Page:A History of Art in Chaldæa & Assyria Vol 1.djvu/91

 THE CHALD.-EAN RELIGION. 71 one composed of twelve lunar months, alternately full and short, that is, of twenty-nine and thirty days respectively. The lunar and solar years were brought into agreement by an intercalary cycle of eight years. 1 The assertion of the philosopher Simplicius has been called in question for very plausible reasons. Simplicius declares, upon the faith of Porphyrius, that Callisthenes sent from Babylon to his uncle Aristotle, a copy of Chaldsean observations dating back as far as 1903 years before the entry of Alexander into Mesopotamia, that is, to more than twenty-two centuries before our era. 2 However this may be, all ancient writers are agreed in admitting that the Chaldseans had begun to observe and record astronomical phenomena long before the Egyptians ; 3 moreover the remains of those clay tablets have been found in various parts of Chaldaea and Assyria upon which, as Pliny tells us upon the authority of the Greek astronomer Epigenes, the Chaldaeans had inscribed and preserved the astronomical observations of seven hundred and eighty thousand years. 4 We need not dwell upon the enormity of this figure ; it matters little whether it is due to the mistakes of a copyist or to the vanity of the Chaldaeans, and the too ready credulity of the Greeks ; the important point is the 1 LENORMANT, Manuel, vol. ii. pp. 175, 178, 180. G. SMITH, Assyrian Dis- coveries (London, 1876, Svo), pp. 451, 452. RAWLINSON, Ancient Monarchies, vol. i. pp. too, 101, fourth edition. We know that the Astronomical Canon of Ptolemy begins with the accession of a king of Babylon named Nabonassar, in 747 B.C. M. Fr. LENORMANT thinks that the date in question was chosen by the Alexandrian philosopher because it coincided with the substitution, by that prince, of the solar for the lunar year. Astronomical observations would thus have become much easier to use, while those registered under the ancient system could only be employed after long and difficult calculations. A reason is thus given for Ptolemy's contentment with so comparatively modern a date. (Essai sur les Fragments cosmogoniques de Bh-ose, pp. 192-197.) 2 See the paper by M. T. H. MARTIN, of Rennes, Sur les Observations astro- nomiques envoyees, dit on, de Babylone en Grece par Callisthene, Paris, 1863. 3 The texts to this effect will be found collected in the essay of M. Martin. We shall be content here with quoting a phrase from Cicero which expresses the general opinion: "Chaldaei cognitione siderum solertiaque ingeniorum antecellunt." De Divinatione, i. 41. 4 PLINY, Natural History, vii. 57, 3. The manuscripts give 720, but the whole context proves that figure to be far too low, neither does it accord with the writer's thought, or with the other statements which he brings together with the aim of showing that the invention of letters may be traced to a very remote epoch. The copyists have certainly omitted an M after the DCCXX. Sillig, following Perizonius has introduced this correction into his text.