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SEASONS AND CALENDARS

I

It is feasible that since human beings became aware of their environment, (in whatever stage pantalones futbol of human development it had occurred), one of the first thing that must have impressed them very much were the changes that are continually taking place in the world around them. These changes had to be adjusted to, and this idea is beautifully expressed in the Old Testament book of Ecclesiastes 3, 1-2: "To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven... A time to be born and a time to die; a time to plant and a time to pluck up the planted..." etc.

For early farmers, it was very important to know when to do the various works in fields and gardens, so as to make sure of the best crop they could get. A very basic farming calendar was found carved in stone on the site of the ancient Israelite town of Gezer, possibly written by pantalon futbol baratos a student:

‘sf ? 2 months of ingathering (September-October ? Autum equinox)
q'l ? 2 months of early sowing (November-December ? Winter solstice)
lqsh ? 2 months of late sowing (January-February)
‘tzd psht ? 1 month of flax plucking (March ? Spring equinox)
qtzr sr ? 1 month of barley harvest (April)
qtzr kl ? 2 months of the rest of harvest (May-June ? Summer solstice)
zmr ? 1 month of grape harvest (July)
qtz ? last month of late fruit harvest (August)

Interestingly, the names of these months, that express the farm works done in them, do not correspond to any of the traditional names of the Israelite year, either native or Babylonian (s. below).

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The most ancient counting of changes in Nature, though, is considered to be the one of the phases of the moon. In an Internet site called THE MOON IN ANCIENT HISTORY ? ANCIENT ASTRONOMICAL CALENDARS (s. site) we can read: "There are ‘Man made' lunar calendars that some scientists place as old as 32,000 years. Some recent archeological findings are from the Ice Age where hunters carved notches and gouged holes into sticks, reindeer bones and the tusks of mammoths, depicting the days between each phase of the Moon." This continuous change that never alters in one of the most sacred objects of human beliefs ? the Moon ? must have left a strong impression on all peoples around the world. So much so, that as far as known to historians, all earlier calendars were lunar in nature. The word "calendar" itself seems to derive from the Latin word "kalendae", referring to the first day of every month.

The following peoples are among those who are known to initially have a lunar calendar, and some of them still use it today: Ancient Egyptian, Babylonian, Greek, Roman, Anglo-Saxon, Hindu, Chinese, Mayan, the Celts, Jews and Muslims.

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Counting the phases of the moon, however, has no reference to the changes in the seasons, which depend on the relative position of the earth in reference to the sun, and is more relevant to the physical environment of human beings (while the attitude toward the moon has always been of a more spiritual nature).

Observing the changes of seasons and their effect on life around them was important for the gatherer-hunters long before farming. They had to know when and where the various parts of plants appear and are edible; when birds nest and their eggs could be collected; when beasts drop their young and can be taken and eaten. In the same way, the cyclical movements of herd beasts from pasture to pasture according to the wet and dry seasons were important to the hunters following them.

In equatorial Africa, the birth place of the human species, two seasons of the year are known: wet and dry, with no significant change of temperature. The Himba people in Namibia (s. site) mark the coming of the New Year with the arrival of seasonal rains that transform the parched red soil into a carpet of green. According to the saying of a Namibian villager, "When the thunderstorms start and the leaves grow from the ground, that's how we know it's the New Year."

As Homo sapiens began moving northward toward the Middle East and Europe, changes of cold and hot between the seasons were also noticed. Thus, in Mediterranean areas, the year is divided into two basic seasons: wet and cold winter; dry and hot summer. In time, further developments have occurred, making calendars all over the world different in their complexity.

Two prominent calendars have been founded on this basic idea: the ancient Babylonian (s. below), and the Jewish one ? the latter still exists today. Such division has led to the possibility of two beginnings of the year. Following the Babylonian example, when Jewish leaders came back to the Land of Israel from their exile in Babylon in the 6th-5th cent. B.C., they brought with them, together with the Babylonian months' names, a year beginning around the Spring equinox; at this time, in the words of the Biblical poet (Canticles 2,11), "Lo, the winter is past, the rain is over... and the time of birds' nesting(?) is come..." The days then get longer and warmer, and the first barley harvest takes place.

However, although the Jews have kept the Babylonian names of months at the expense of the ancient Hebrew ones (some of which are mentioned in the Old Testament), their calendar has reverted to the natural Israelite year beginning around the Autumn equinox. This is when the long, dry and hot summer is over, the rains begin to wet the parched earth and the first plowing for the winter sowing (as mentioned in the Gezer calendar) takes place. This calendar is still kept today by Jews all over the world, as well as in by the state of Israel.

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An ancient civilization highly depending on rains is the Hindu. This is how the Indian climate is described in a modern almanac (s. site): "It is possible to identify seasons, although these do not occur uniformly throughout South Asia. The Indian Meteorological Service divides the year into four seasons: the relatively dry, cool winter from December through February; the dry, hot summer from March through May; the southwest monsoon from June through September when the predominating southwest maritime winds bring rains to most of the country; and the northeast, or retreating, monsoon equipaciones de futbol baratas of October and November."

Some societies, not wanting to give up their lunar calendar in favor of a seasonal one, have found various ways of compromising between these two ways of counting months, seasons, years. Some do it by adding a thirteenth month every certain number of years in a cycle of 19 years, as the Jews do; others, like the Chinese, do it in a different way, as described in the Widipedia (s. site): "Chinese months follow the phases of the moon. As a result, they do not accurately follow the seasons of the solar year. To assist farmers to decide when to plant or harvest crops, the drafters of the calendar put in 24 seasonal markers, which follow the solar year." It must be observed that in China, a season begins not at a solstice or equinox, but at a date between them; each of those points serves as the peak of the season and not its beginning, as they do in Europe.

The "Dog Star" Sirius is the very bright star that accompanies the group of Orion "The Hunter", as a dog follows his master on the hunt. This star was significant for the ancient Egyptians, marking the time of its first appearance above the horizon as hailing the overflow of the river Nile.

Egypt has no rainfall, either to wet the land for farming or to divide the year into wet and dry seasons. It's farming, which is one of the oldest in the world, entirely depends on the overflow of the river to wet the land and prepare it for planting. In consequence, the ancient Egyptian year was divided into three seasons: Inundation; Growth = Winter; Harvest = Summer (s. site).