Bīrūnī, Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad, Alberuni's India (v. 1)

(London :  Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co.,  1910.)

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(    359   )
 

CHAPTEE  XXXVIII.

ON  THE  VAEIOUS   MEASUEES   OF  TIME   COMPOSED   OF       Rige 182.
DAYS,   THE  LIFE   OF  BEAHMAN  INCLUDED.

The day is called dimas (dimctsu), in classical language Becapituia-

-,         •   •,                         -.111                      1-^.1         tionofthe

ciivasa, the night rdtri, and the nychthemeron ahoratra. single mea-
The month is called mdsa and its half paksha. The first time.
or white half is called suklapaksha, because the first
parts of its nights have moonlight at times when people
do not yet sleep, when the light on the moon's body
increases and the dark portion decreases. The other
or black half is called krishnapaksha, because the first
parts of its nights are moonless, whilst other parts have
moonlight, but only then when people sleep. They are
the nights when the light on the body of the moon
wanes, whilst the dark part increases.

The sum of two months is a ritu, but this is only an
approximative definition, for the month which has two
paksha is a lunar month, whilst that one the double
of which is a ritu is a solar month.

Six ritu are a year of mankind, a solar year, which
is called barh or barkh or harsh, the three sounds h,
kh, and sh being much confounded in the mouth of the
Hindus (Skr. varsha).

Three hundred and sixty years of mankind are one
year of the angels, called dibba-harh (divya-vctrsha), and
12,000 years of the angels are unanimously reckoned as
one caturyugct. There is a difference of opinion only
regarding the four parts of the caturyuga and regarding
the multiplications of it which form a manvantara and
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