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CHAPTER XXIII - THEY OBSERVED THE ECLIPSES OF THE SUN, AND WHAT THEY DID WHEN THOSE OF THE MOON OCCURRED

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 November 2010

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Summary

They reckoned the months by the moons, from one new moon to another, and they therefore called a month Quilla, as well as the moon. They gave a special name to the months, reckoning half months by the increasing and waning of the moon, and the weeks by its quarters, but they did not have names for the days of the month. They observed the eclipses of the sun and of the moon, but they did not understand their cause. Of a solar eclipse they said that the Sun was enraged at some offence that had been committed against Him, for that His face was disturbed like that of an angry man, and they prophesied (like the astrologers) that some heavy chastisement was approaching. When a lunar eclipse took place, seeing the moon become dark, they thought that she was ill; but if it disappeared altogether, they said she was dead, and would fall from the sky, and kill every one beneath, and that the end of the world would come. In great terror, when an eclipse of the moon began, they sounded trumpets, horns, and drums, and all other instruments they possessed, so as to make a great noise. They tied up all the dogs, both large and small, and gave them many blows, to make them call and yell to the moon; for, according to a certain fable they recount, the moon was fond of dogs, owing to a service they had done her, and they hoped that, when she. heard them cry, she would be sorry for them, and awake from the sleep which had been caused by her sickness.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2010
First published in: 1869

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