Show wa 1 KNOW BY CALENDAR CAL PUZZLE OF MANY A rs S dy vy EDGAR ELLSWORTH OWEN of the night flight of timo t I 1 M 0 wera in a arcy 70 muddle lu iu tho the I 1 early ages you accept as no a matter of fact tho the arrival of now years day and it never occure occurs to you that thoro thero might not bo be a now new year nor any year and 1 oven even if it tho the year 1 d did id havo have a systematic plan it might up in tho the early springtime or late in fall or some other timo time of tho the year X as wo we know it 11 now little more than twenty centuries of tho the earths annual celestial tour tours havo have been tallied with the year OB an ho ole unit of time thie this innovation Is credited to tn mathematician alho ian and philosopher who hold a job as an librarian for one oho of tho the atol at alexandria about boaro before christ no doubt found delight in devising a system by which future ages could cat eat their ingals and go to bod bed and rot got up again agnin without having to first run out into thu the yard to see where tho the eun sun or moon or some starry constellation might chanco chance to bo be wo we all know that tho year ie to tho the period in which the sun makee makes a complete completo circuit of tho the heavens and returns to the point in the zodiac ghenco it started but wo we never atop stop to question how or why it Is to enough for us that calendars and almanacs aro are thrown our way for tho the asking 4 wherein wo we fand each day of the month and of the year carefully numbered our yeara years aro are of the christian pra and extend from january I 1 to december 31 this era was first used by dionysius lus in A D it was more than a thousand years before tho the year was aaa begun on january 1 by many nations before the days of thoro there seems to havo have been no crying demand domand for fora a precise plan of counting time in one city the reckoning was wag by a succession of kings in another by a succession of 4 magistrates or priests even after iho tho adoption in european countries of the christian era there were so many methods of dating national provincial and ecclesiastical that only confusion could result mythology long had bad held a higher place than astronomy Ile peoples oples of egypt and babylonia aro are aid sald to havo have been wiser than those of other nations that figure in the centuries 4 following them sages of those 1 olden times wore were familiar with the heavens be avons but tho the greeks who followed them could not calculate the advent of their moons in conjunction with the eun sun tho the hebrews before going flown down into egypt and tho the Arn arabians blans before tho the timo time of mohammed calculated timo time only by the moon they figured 12 luna tlona tiona or days as iho the duration of the 3 ear car on that basis tho the now years day returned to tho the samo same season once in 33 years moses is said to have obtained all of I 1 bis his chronological kno knowledge uledge from tho the egyptians vho aho ho learned the length pf tho the tropical year by almor observing ting the rising of sirlei tho the dog star I 1 porno troubles of the jews in keeping their calender calendar straight are told in F iho the jewish encyclopedia in early I 1 allm ume hs an extra month was nas thrown in every two or three years calculations I 1 of tho the relative length of the olar solar and lunar years were handed down don by traditions in tho the ial family it was as possible pos also to judge by tho the grain harvest if tho the month of nisan and the sun was so far from the vernal equinox thai that it could not reach it by tho the of the month tho the month was not called NI tan but adar shoni second tho the country people and tho the inhabitants of BabI onla were informed of the beginning of the month by faro signals carried from elation to station in the mountain country under tho the of at rabbi judah I 1 L saya says the jewish encyclopedia the samaritans samaritana Samar itans in order to confuse confuso the jews sot act fire signals at improper times and thus caused the 1 jews to tall fall into error with regard to the day of tho the now moon rabbi judah accordingly abolished tho the ire fire signals and employed messengers the jewish calendar reckons tho the baya from evening to evening in accordance cor dance danca with tho the order observed in the biblical account of the creation the jewish cycle in nineteen years exceeds the gregorian by 2 hours 8 minutes and seconds this makes difference in a hundred cycles 1900 years of 8 days 21 hours 46 and 6 seconds the assumed duration of at tho the solar year te to 6 minutes 39 25 ga seconds in excess of the tho truo true astronomical value alue which will cauro tho the dates of tho the commencement of future jewish years that are calculated ton dianco danco from iho the ocul nox a day in error in years all european countries borrower avil calendars from tho the romans abd year began with march and that nc counts for tho the present names of 0 thy the last four months of tho the year in tha reign of numa two months were add ed d january at tho the beginning and february at tho the end in 42 D B 0 feb auary was given its present place at that timo time tho the months had twenty cinq and thirty days alternately so that ho the year had days to mako make this more fortunato fortunate under tho the old duport atimion that luck lies iles in odd nuro num bers ono one day was added tho the moon makes a revolution in about twenty olno and one halt half days and twelve lu nations form a period at 0 days to got tho the civil calendar oven even with thi solar year numa ordered an addition al month to be inserted every second year between the and a 0 february consisting of aw twenty two C and twenty days alternately four years contained 1465 1466 days and tho the moan mean length of tho the ear car waa 30 days this was onn one day too much from an effort to adjust mat more confusion resulted politicians of that day were no less prone to manipulate affairs to their own advantage than they are today every third period of eight years was to contain only three intercalary months instead of four this would reduce tho the moan length of the year to days but the care of tho the calen dar was loft left with certain with discretion to intercalate more or few er days to prolong the terms of or to hasten elections ho the question of tho the calendar was ignored when julius capsar carna into power ho he found tho the civil equinox differed aiom the astronomical by throe three months winter months had been carried back into autumn and autumn into summer genes an old mathematician who was more familiar with the stars than any man of his time came to caesars rescue and devised a plan to put an nn end to the disorder tho ci civil 11 year was regulated entirely by the sun and was fixed at 5 days tho the quarter day being added to each fourth year as we havo have it now the tho original plan was to havo have thirty one days each for the first third fifth seventh ninth and eleventh months and tho the other months thirty except february which was to have twenty venty janus won immortal fame while serving as janitor of heaven and at the same time gw guardian ardian of gates and doors on earth he presided over the beginning of everything and it we natural that the first month should be called in his honor nine on common v ears cars and thirty each fourth bear ear this would have been so much more simple that had it been kept 0 o no doubt would want ant to give giva thanks to caesar but then came that other caesar and spoiled it all july had been named for julius and augus tue insisted tho the month to bear hie his own name must have as many daya days as july ono one day was taken from february and added to august to gratify the vanity of this ruler when the julian calendar was introduced trod tho the equinox fell on tho the of march in the course of a few centuries it changed tho the error in timo time amounted to a day in years in 1682 pope gregory XIII abolished tho the julian calendar in all catholic countries and introduced the ono one now in use at that timo time the equinox had 61 upped back to march 11 ten days were ere dropped from tho the calendar every one hundredth year that by tho th old style would be a leap year was wags to be a common year the fourth century divisible by four excepted 1600 was to be almap year but 1700 1800 1900 of tho the common length and 2000 a leap year again some countries were slow to accept this method but russia is to the only christian country that does not follow M chicado record heralds P WN |