History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v6.c82.94
History of Dharmaśāstra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v6.c82.94
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v6.c82.94.1
The next question is: what was the extent of the year in the Vedic age. Some Ṛk. verses may be cited in this connection. 'The wheel⁷⁰⁷ of *ṛta* has twelve spokes, it revolves round the heavens; it does never wear out. O Agni! in this (wheel) seven hundred and twenty sons in pairs abide Some say that the father (Sun) who sends down water has five feet and twelve forms and remains endowed with fulness in the distant half (part) of heavens while others say that he (the Sun), the all-seeing, is placed in a lower (place) that has seven wheels and six spokes, all the worlds abide in the revolving wheel with five spokes, one wheel and twelve rims (of the wheel) and three naves—who is there that knew these (thoroughly); in that (wheel i e. year) are placed together three hundred and sixty very unstable nails' (Ṛg I 164. 11-13 and 48). In these passages the sage poses a riddle or puzzle in very metaphorical and mystic language about a year divided into three, five or six seasons, twelve months, 360 days and 720 days and nights (when calculated separately). It is possible to hold that the wheel of *ṛta* means the zodiacal belt divided into twelve parts (dvādaśāra). But it is a very difficult matter to keep in view the twelve divisions correctly. In Ṛg. I. 164. 15 it is said 'They say that the 7th of those that are born together is born of one; there are only six twin sages born of the gods'.
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Here there is a reference to seasons, six of which have two months each, the 7th has only one (viz. 13th or intercalary month) and that the 13th month is not fit for religious rites. The Atharvaveda V. 35. 4⁷⁰⁸ also states that saṃvatsara has twelve spokes and the months have 30 spokes This explains Ṛg. I. 164. 11-13 and 48. In the Brāhmaṇas also the year is said to have 360 days and 720 days and nights together; Śatapatha IX. I. 1. 43, Ait. Br. VII, 7 also say the⁷⁰⁹ same. We have also to recognize that the Vedic saṃhitās and Brāhmaṇas speak of a 13th month that was intercalated. About Varuṇa the Ṛgveda says⁷¹⁰ 'He knows the twelve months with their progeny (the days) and also the month that is added.' The Tai. S. (IV. 6. 7. 1-2) refers to a year of twelve months and also of 13 months. The Kauṣītaki Br 19. 2 speaks of the 13th month. The Tai. S. (I. 14. 4, VI. 5. 3 4) expressly mentions the 13th month called 'Saṃsarpa or Amhaspatya'. It is called Amhasaspati in Vāj. S. (VII. 30 and XXII. 31) and Saṃsarpa in Maitrāyaṇī S. III. 12. 13. The Kauṣītaki Brāhmaṇa connects the 13th month with the Śunāsīrīya sacrifice.⁷¹¹ The Maitrāyaṇī Saṃhitā (I. 10.
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8) draws a distinction between a ṛtuyājī and cāturmāsya-yājī, the former being one who offers sacrifice thinking 'now Vasanta has started, rainy season has started, śarad has started while the Cāturmāsya-yājī is one who offers sacrifice in view of the 13th month'.711a How and when the month was inserted in the Ṛgveda times or the times of the Tai S is not clear What is clear is that one whole month was added Therefore, Thibaut overstates the case when he asserts emphatically (Grundriss p 7) that all Vedic texts agree that the year was exclusively of 360 days. A year in which one month was added (i e of 390 days) was also well-known to the Ṛgvedic Indians. Therefore, in order to explain the facts we have here probably to postulate two calendars, one a purely sacrificial (or religious) of 360 days (12 months of 30 days) probably inherited by the Vedic Indians from their ancestors about whom we know next to nothing, and another calendar where a month was added in order to bring the year in line with visible astronomical data. It is known that the ancient Egyptians⁷¹² had an official calendar of 360 days (12 months of 30 days each) plus five days added at end i. e of 365 days only and no intercalary day was inserted in a year.
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The result was that the opening day of this calendar would shift back through the solar year until a whole cycle of that year had been completed in 1456 or 1506 years This calendar called sliding calendar was in use for about 3000 years in Egypt from proto-dynastic period until the Roman period. There was also another calendar against which this sliding calendar moved. A year of 360 days (divided into 12 months of 30 days each) was not peculiar to ancient Vedic India nor to ancient Egypt, but played an important role also in Mesopotamia, which had a strictly lunar calendar The co-existence of months of various lengths for later times is vouchsafed by the Arthaśāstra p 108 (Sham Shastri's ed of 1919). A year of 360 days was in later times in India called a *Sāvana* one (from 'savana' meaning extracting of soma juice in a sacrifice) and a month was added after about 30 months to bring the lunar year (of 354 days) in line with the solar year.