The Orion, or Researches into the Antiquity of the Vedas c7.59

c7.59

If Jaimini's interpretation of this passage is correct, we may, so far as our present inquiry is concerned, deduce the following conclusions from it :—(1) That in the days of the Taittiriya Sanhita the winter solstice occurred before the eighth day of the dark half of Mâgha, which again was a month of the cold season. Whether the solstitial day fell on the Mâgha full-moon is not so certain, though it may be taken as fairly implied. For the Ekâshṭakâ was abandoned because it occurred in the " reversed " period of the year, and it is quite natural to suppose that the priests in choosing a second day would try to remove as many of the objections to the Ekâshṭakâ as they could. In other words, they would not select a day in the " reversed " period of the year, nor one in the last season. The fact that a day before the full-moon in Mâgha was selected is, therefore, a clear indication of the solstice occurring on that day, while their anxiety to utilise the Ekāṣṭaka fully accounts for the selection of the fourth in preference to any other day before the full-moon. I may also remark that throughout the whole passage the intention of sacrificing at the beginning (real, constructive, or traditional) of the year is quite clear. The full-moon-in Māgha must, therefore, have been one of such beginnings. (2) That the year then commenced with the winter solstice. (3) That as there cannot be three real beginnings of the year at an interval of one month each, the passage must be understood as recording a tradition about the Chitrā full moon and the Phalgunī full-moon being once considered as the first days of the year. (4) That Viṣuvān had lost its primary meaning and that it fell in the rainy season if the sacrifice was commenced on the Phalgunī full-moon.