Archaeologica.org

Well ... you asked for it!

I'm sorry Ish but there is absolutely no basis in that lot that I can find that permits of the calculations as translated. There is also one glaring error, as follows-

Two pakñas comprise one month, and twelve months comprise one calendar year, or one full orbit of the sun.

And if you work through that it is very odd year!
So obvious is that error that I find it rather surprising.

Dig, I haven't worked through the maths (not being a particularly numerate person) but there is a discussion here about it that you may find enlightening. I don't understand it, but it starts because one person spotted what they thought was an error ...

http://hitxp.wordpress.com/2007/05/28/s ... n-rigveda/

But I don't follow you on why there is an error with two paknas comprising a month, and 12 months comprising a calendar year.

Maybe I'm missing something, but it makes sense to me. If a pakna is 15 days, then two would make a month ...and so on ...

Maybe I'm missing something, but it makes sense to me. If a pakna is 15 days, then two would make a month ...and so on ...= 360 days!

Yes, back then they had 360 days for a year. The Babylonians did too.

plus,

The Vedic year consisted of twelve months of thirty days each...and the Vedic day contained thirty hours of sixty minutes." (McClain, p. 14) ...

so how many 'days' in a month then?
These people are supposed to be working in fractions of a second!

Digit wrote:plus,

The Vedic year consisted of twelve months of thirty days each...and the Vedic day contained thirty hours of sixty minutes." (McClain, p. 14) ...

so how many 'days' in a month then?
These people are supposed to be working in fractions of a second!

Who is McClain, Dig? The calculations I gave you were straight from the scriptures.

No idea Ish, this is the source,

http://www.laetusinpraesens.org/docs80s ... sx/x07.php

Dig, I don't know these people and also, there's an awful lot of crap talked about the Vedas, and has been since the 19th century when Max Mueller declared that the 'arya' were white invaders.

If you just stick to the calculations I gave you from the Srimad Bhagavatham, you are getting the data from the source. This clearly states that one day is made of 12 hours, and one night is made up of 12 hours, giving 24 hours.

I don't know everything about the Indian Vedas (obviously!) . But for what it's worth with my experience such as it is, I've never heard anything about an Indian day being 30 hours long. And it would be totally against their culture because it would be so unnatural. They lived by the cycles of nature.

The reason they divide the month into two 15 days sections (they still do) is because they were a moon-based civilisation - they planted and harvested their crips by the phases of the moon. So the first 15 days when the moon is waxing is known as 'the bright half' and the second 15 days when the moon is waning is known as 'the dark half'.

So a Vedic month is made up two 15 day fortnights, and a year is made of 12 months, giving 360 days which was the standard at the time. The Egyptians and the Babylonians had a 360 day calendar, possibly the Mayans, and also some of the OT is based on the same, apparently, until about the 8th century BC.

http://webexhibits.org/calendars/calendar-ancient.html

In the eighth century B.C.E., civilizations all over the world either discarded or modified their old 360 day calendars. The 360 day calendars had been in use for the greater part of a millennium. In many places, month lengths immediately after that change were not fixed, but were based instead upon observation of the sky.

Priest-astronomers were assigned the duty of declaring when a new month began -- it was usually said to have started at the first sighting of a new moon. Month length at that time was simply the number of days that passed from one new lunar crescent to the next.

I'm sure FM knows much more about this than I do.

And it would be totally against their culture because it would be so unnatural. They lived by the cycles of nature.

Well those cycles will have gone down the pan PDQ with a 360 day year Ish. Within 10 years their cycles would be nearly two months adrift, they would have to have noticed that!
How long did they stick with it?

God knows!

But then everyone else's cycles would also be adrift - so maybe they just didn't notice.

Ish - I think the vedic calendar was luni/solar. Most lunar calendars were. This might help a little too with their math and calendar systems: http://kosal.us/Mathematics/MathPartIII.html

Aaargh.....but it's all figures, Rich.

I wish I'd never brought this subject up now.

And as they apparently worked with a Lunar clander, (Dark fortnight etc) it's worthwhile noting that the Lunar day to an Earth bound observer isn't 24 hrs in length.

Goodness... how long is it then?