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CHAPTER  LXXVIII.

ON   THE   KAEANAS.

Explanation We havc already spoken of the lunar days called tithi,
and have explained that each lunar day is shorter than
a civil day, because the lunar month has thirty lunar
days, but only a little more than twenty-nine and a half
civil days.

As the Hindus call these tithis nychthemera, they
also call the former half of a tithi day, the latter half
night. Each of these halves has a separate name, and
they all of them (i.e. all the halves of the lunar days of
the lunar month) are called kctrctncts.

Fixed and        Somc of the uames of the karctnas occur only once

karanas. in a mouth and are not repeated, viz. four of them
about the time of new moon, which are called the fixed
ones, because they occur only once in the month, and
because they always fall on the same day and night of
the month.

Others of them revolve and occur eight times in a
month. They are called the movable ones, because of
their revolving, and because each one of them may as
well fall on a day as on a night. They are seven in
number, and the seventh or last of them is an unlucky
day, by which they frighten their children, the simple
mention of which makes the hairs on the head of their
boys stand  on  end.    We  have given an exhaustive

Page 29s. description of the karanas in another book of ours.
They are mentioned in every Indian book on astronomy
and mathematics.