The+Egyptian+Calendar

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The Egyptian calendar arises at the beginning of the third millenium B.C. and is the first solar calendar known about the History. It was in full use in times of Shepseskaf, the Pharaoh of the dynasty the IVth. In the Texts of the Pyramids already the existence of the days is mentioned epagómenos. The papyrus Rhind is the first Egyptian text that it mentions 365 days of the Egyptian calendar year. Each one was divided in 12 months of 30 days, organized in three periods of 10 days. At the end of last month of every year were added five days (epagómenos) that several Egyptian gods were lacking to complete the solar year, dedicated. As the Egyptian civil calendar did not have the day room has in excess astronomical solar year every four years lost one day, so it became a "wandering calendar" where developments "astronomically fixed periodic" roamed calendar months. Canopus reform tried to solve this, but the opposition of the clergy of the different regions scuppered reform.

= Introduction = Since the dawn of the Empire Egyptian priests carefully recorded water level, measuring the nilometers.

The time of planting or harvest depended on it,and after years of observations found that every 365 days the cycle is repeated.

In the words of Herodotus: Egypt was a gift of the Nile This comment is not a figure of speech, but a reality. The annual flooding of the river caused by the African monsoon flooded fields, covering the desert sands of fertile silt. The vast amounts of water discharged into the Ethiopian plateau in spring are carried by the Blue Nile north to empty into the Mediterranean. And this year after year. The periodic variations of the flow of the Nile were crucial in the life of Egypt and made ​​possible the existence of this dazzling civilization. = = = Calendars = In Egypt we used several calendars: the Lunar, Solar (civil) and possibly a third secondary lunar calendar, to accurately calculate ephemeris.

Priests Egyptian astronomers discovered that the lunar calendar was not practical to predict the onset of the flooding of the Nile, calculating or counting stations extended periods, and comparing them with a measure referred to the apparent motion of the sun and the stars, preferred to use the calendar Solar civilian uses for the first time in history.

The Egyptians may have used a lunar calendar before, but when they discovered the discrepancy between the lunar calendar and the regular passage of the seasons, probably changed to a seasonal calendar, basing his regular start on each annual flooding of the Nile flood first as the calendar was observed in the first capital of Egypt, Memphis, while the heliacal rising of the star Sothis (Sirius). The Egyptian year was divided into three seasons of an agricultural nature.

The heliacal rising of Sothis happened the same day in the Egyptian civil calendar once every 1460 years (the period of this duration is called Sothic cycle). The difference between a seasonal year (solar year) and the calendar year was therefore 365 days every 1460 years, or what is the same 1 day every 4 years. Similarly, the Egyptians were able to calculate that lunar 309 months (lunations) almost equaled 9125 days, equivalent to 25 years Egyptians. These calculations were probably used in the construction of secondary lunar calendar.

During much of Egyptian history, the months did not have individual names, but numbered within each of the three agricultural seasons. From the Middle Kingdom, however, each month had its own name. These names eventually evolved into the names of the months in the New Empire, which in turn gave rise to the Hellenized names that were used in the chronology of Claudius Ptolemy in his Almagest and other ancient astronomers. Astronomers in the Middle Ages used the Egyptian calendar because of its mathematical regularity and scientific authority of Ptolemy. Copernicus, for example, built its tables for the movement of the planets based on the measurement of the time with the Egyptian year.

The convention between modern Egyptologists is to list the months consecutively using Roman numerals.

= Name of the months = The Egyptian civil calendar had three seasons of four months of thirty days, over five days epagómenos. Only from the New Kingdom have their own name civil calendar months. The names of the months underwent changes over time, and the exact date of the beginning of the year. The name given to each of the twelve months corresponds to the time of the New Kingdom.

With the introduction of "Alexandrian Calendar" by Caesar Augustus in 26-25 BC, definitely included the sixth of the days epagómenos first 22 BC The adoption of this measure almost stopped the running of the first of the year, on 1 Thoth, with respect to the seasons, leaving him in the August 29 of the Julian calendar except before Julian leap year when the sixth day occupied year epagómeno day Julian August 29, displacing the first of Thoth 30 agosto.

//** VIDEO ANTIGUO EGIPTO **//

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