Indian Antiquary Vol 60

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Charles E A W Oldham, S Krishnaswami Aiyangar, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarka
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 260

230
:
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
[ DECEMBER, 1931
"Owing to the greater exactitude of the European system of the measurement of time, the Tibetans who have come into contact with life in India have learned to understand and even employ European reckoning of the hours. Curiously enough, this is quite irrespective of whether they have watches or not. A certain position of the sun in the sky means to them three p.m., and so on."
As a matter of fact, the Tibetans employ the same methods of reckoning time with sufficient accuracy for their wants as do other peoples who have no watches. Their divisions of the day and night correspond with those of the Nicobarese and Andamanese. The Nicobarese are & semi-civilised people of ultimate origin in Western Chinese bighlands, and the Adamanese are savages who cannot count, and yet they divide their days and nights with sufficient accuracy by the same process as the Tibetans.
The Burmese adopted the Indian system of watches of uneven length for daylight and dusk--four watches, nominally three hours each.
In Burma again Shway Yoe, The Burman, 553 f., tells us that "in the smaller villages and towns time is only roughly indicated by a reference to the position of the sun or the moon or to a certain daily occurrence taking place at a fixed time, as 'in the morning when the sun was as high as a toddy palm': or before the sky was light : when the light got strength (about half-past five): the earliest cock-crowing time; when the monks go a-begging (six or seven in the morning, according to the custom of the monastery): the monks returning time (usually about eight, but varying, of course, with the charity of the neighbourhood): after midday: sky closing time (about six p.m.): 'brothers don't know each other time' (just after dark): when the lamps are lighted : children's go to bed time (about eight): lads go courting time (about the same hour): when grown up people lay their heads down (ten in the country, twelve with kalathas of the town) : all the world quiet time: thagaung-gyaw 'the wee short hour ayont the twal': when the red star rises--all these and a multitude of others are in common everyday use."
In Burma "a breath's space" serves to denote a moment : "the chewing of a fid of betel " oocupies ten minutes ; "the time it would take to boil one pot of rice," twenty minutes.
6. The Calendar. "The first of these (pageants) took place on March 3 [1923), which (p. 317) was the fif. teenth day of the first Tibetan month, and as the Tibetans have a lunar calendar, the night of every fifteenth is marked by the full moon." [It is a pity that Dr. McGovern has not told ya whether the Tibetans reckon by thirteen months in the solar year.]
Shway Yoe, The Burman, 549, tells us that "the ordinary year in Burma consists of twelve lunar months of 29 and 30 days alternately. Every third year a thirteenth month is intercalated between the fourth and fifth. The date on which the year begins in the month of April was determined by the calculation of the Royal astronomers in Mandalay, and published throughout the country by the monks and district officials."