DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.12654#0060
32
celebration of rising of sothis.
[Part I.
latter King; yet I have no doubt that the Calendar of
Medeenet-Haboo is one of a Vague Year; and it ap-
pears that the Panegyry of " the Manifestation of
Sothis" (the rising one hour before the sun) con-
tinued to be celebrated on the first day of Thoth as
long as the phenomenon occurred in the course of that
month ; that is, for the space of 120 Julian years.
Hence it appears that the position of Sothis in the
sculptures of the ceiling of the Rameseum of El-
Kurneh shows that at the time at which those sculp-
tures were executed the manifestation of Sothis was
celebrated on the first day of Thoth vague ; and thus
we see the date of this record to be within the
first hundred and twenty Julian years of the Sothic
Cycle that commenced during the Nineteenth Dynasty,
or from the year b.c. 1322 to 1202.
There are two important inquiries respecting the
Sothic Cycle which remain to be noticed: the con-
nection of these cycles with history, and the question
as to whether there were any Sothic Cycles before that
commencing in the year b.c. 1322, the earliest recorded
by ancient writers of any authority.
The first known Sothic Cycle commenced on the
20th July, b.c. 1322, as already mentioned; and the
second, on the same day, a.d. 139. It is well known
that the latter epoch fell in the reign of the Emperor
Antoninus Pius, and we find allusions to it on the
coins of his reign*. It is the commencement of the
earlier cycle, in the year b.c. 1322, which is the more
important, as affording an approximative date in the
chronology of Manetho's Nineteenth Dynasty, if we
can satisfactorily ascertain in whose reign it took place.
* V. Zoega Num. iEg. referred to by Sharpe, in his valuable
History of Egypt, new edition, p. 418.
celebration of rising of sothis.
[Part I.
latter King; yet I have no doubt that the Calendar of
Medeenet-Haboo is one of a Vague Year; and it ap-
pears that the Panegyry of " the Manifestation of
Sothis" (the rising one hour before the sun) con-
tinued to be celebrated on the first day of Thoth as
long as the phenomenon occurred in the course of that
month ; that is, for the space of 120 Julian years.
Hence it appears that the position of Sothis in the
sculptures of the ceiling of the Rameseum of El-
Kurneh shows that at the time at which those sculp-
tures were executed the manifestation of Sothis was
celebrated on the first day of Thoth vague ; and thus
we see the date of this record to be within the
first hundred and twenty Julian years of the Sothic
Cycle that commenced during the Nineteenth Dynasty,
or from the year b.c. 1322 to 1202.
There are two important inquiries respecting the
Sothic Cycle which remain to be noticed: the con-
nection of these cycles with history, and the question
as to whether there were any Sothic Cycles before that
commencing in the year b.c. 1322, the earliest recorded
by ancient writers of any authority.
The first known Sothic Cycle commenced on the
20th July, b.c. 1322, as already mentioned; and the
second, on the same day, a.d. 139. It is well known
that the latter epoch fell in the reign of the Emperor
Antoninus Pius, and we find allusions to it on the
coins of his reign*. It is the commencement of the
earlier cycle, in the year b.c. 1322, which is the more
important, as affording an approximative date in the
chronology of Manetho's Nineteenth Dynasty, if we
can satisfactorily ascertain in whose reign it took place.
* V. Zoega Num. iEg. referred to by Sharpe, in his valuable
History of Egypt, new edition, p. 418.