., ii. 356). Some other less plausible reasons for the selection of 

 the number 13 are considered by Mr. C. P. Bowditch, The Numeration, 

 Calendar Systems, and Astronotnical Kncwledge of the Mayas, Cambridge, 

 [Mass.], 1910, pp. 266 sq. In some pueblos the markets were held every 13th 

 day; a circumstance which has been rightly regarded as relating back to 

 times when the 13-day cycle was the only one known (Payne, op. cit., ii. 

 368). The later cycle of 5 days found among the Mexicans and Mayas 

 may be regarded simply as a convenient division of the 20-day periods, 

 eighteen of which were counted in the solar year. (Brinton, " The Native 

 Calendar of Central America and Mexico," Proceedings of the American 

 Philosophical Society, 1893, xxxi. 262 sqq.). On the market-day which 

 closed each 5-day period see supra. 



^ Schrader, Reallexikon, s. v. " Mond und Monat " ; H. Zimmer, 

 Altindisches Leben, Berlin, 1879, p. 364. Modern Hindus divide the month 

 into two parts called pukh, or fortnights. The first is called badi, reckon- 

 ing from the first to the fifteenth, which day is called amaviis, answering 

 to the Roman Ides, and is held in great sanctity. The second division is 

 called stidi, from full moon to new moon (Balfour, Cyclopaedia of India, 

 s. V. "Month"). The days of the month are thus reckoned by the 

 increasing and decreasing moon (supra). For a similar bipartite division 

 of the month in Cambodia and Siam see Hastings, op. cit., iii. iii, 113, 

 136. 



"* Tacitus, Germania, 11 (cu)n out inchoaiur Itina aut impletiir). 



^Loth, in Revue celtique, 1904, xxv. 131; Thurneysen, in Zeitschrift fiir 

 dciitsche Wortforschung, 1901, i. 191. In the Calendar of Coligny between 



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