________________
424
EPIGRAPHIA INDICA.
The tithi 15:01, shows that on the day calculated, a Sunday, full-moon occurred before mean sunset at Lanka (about 19h. earlier, see Table IV) and as 'node'=5 is within the limits of certain eclipse, there was therefore a lunar eclipse visible in India. The date is 17th January, 930 A.D. On that day, according to von Oppolzer's Canon, the middle of a lunar eclipse occurred at 18 hours 8 minutes after mean midnight at Greenwich or 12 hours 12 minutes after mean sunrise at Lanka. Our tables make the middle of the eclipse fall about half an hour earlier than the true time. Ex-Was there a solar eclipse in 4730 K.Y. Jyaishtha? Calculate first Jyaishtha badi 15:
4700 K. Y.
30 years 4:30 K.Y. 13 Ashadha
An. 920, eq.
Tithi. 14.20
An.
605
684
289
631
920
Node.
345
328
Ind. 18-61
2.19
16.39
13:30
29.69
0-22
29.91
New-moon therefore occurred 0·09 tithis or 5 ghatikás = 2 hours 12 minutes later. There was a solar eclipse at that time, though we do not find by the tables whether it was visible in India or not. But we learn from von Oppolzer's Canon and maps that the eclipse on the 11th June 1629 was so. The middle of the eclipse occurred at 3 hours after mean sunrise at Lanka. Our result therefore is in error by 48 minutes.
578
413
986
The cycles of Jupiter.
42. A chronological datum not unfrequently met with in Hindu dates is the name of the year according to one of the cycles of Jupiter. We know of two Jovian cycles, one of twelve years, and one of sixty years; and there are two ways of applying either cycle. We begin with:
43. The sixty-year cycle.-The names of the 60 years in the cycle are given in Table XXIII. They are applied, in the north, on strictly astronomical principles, while in the south this cycle has no longer any connection with the movements of Jupiter. The years in the sixty-year cycle in the south coincide with the civil (solar) year.
Rule.-Subtract 14 from the year of the Kaliyuga, or 15 from the Saka year, or 30 from the Vikrama year (or 33 from the year A.D.); divide by 60, and the remainder is to be looked out in Table XXIII as the number of the cyclic year; e.g.-For 3678 K.Y. 3678-14-3664.61, rem. 4. No. 4 in Table XXIII is Hemalamba, which therefore is the cyclic name of the K.Y. year 3678; that year is Saka 499, Vikrama 631, 577 A.D.; and going through the same operation as prescribed in the rule with these numbers, we always arrive at the same result.
44. The sixty-year cycle in the north.-The years in this cycle are Jovian years. The Jovian year is equal to the mean time (about 361 days 14 gh.), required by Jupiter to move through a zodiacal sign. Therefore one cycle contains five mean revolutions of Jupiter or about 59 civil years.
27 Greenwich time from midnight, less 56 minutes, gives mean Lanká time from sunrise. Compare note 9.
These five minor cycles, contained in one whole eyele, are named (after the five years of the Vedic yugo):
(1 Smvatsara, (2) Parivatsara (3) Idavatsara, (4) Anuvatsara, and (5) Udvatsara.-Brihat Samhita, VIII, 24
