Page:Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje - The Achehnese - tr. Arthur Warren Swete O'Sullivan (1906).djvu/285



Both years have thus 13 keunòngs. Where the first keunòng falls on one of the first days in January, as in 1886 (1$th$ Jan.) or 1891 (7$st$ Jan.) there are 14 in one solar year.

It will be noticed that the column showing the intervals separating the new moons from the keunòngs which succeed them, exhibits a fairly uniform decrease. The greatest interval varies in different years from 24—27 and the smallest from 0—2. This minumum interval is succeeded by a minus quantity and then again by a maximum, after which the series descends as before.

If we date the keunòngs according to the months of our own calendar, this uniformity is of course not so obvious as if we use the Mohammedan notation of time. In order to convert our series of intervals into Mohammedan dates, we have only to bear in mind the two following circumstances. First, that the Mohammedan month begins with the visible new moon, thus one to two days later than the new moon of our almanac; secondly, that while the day of the new moon