We know from Censorinus (De die natali, xxi. 10) that the first of Thoth coincided with the heliacal rising of Sirius on July 20 (Julian calendar) in the year 139 a.d. Hence reckoning backwards by Sothic periods of 1460 solar years we may infer that Sirius rose on July 20th (Julian calendar) in the years 1321 b.c., 2781 b.c., and 4241 b.c.; and accordingly that the civil or vague Egyptian year of 365 days was instituted in one of these years. In favour of supposing that it was instituted either in 2781 b.c. or 4241 b.c., it may be said that in both these years the rising of Sirius nearly coincided with the summer solstice and the rising of the Nile; whereas in the year 1321 b.c. the summer solstice, and with it the rising of the Nile, fell nineteen days before the rising of Sirius and the first of Thoth. Now when we consider the close causal connexion which the Egyptians traced between the rising of Sirius and the rising of the Nile, it seems probable that they started the new calendar on the first of Thoth in a year in which the two natural phenomena coincided rather than in one in which they diverged from each other by nineteen days. Prof. Ed. Meyer decides in favour of the year 4241 b.c. as the date of the introduction of the Egyptian calendar on the ground that the calendar was already well known in the Old Kingdom. See L. Ideler, op. cit. i. 125 sqq.; F. K. Ginzel, op. cit. i. 192 sqq.; Ed. Meyer, “Nachträge zur ägyptischen Chronologie,” Abhandlungen der königl. Preuss. Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1907 (Berlin, 1908), pp. 11 sq.; id., Geschichte des Altertums,2 i. 2. pp. 28 sqq., 98 sqq. When the fixed Alexandrian year was introduced in 30 b.c. (see above, pp. [27] sq.) the first of Thoth fell on August 29, which accordingly was thenceforth reckoned the first day of the year in the Alexandrian calendar. See L. Ideler, op. cit. i. 153 sqq. The period of 1460 solar or 1461 movable Egyptian years was variously called a Sothic period (Clement of Alexandria, Strom. i. 21. 136, p. 401 ed. Potter), a Canicular year (from Canicula, “the Dog-star,” that is, Sirius), a heliacal year, and a year of God (Censorinus, De die natali, xviii. 10). But there is no evidence or probability that the period was recognized by the Egyptian astronomers who instituted the movable year of 365 days. Rather, as Ideler pointed out (op. cit. i. 132), it must have been a later discovery based on continued observations of the heliacal rising of Sirius and of its gradual displacement through the whole length of the official calendar. Brugsch, indeed, went so far as to suppose that the period was a discovery of astronomers of the second century a.d., to which they were led by the coincidence of the first of Thoth with the heliacal rising of Sirius in 139 a.d. (Die Ägyptologie, p. 357). But the discovery, based as it is on a very simple calculation (365 × 4 = 1460), could hardly fail to be made as soon as astronomers estimated the length of the solar year at 365-¼ days, and that they did so at least as early as 238 b.c. is proved conclusively by the Canopic decree. See above, pp. 25 sq., 27. As to the Sothic period see further R. Lepsius, Die Chronologie der Aegypter, i. 165 sqq.; F. K. Ginzel, op. cit. i. 187 sqq.
For the convenience of the reader I subjoin a table of the Egyptian months, with their dates, as these fell, (1) in a year when the first of Thoth coincided with July 20 of the Julian calendar, and (2) in the fixed Alexandrian year.
Egyptian Months, Sothic Year beginning July 20, Alexandrian Year.
1 Thoth, 20 July, 29 August
1 Phaophi, 19 August, 28 September
1 Atbyr, 18 September, 28 October
1 Khoiak, 18 October, 27 November
1 Tybi, 17 November, 27 December
1 Mechir, 17 December, 26 January
1 Phamenoth, 16 January, 25 February
1 Pharmuthi, 15 February, 27 March
1 Pachon, 17 March, 26 April
1 Payni, 16 April, 26 May
1 Epiphi, 16 May, 25 June
1 Mesori, 15 June, 25 July
1 Supplementary, 15 July, 24 August
See L. Ideler, op. cit. i. 143 sq.; F. K. Ginzel, op. cit. i. 200.
Theoretically the shift should have been 40, or rather 42 days, that being the interval between July 20 and August 29 or 31 (see the preceding note). If that shift was actually made, the calendar date of any festival in the old vague Egyptian year could be found by adding 40 or 42 days to its date in the Alexandrian year. Thus if the death of Osiris fell on the 17th of Athyr in the Alexandrian year, it should have fallen on the 27th or 29th of Khoiak in the old vague year; and if his resurrection fell on the 19th of Athyr in the Alexandrian year, it should have fallen on the 29th of Khoiak or the 1st of Tybi in the old vague year. These calculations agree nearly, but not exactly, with the somewhat uncertain indications of the Denderah calendar (above, p. [88]), and also with the independent evidence which we possess that the resurrection of Osiris was celebrated on the 30th of Khoiak (below, pp. [108] sq.). These approximate agreements to some extent confirm my theory that, with the adoption of the fixed Alexandrian year, the dates of the official Egyptian festivals were shifted from their accidental places in the calendar to their proper places in the natural year.
Since I published in the first edition of this book (1906) my theory that with the adoption of the fixed Alexandrian year in 30 b.c. the Egyptian festivals were shifted about a month backward in the year, Professor Ed. Meyer has shown independent grounds for holding “that the festivals which gave rise to the later names of the (Egyptian) months were demonstrably held a month later in earlier ages, under the twentieth, eighteenth, indeed partly under the twelfth dynasty; in other words, that after the end of the New Kingdom the festivals and the corresponding names of the months were displaced one month backwards. It is true that this displacement can as yet be proved for only five months; but as the names of these months and the festivals keep their relative position towards each other, the assumption is inevitable that the displacement affected not merely particular festivals but the whole system equally.” See Ed. Meyer, Nachträge zur ägyptischen Chronologie (Berlin, 1908), pp. 3 sqq. (Abhandlungen der königl. Preuss. Akademie der Wissenschaften vom Jahre 1907). Thus it is possible that the displacement of the festivals by a month backward in the calendar took place a good deal earlier than I had supposed. In the uncertainty of the whole question I leave my theory as it stood.
E. J. Payne, History of the New World called America, i. (Oxford, 1892) p. 495. In his remarks on the origin of moon-worship this learned and philosophical historian has indicated (op. cit. i. 493 sqq.) the true causes which lead primitive man to trace the growth of plants to the influence of the moon. Compare Sir E. B. Tylor, Primitive Culture2 (London, 1873), i. 130. Payne suggests that the custom of naming the months after the principal natural products that ripen in them may have contributed to the same result. The custom is certainly very common among savages, as I hope to show elsewhere, but whether it has contributed to foster the fallacy in question seems doubtful.
The Indians of Brazil are said to pay more attention to the moon than to the sun, regarding it as a source both of good and ill. See J. B. von Spix und C. F. von Martius, Reise in Brasilien (Munich, 1823-1831), i. 379. The natives of Mori, a district of Central Celebes, believe that the rice-spirit Omonga lives in the moon and eats up the rice in the granary if he is not treated with due respect. See A. C. Kruijt, “Eenige ethnografische aanteekeningen omtrent de Toboengkoe en de Tomori,” Mededeelingen van wege het Nederlandsche Zendelinggenootschap, xliv. (1900) p. 231.
A. Moret, Mystères Égyptiens (Paris, 1913), pp. 187-190. For a detailed account of the Egyptian evidence, monumental and inscriptional, on which M. Moret bases his view of the king's rebirth by deputy from the hide of a sacrificed animal, see pp. 16 sqq., 72 sqq. of the same work. Compare his article, “Du sacrifice en Égypte,” Revue de l'Histoire des Religions, lvii. (1908) pp. 93 sqq. In support of the view that the king of Egypt was deemed to be born again at the Sed festival it has been pointed out that on these solemn occasions, as we learn from the monuments, there was carried before the king on a pole an object shaped like a placenta, a part of the human body which many savage or barbarous peoples regard as the twin brother or sister of the new-born child. See C. G. Seligmann and Margaret A. Murray, “Note upon an early Egyptian standard,” Man, xi. (1911) pp. 165-171. The object which these writers take to represent a human placenta is interpreted by M. Alexandre Moret as the likeness of a human embryo. As to the belief that the afterbirth is a twin brother or sister of the infant, see above, vol. i. p. 93, and below, pp. [169] sq.; The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings, i. 82 sqq.
Professor J. H. Breasted thinks that the Sed festival is probably “the oldest religious feast of which any trace has been preserved in Egypt”; he admits that on these occasions “the king assumed the costume and insignia of Osiris, and undoubtedly impersonated him,” and further that “one of the ceremonies of this feast symbolized the resurrection of Osiris”; but he considers that the significance of the festival is as yet obscure. See J. H. Breasted, Development of Religion and Thought in Ancient Egypt (London, 1912), p. 39.