Chapter V: Part 5

The interesting researches of M. Champollion the younger, and his astonishing discoveries regarding the language of the hieroglyphics[156], far from overturning these conjectures, on the contrary, confirm them. This ingenious antiquary has read, in a series of hieroglyphic paintings in the temple of Abydos[157], the prenomens of a certain number of kings placed in regular succession one after another; and a part of these prenomens (the last ten) recurring on various other monuments, accompanied with proper names, he has concluded that they are those of kings who bore those proper names, and this has afforded him nearly the same kings, and in the same order, as those of which Manetho composes his eighteenth dynasty, that which expelled the shepherds. The concordance, however, is not complete: in the painting of Abydos, six of the names that appear in Manetho’s list are wanting; there are some, again, which bear no resemblance; and, lastly, there unfortunately occurs a blank before the most remarkable of all, the Rhamses, who appears the same as the king represented on many of the finest monuments, with the attributes of a great conqueror. It would be, according to M. Champollion, in the list of Manetho, the Sethos, the chief of the nineteenth dynasty, who, in fact, is indicated as powerful in ships and in cavalry, and as having carried his arms into Cyprus, Media and Persia. M. Champollion thinks, with Marsham and many others, that it is this Rhamses, or this Sethos, who is the Sesostris, or the Sesoosis of the Greeks; and this opinion possesses some probability, in this respect, that the representations of the victories of Rhamses, probably carried over the wandering tribes in the vicinity of Egypt, or at the most into Syria, have given rise to those fabulous ideas of vast conquests attributed, by some other confusion, to a Sesostris. But, in Manetho, it is in the twelfth dynasty, and not in the eighteenth, that a prince bearing the name of Sesostris is inscribed, who is noted as having conquered Asia and Thrace[158]. Marsham also asserts, that this twelfth dynasty and the eighteenth make but one[159]. Manetho could not himself, therefore, have understood the lists which he copied. Lastly, if we admit in their full degree, both the historical truth of this bas-relief of Abydos, and its accordance, whether with the part of Manetho’s lists that seems to correspond to it, or with the other hieroglyphic inscriptions, this consequence would result, that the pretended eighteenth dynasty, the first regarding which the ancient chronologists begin to manifest some agreement, is also the first which has left traces of its existence upon monuments. Manetho may have consulted this document and others of a like nature; but it is not the less obvious, that a mere list, a series of names or of portraits, as he has throughout, is far from being a history.

Ought not this, then, which is proved and demonstrated with respect to the Indians, and which I have rendered so probable with respect to the inhabitants of the valley of the Nile, be presumed also to be the case with those of the valleys of the Euphrates and Tigris? Established, like the Indians[160] and Egyptians, upon a much frequented route of commerce, in vast plains, which they had been obliged to intersect with numerous canals; instructed, like them, by hereditary priests, the pretended depositaries of secret books, the privileged possessors of the sciences, astrologers, builders of pyramids, and other great monuments[161]; should they not also resemble them in other essential points? Should not their history be equally a mere collection of legendary tales? I venture almost to assert, that not only is this probable, but that it is actually demonstrated.

Up to this period neither Moses nor Homer speak of any great empire in Upper Asia. Herodotus[162] gives to the supremacy of the Assyrians a duration of only 520 years, and does not attribute to their origin a greater antiquity than about eight centuries before his own time. After having been at Babylon, where he consulted the priests, he had not even learnt the name of Ninus as king of the Assyrians, and does not mention him otherwise than as the father of Agro[163], the first Lydian king of the family of the Heraclides. Notwithstanding, he makes him the son of Belus: so much confusion had there been in the traditions. Though he speaks of Semiramis as one of the queens who left great monuments in Babylon, he only places her seven generations before Cyrus.

Hellanicus, who was cotemporary with Herodotus, far from allowing that Semiramis had built any thing at Babylon, attributes the foundation of that city to Chaldæus, the fourteenth successor of Ninus[164]. Berosus, a Babylonian and a priest, who wrote scarcely a hundred and twenty years after Herodotus, gives an astounding antiquity to Babylon; but it is to Nabuchodonosor, a prince comparatively very modern, that he attributes the principal monuments[165]. Regarding even Cyrus, a prince so remarkable, and whose history must have been so well known and so popular, Herodotus, who only lived a hundred years after him, owns that, in his time, there already existed three different opinions; and, in fact, sixty years later, Xenophon gives a biography of this prince quite at variance with that of Herodotus.

Ctesias, who was nearly cotemporary with Xenophon, pretends to have extracted from the royal archives of the Medes, a chronology which carries back the origin of the Assyrian monarchy upwards of 800 years, putting at the head of their kings, that same Ninus, the son of Belus, whom Herodotus had made one of the Heraclides; and, at the same time, he attributes to Ninus and Semiramis conquests towards the west, of an extent absolutely incompatible with the Jewish and Egyptian history of the times in question[166].

According to Megasthenes, it was Nabuchodonosor who made these incredible conquests. He pushed them by way of Libya, as far as Spain[167]. We find that, in the time of Alexander, Nabuchodonosor had completely usurped the reputation which Semiramis had possessed in the time of Artaxerxes. But we must suppose, without doubt, that Semiramis and Nabuchodonosor had conquered Ethiopia and Libya, much in the same way as the Egyptians made India and Bactria to be subdued by Sesostris or Osymandias.

It would lead to no result were we now to examine the different accounts respecting Sardanapalus, in which a celebrated writer imagined he had found proofs of the existence of three princes of that name, who were all victims of similar misfortunes[168]; much in the same way as another writer found in the Indian Vicramaditjia, at least three princes, who were equally the heroes of similar adventures.

It is apparently from the want of agreement in all these accounts, that Strabo thought himself justified in saying, that the authority of Herodotus and Ctesias was not equal to that of Homer or Hesiod[169]. Nor has Ctesias been more happy in transcribers than Manetho; and it is very difficult, at the present day, to harmonize the extracts made from his writings by Diodorus, Eusebius, and the Syncelle.

Since there existed such a state of uncertainty in the fifth century before the Christian era, how should it be imagined that Berosus had been able to clear it up in the third century before that era; or how should we repose more confidence in the 430,000 years which he puts before the deluge, or the 35,000 years which he places between the deluge and Semiramis, than in the registers of 150,000 years, which he boasts of having consulted[170].

Structures raised in remote provinces, and bearing the name of Semiramis, have been spoken of; and columns erected by Sesostris[171] have been pretended to have been seen in Asia Minor, in Thrace. But, in the same way, in Persia, at the present day, the ancient monuments, perhaps even some of the above, bear the name of Roustan; and in Egypt or Arabia, they bear the names of Joseph or Solomon. This is an ancient custom among the eastern nations, and probably among all ignorant people. The peasants of our own country give the name of Cæsar’s Camp to all the remains of Roman entrenchments.

In a word, the more I consider the subject, the more I am persuaded that there existed no ancient history at Babylon or Ecbatan, more than in Egypt and India. And, in place of reducing mythology to history, with Evhemere and Bannier, I am of opinion that a great part of history should be referred to mythology.

It is only at the epoch of what is commonly called the Second Kingdom of Assyria, that the history of the Assyrians and Chaldeans begins to become more intelligible; and this epoch is also that at which the history of the Egyptians undergoes a similar change, when the kings of Nineveh, of Babylon, and of Egypt, commence their conflicts on the theatre of Syria and Palestine.

It appears, nevertheless, that the authors of these countries, or those who had consulted the traditions regarding them, Berosus, and Hieronymus, and Nicholas de Damas, agreed in speaking of a deluge. Berosus has even described it with circumstances so similar to those detailed in the book of Genesis, that it is almost impossible what he says of it should not have been derived from the same sources, even although he removes its epoch a great number of ages back,--insomuch, at least, as we may judge of it, by the confused extracts which Josephus, Eusebius, and Syncellus, have preserved of his writings. But we must remark, and with this observation we shall conclude what we have to say with regard to the Babylonians, that these numerous ages, and this long series of kings, placed between the deluge and Semiramis, are a new thing, entirely peculiar to Berosus, and of which Ctesias, and those who have followed him, had no idea, and which has not even been adopted by any of the profane authors posterior to Berosus. Justin and Velleius consider Ninus as the first of the conquerors, and those who, contrary to all probability, place him highest, only refer him to a period of forty centuries before the present time[172].

The Armenian authors of the middle age nearly agree with one of the texts of Genesis, when they refer the deluge to a period of 4916 years from their own time; and it might be thought that having collected the old traditions, and perhaps extracted the old chronicles of their country, they form an additional authority in favour of the newness of the nations. But when we reflect that their historical literature commences only in the fifth century, and that they were acquainted with Eusebius, we perceive that they must have accommodated themselves to his authority, and to that of the Bible. Moses of Chorene expressly professes to have followed the Greeks, and we see that his ancient history is moulded after Ctesias[173].

However, it is certain, that the tradition of the deluge existed in Armenia long before the conversion of its inhabitants to Christianity; and the city, which, according to Josephus, was called _the Place of the Descent_, still exists at the foot of Mount Ararat, and bears the name of _Nachid-chevan_, which, in fact, has the same signification.[174]

Along with the Armenians, we include the Arabians, Persians, Turks, Mongolians, and Abyssinians, of the present day. Their ancient books, if they ever had any, no longer exist. They have no ancient history, but that which they have recently made up, and which they have modelled after the Bible; hence, what they say of the deluge is borrowed from Genesis, and adds nothing to the authority of that book.

It were curious to inquire what had been the opinion of the ancient Persians upon this subject, before it was modified by the Christian and Mahomedan creeds. We find it deposited in their Boundehesh, or Cosmogony, a work of the time of Sassanides, (but evidently extracted or translated from more ancient works), and which was discovered by Anquetil du Perron, among the Parsis of India. According to it, the total duration of the world could only be 12,000 years; hence it cannot still be very old. The appearance of _Cayoumortz_ (the bull-man, the first of the human race), is preceded by the creation of a great water.[175]

For the rest, it would be as useless to expect a regular history of ancient times from the Parsis, as from the other eastern nations. The Magi have left none, any more than the Brahmins or Chaldeans. Of this there is nothing more required for proof than the uncertainty which exists regarding the epoch of Zoroaster. It is even asserted, that the little history they may have possessed, that which relates to the Achemenides, the successors of Cyrus to Alexander, had been expressly altered, and this in consequence of an official order to that purpose from a monarch named Sassanides[176].

In order to discover authentic dates of the commencement of empires, and traces of a general deluge, we must therefore go beyond the great deserts of Tartary. Toward the east and north we find another race of men, who differ from us as much in their institutions and manners as in their form and temperament. Their language consists of monosyllables, and they make use of arbitrary hieroglyphics in writing. They have only a political system of morals, without religion; for the superstitions of Fo were imported among them from India. Their yellow skin, their prominent cheeks, their narrow and oblique eyes, and their scanty beard, render them so different from us, that one is tempted to believe that their ancestors and ours had escaped the great catastrophe on two different sides. But however this may be, the epoch which they assign to their deluge is nearly the same as ours.

The Chou-king is the most ancient of the Chinese books[177]; it is said to have been compiled by Confucius, about 2255 years ago, from fragments of more ancient works. Two hundred years afterwards, a general persecution of the men of letters, and destruction of the books, is said to have taken place under the emperor Chi-Hoang-ti, whose object in this was to destroy the traces of the feudal government established under the dynasty which preceded his. Forty years after, under the dynasty which had overturned that to which Chi-Hoang-ti belonged, a portion of the Chou-king was restored from memory by an old literatus, and another was discovered in a tomb; but nearly the half of it was for ever lost. Now, this book, the most authentic which the Chinese possess, commences the history of their country with the reign of an emperor named _Yao_, whom it represents to us as occupied in removing the waters, _which, having risen to the skies, still bathed the foot of the higher mountains, covered the less elevated hills_, and rendered the plains impassable[178]. According to some, the reign of Yao was 4163 years before the present time; according to others, 3943. The discrepancy in the opinions regarding this epoch even amounts to 284 years.

A few pages farther on we find one _Yu_, a minister and engineer, re-establishing the courses of the waters, raising embankments, digging canals, and regulating the taxes of all the provinces in China, that is to say, in an empire extending 600 leagues in all directions. But the impossibility of such operations, after such events, shews clearly that the whole is nothing else than a moral and political romance[179].

More modern Chinese historians have added a series of emperors before Yao, but with a multitude of fabulous circumstances, without venturing to assign them fixed epochs. These writers are at perpetual variance with each other, even regarding the number and names of their emperors, and are not universally approved by their countrymen. Fouhi, with the body of a serpent, the head of an ox, and the teeth of a tortoise, together with his successors, who are not less monstrous, are altogether absurd, and have no more existed than Enceladon and Briareus.

Is it possible that mere chance could have produced so striking a result, as to make the traditional origin of the Assyrian, Indian, and Chinese monarchies agree in being referred to an epoch of nearly 4000 years from the present period? Would the ideas of nations which have had so little communication with each other, and whose language, religion, and laws are altogether different, have corresponded upon this point, had they not been founded upon truth?

We could not expect precise dates from the natives of America, who had no real writings, and whose oldest traditions extended only to a few centuries before the arrival of the Spaniards. And yet, even among them, traces of a deluge are imagined to be found in their rude hieroglyphics. They have their Noah, or Deucalion, as well as the Indians, Babylonians, and Greeks[180].

The Negroes, the most degraded race among men, whose forms approach the nearest to the brutes, and whose intellect has not yet arrived at the institution of regular governments, or at any thing having the least appearance of systematic knowledge, have preserved no sort of annals or traditions. They cannot, therefore, afford us any information on the subject of our present researches, though all their characters clearly shew us that they have escaped from the great catastrophe, at another point than the Caucasian and Altaic races, from which they had perhaps been separated for a long time previous to the occurrence of that catastrophe.

But if the ancients, it is argued, have left no history, their long existence as nations is not the less attested by the advances which they have made in astronomy, by observations whose date is easily determined, and even by monuments which still remain, and which themselves bear their dates. Thus, the length of the year, such as the Egyptians are supposed to have determined it, according to the heliacal rising of Sirius, proves correct for a period comprised between the year 3000 and the year 1000 before Christ, a period to which the traditions of their conquests and of the great prosperity of their empire also refer. This accuracy proves to what perfection they had carried their observations, and shews that they had for many ages applied themselves to such investigations.

In order to determine the force of this argument, it is necessary that we should here enter upon some explanations.

The solstice is the moment of the year at which the rise of the Nile commences, and that which the Egyptians must have observed with most attention. Having, at the beginning, made, from imperfect observations, a civil or sacred year of three hundred and sixty-five days complete, they would preserve it from superstitious motives, even after they had perceived that it did not agree with the natural or tropical year, and did not bring back the seasons to the same days[181]. However, it was this tropical year which it behoved them to mark for the purpose of directing them in their agricultural operations.

They would, therefore, have to search in the heavens for an apparent sign of its return, and they imagined they had found this sign when the sun returned to the same position, relatively to some remarkable star. Thus they applied themselves, like almost all nations who are beginning this inquiry, to observe the heliacal risings and settings of the stars. We know that they chose particularly the heliacal rising of Sirius, at first, doubtless, on account of the beauty of the star; and, especially, because, in those ancient times, this rising of Sirius being nearly coincident with the solstice, and indicative of the inundation, was to them the most important phenomenon of this kind. Hence it was that Sirius, under the name of Sothis, occupied so conspicuous a place in their mythology, and in their religious ceremonies. Supposing, therefore, that the return of the heliacal rising of Sirius and the tropical year were of the same duration, and believing, at length, that this duration was 365 days and a quarter, they would imagine a period after which the tropical year and the old year, the sacred year of 365 days only, would return to the same day; a period which, according to these incorrect data, was necessarily 1461 sacred years, and 1460 of those improved years to which they gave the name of years of Sirius.

They took for the point of departure of this period, which they named the Sothiac or great year, a civil year, the first day of which was, or had been, also that of a heliacal rising of Sirius; and it is known, from the positive testimony of Censorinus, that one of these great years had ended in the 138th year of the Christian era[182]. It had consequently commenced in the 1322d before Christ, and that which preceded it in the 2782d. In fact, the calculations of M. Ideler shew, that Sirius was heliacally risen on the 20th July of the Julian year 139, a day which corresponded that year to the first of Thot, or the first day of the Egyptian sacred year[183].

But not only is the position of the sun, with relation to the stars of the ecliptic, or the sidereal year different from the tropical year, on account of the precession of the equinoxes. The heliacal year of a star, or the period of its heliacal rising, especially when it is distant from the ecliptic, differs still from the sidereal year, and differs in various degrees according to the latitudes of the places where it is observed. What is very singular, however, and the observation has already been made by Bainbridge[184] and Father Petau[185], it happens, by a remarkable concurrence in the positions, that, in the latitude of Upper Egypt, at a certain epoch, and during a certain number of ages, the year of Sirius was really within very little of 365 days and a quarter; so that the heliacal rising of this star returned in fact to the same day of the Julian year, the 20th July, in the year 1322 before, and the year 138 after Christ[186].

From this actual coincidence, at this remote period, M. Fourier, who has confirmed all these accounts by new calculations, concludes, that, since the length of the year of Sirius was so perfectly known to the Egyptians, they must have determined it by observations made during a long series of years, and conducted with great accuracy; observations which must be referred to at least 2500 years before the present time, and which could not have been made long before or long after this interval of time[187].

This result would assuredly be very striking, had it been directly, and by observations, made upon Sirius itself, that they had fixed the length of the year of Sirius. But experienced astronomers affirm it to be impossible that the heliacal rising of a star could afford a sufficient foundation for exact observations on such a subject, especially in a climate where _the circumference of the horizon is constantly so much loaded with vapours, that, in clear nights, stars of the second or third magnitude can never be seen within some degrees of the verge of the horizon, and that the sun itself is completely obscured at its rising and setting_.[188] They maintain, that, if the length of the year had not been otherwise ascertained, there would have been a mistake of one or two days.[189] They have no doubt, therefore, that this duration of 365 days and a quarter, is that of the tropical year inaccurately determined by the observation of the shadow, or by that of the point where the sun rose each day, and through ignorance identified with the heliacal year of Sirius; so that it would be mere chance which had fixed with so much accuracy the duration of this latter for the period of which we speak.[190]

Perhaps it will also be judged, that men capable of making observations so exact, and which they had continued during so long a period, would not have attributed so much importance to Sirius, as to pay him religious homage; for they would have seen that the relations of the rising of this star with the tropical year, and with the inundation of the Nile, were merely temporary, and took place only in a determinate latitude. In fact, according to M. Ideler’s calculations, in the year 2782 before Christ, Sirius appeared in Upper Egypt, on the second day after the solstice; in 1322, on the third; and in the year 139 after Christ, on the twenty-sixth.[191] At the present day, its heliacal rising is more than a month after the solstice. The Egyptians would therefore set themselves by preference to finding the period, which would bring about the coincidence of the commencement of the sacred year, with that of the true tropical year, and then they would discover that their great period must have been 1508 sacred years, and not 1461.[192] Now, we assuredly do not find any traces of this period of 1508 years in antiquity.

In general, we may defend ourselves with the idea, that, if the Egyptians had possessed so long a series of observations, and of accurate observations too, their disciple Eudoxus, who studied among them for thirteen years, would, on his return, have brought into Greece a system of astronomy more perfect, and maps of the heavens less erroneous, and more coherent in their different parts.[193] How should it happen that the precession of the equinoxes was not known to the Greeks, but through the works of Hipparchus, if it had been marked in the registers of the Egyptians, and inscribed in characters so manifest upon the ceilings of their temples? And how comes it that Ptolemy, who wrote in Egypt, should not have deigned to avail himself of any of the observations of the Egyptians?[194]

Farther, Herodotus, who lived so long with them, says nothing of those six hours which they added to the sacred year, nor of that great Sothian period which resulted. On the contrary, he says expressly that the Egyptians, making their year of 365 days, the seasons returned to the same point, so that in his time the necessity of this quarter of a day does not appear to have been suspected.[195] Thalles, who had visited the priests of Egypt, less than a century before Herodotus, did not, in like manner, make known to his countrymen, any other than a year of 365 days only.[196] And, if we reflect that all the colonies which migrated from Egypt, fourteen or fifteen centuries before Christ, the Jews and the Athenians, carried with them the lunar year, it will perhaps be inferred that the year of 365 days itself had not existed in Egypt in these remote ages.

I am aware that Macrobius[197] gives the Egyptians a solar year of 365¼ days; but this author, who is comparatively modern, and who lived at a long period after the establishment of the fixed year of Alexandria, must have confounded the epochs. Diodorus[198] and Strabo[199] only attribute such a year to the Thebans; they do not say that it was in general use, and they themselves did not live till long after Herodotus.

Thus the Sothian or great year must have been a comparatively recent invention, since it results from the comparison of the civil year with this pretended heliacal year of Sirius; and it is for this reason that it is only spoken of in the works of the second and third century after Christ[200], and that Syncellus alone, in the ninth, seems to cite Manetho as having made mention of it.

Notwithstanding all that is said to the contrary, the same opinion must be formed of the astronomical knowledge of the Chaldeans. It is natural enough to think, that a people who inhabited vast plains, under a sky perpetually serene, must have been led to observe the course of the stars, even at a period when they still led a wandering life, and when the stars alone could direct their courses during the night; but since what period were they astronomers, and to what perfection did they carry the science? Here rests the question. It is generally allowed that Callisthenes sent to Aristotle observations made by them, and which referred to a period of 2200 years before Christ; but this fact is related only by Simplicius[201], as stated upon the authority of Porphyry, and 600 years after Aristotle. Aristotle himself says nothing on the subject, nor has any creditable astronomer spoken of it. Ptolemy mentions and makes use of ten observations of eclipses really made by the Chaldeans; but they do not refer to an earlier period than that of Nabonassar (721 years before Christ); they are inaccurate also; the time is expressed only in hours and half-hours, and the shadow only in halves or fourths of the diameter. Notwithstanding, as they had fixed dates, the Chaldeans must have had some knowledge of the true length of the year, and some means of measuring time. They appear to have known the period of eighteen years, which brings back the eclipses of the moon in the same order; a piece of knowledge which the mere inspection of their registers would promptly afford them; but it is certain that they could neither explain nor predict eclipses of the sun.

It is from not having sufficiently understood a passage of Josephus, that Cassini, and after him Bailly, have imagined that they discovered in it a luni-solar period of 600 years, which had been known from the time of the first patriarchs[202].

Thus every thing leads us to believe that the great reputation of the Chaldeans was given them at a more recent period, by their unworthy successors, who, under the same name, sold their horoscopes and predictions throughout the whole Roman empire, and who, in order to procure themselves more credit, attributed to their rude ancestors the honour of the discoveries of the Greeks.

With regard to the Indians, every body knows that Bailly, believing that the epoch which is used as a period of departure in some of their astronomical tables had been actually observed, has attempted to draw from thence a proof of the great antiquity of the science among this people, or at least among the nation which had bequeathed them its knowledge. But the whole of this system, invented with so much labour, falls to the ground of itself, now that it is proved that this epoch has been adopted but of late, from calculations made backwards, and even false in their results.[203]

Mr Bentley has discovered that the tables of Tirvalour, on which the assertion of Bailley especially rested, must have been calculated about 1281 of the Christian era, or 540 years ago, and that the Surya-Siddhanta, which the Brahmins regard as their oldest scientific treatise on astronomy, and which they pretend to have been revealed upwards of 20,000,000 of years ago, could not have been composed at an earlier period than about 760 years from the present day[204].

Solstices and equinoxes indicated in the Pouranas, and calculated according to the positions which seem to be attributed to them by the signs of the Indian zodiac, such as they are supposed to be, have acquired the character of an enormous antiquity. A more attentive examination of these signs or nacchatras has lately convinced M. de Paravey that reference is only made to solstices of 1200 years before the Christian era. This author at the same time admits, that the place of the solstices is so inaccurately fixed, that this determination of their date must be received with a latitude of 200 or 300 years. They are in the same predicament as those of Eudoxus and of Tcheoukong[205].

It is ascertained that the Indians do not make observations, and that they are not in possession of any of the instruments necessary for that purpose. M. Delambre indeed admits, with Bailly and Legentil, that they have processes of calculation, which, without proving the antiquity of their astronomy, shew at least its originality[206]; and yet this conclusion can by no means be extended to their sphere; for, independently of their twenty-seven nacchatras or lunar houses, which strongly resemble those of the Arabians, they have the same twelve constellations in the zodiac as the Egyptians, Chaldeans, and Greeks[207]; and, if we refer to Mr Wilfort’s assertions, their extra-zodiacal constellations are also the same as those of the Greeks, and bear names which are merely slight alterations of their Greek names[208].

It is to Yao that the introduction of astronomy into China is attributed. He is represented, in the Chou-king, as sending astronomers toward the four cardinal points of his empire, to examine what stars presided over the four seasons, and to regulate the operations to be carried on at each period of the year[209], as if their dispersion was necessary for such an undertaking. About 200 years later, the Chou-king speaks of an eclipse of the sun, but accompanied with ridiculous circumstances, as in all the fables of this kind; for the whole Chinese army, headed by a general, is made to march against two astronomers, because they had not properly predicted it[210]; and it is well known that, more than 2000 years after, the Chinese astronomers possessed no means of accurately predicting the eclipses of the sun. In 1629 of our era, at the time of their dispute with the Jesuits, they did not even know how to calculate the shadows.

The real eclipses, recorded by Confucius in his Chronicle of the kingdom of Lou, commence only 1400 years after this, in the 776th before Christ, and scarcely half a century earlier than those of the Chaldeans related by Ptolemy. So true is it, that the nations which escaped at the same time from the general catastrophe, also arrived about the same period, when their circumstances have been similar, at the same degree of civilization. Now, it might be thought, from the identity of the names of the Chinese astronomers in different reigns (they appear, according to the Chou-king, to have all been named _Hi_ and _Ho_), that, at this remote epoch, their profession was hereditary in China, as it was in India, Egypt, and Babylon.

The only Chinese observation of any antiquity, which has nothing in itself to prove its want of authenticity, is that of the shadow made by _Tcheou-kong_ about 1100 years before Christ; and even it is far from being correct[211].

Hence our readers may conclude, that the inferences drawn from the alleged perfection of astronomical science among ancient nations, is not more conclusive in favour of the excessive antiquity of those nations, than the testimonies which they have adduced in reference to themselves.

But had this astronomy been more perfect, what would it prove? Has the progress been calculated which this science ought to make among nations who were not in any degree in possession of others; to whom the serenity of the sky, the necessities of the pastoral or agricultural life, and their superstitious ideas, would render the stars an object of general attention; where colleges, or societies of the most respectable men among them, were charged with keeping a register of interesting phenomena, and transmitting their memory; and where, from the hereditary nature of the profession, the children were brought up from the cradle in the knowledge of facts ascertained by their parents? Supposing that, among the numerous individuals of whom the cultivation of astronomy was the sole occupation, there should happen to be one or two possessed of extraordinary talents for geometry, all the knowledge acquired by these nations might be attained in a few centuries.

Since the time of the Chaldeans, real astronomy has only had two eras, that of the Alexandrian school, which lasted 400 years, and that of our own times, which has not existed so long. The learned period of the Arabians scarcely added any thing to it; and the other ages have been mere blanks with regard to it. Three hundred years did not intervene between Copernicus and the author of the _Mecanique Céleste_; and can it be believed that the Indians required thousands of years to arrive at their crude theories?

_The Astronomical Monuments left by the Ancients do not bear the excessively remote dates which have been attributed to them._

Recourse has therefore been had to arguments of another kind. It has been pretended that, independently of the knowledge which these nations may have acquired, they have left monuments which bear a date fixed by the state of the heavens which they represent, and one that refers to a very remote antiquity. The zodiacs sculptured in two temples of Upper Egypt, are adduced as furnishing proofs perfectly demonstrative of this assertion. They present the same figures of the zodiacal constellations as are employed at the present day, but distributed in a manner peculiar to themselves. The state of the heavens at the period when these monuments were delineated, is imagined to have been represented by this distribution, and it has been thought that it would be possible from it to infer the precise period at which the edifices containing them were erected[212].

But to arrive at the high antiquity which is supposed to be deducible from this, it must, in the _first_ place, be supposed, that their division has a determinate relation to a certain state of the heavens, dependent upon the precession of the equinoxes, which causes the colures to make the tour of the zodiac in 26,000 years; that it indicated, for example, the position of the solstitial point; and, _secondly_, that the state of the heavens represented was precisely that which took place at the period when the monument was erected,--two suppositions which themselves, as is evident, suppose a great number of others.

In point of fact, are the figures of these zodiacs the constellations,--the true groups of stars which at present bear the same names, or merely what astronomers call signs, that is to say, divisions of the zodiac proceeding from one of the colures, whatever place this colure occupies? Is the point at which these zodiacs have been divided into two bands, necessarily that of a solstice? Is the division of the side next the entrance, necessarily that of the summer solstice? Does this division indicate, even in general, a phenomenon dependent upon the precession of the equinoxes? Does it not refer to some period the rotation of which would be less; for example, to the moment of the tropical year when such or such sacred years of the Egyptians commenced, which, being shorter than the true tropical year by nearly six hours, would make the tour of the zodiac in 1508 years? Lastly, whatever signification it may have had, has it been intended by it to mark the time when the zodiac was sculptured, or that when the temple was built? Has not the object been to record a previous state of the heavens at some period which was interesting in a religious point of view, whether it had been actually observed, or inferred from a retrograde calculation?

From the mere announcement of such questions, it will be perceived how complicated they necessarily are, how much subject to controversy any solution that might be adopted on this subject would be, and how little qualified to serve as a solid proof, for the solution of another problem, such as the antiquity of the Egyptian nation. And it may be said, with regard to those who have attempted to infer a date from these data, that there have arisen as many opinions as there have been authors.

The learned astronomer Mr Burkhard, from a first examination, judged that, at Dendera, the solstice is marked by the Lion; which would make it two signs less remote than at the present day, and the temple at least 4000 years old[213]. He gave, at the same time an antiquity of 7000 years to that of Esne, although it is not known how he had purposed to reconcile these numbers with what we know of the precession of the equinoxes. The late M. Lalande, seeing that the Cancer was repeated on the two bands, imagined that the solstice passed to the middle of that constellation; but as this was the case also in the sphere of Eudoxus, he concluded that some Grecian artist might have represented this sphere on the ceiling of an Egyptian temple, without knowing that it represented a state of the heavens which no longer existed[214]. This, as is seen, was a conclusion very different from that of Mr Burkhard. Dupuis was the first who thought it necessary to search for proofs of the idea, in some measure confidently adopted, that it was the solstice that was denoted. He found them, with reference to the great zodiac of Dendera, in the globe on the top of the pyramid, and in several emblems placed near different signs, and which he imagined, sometimes according to the opinion of ancient authors, such as Plutarch, Horus Apollo, or Clement of Alexandria, sometimes according to his own conjectures, ought to be regarded as representing phenomena which had been really those of the seasons affected at each sign. As for the rest, he maintained that this state of the heavens affords the date of the monument, and that it is the original, and not a copy, of the sphere of Eudoxus, that was represented at Dendera, which would refer it to a period of 1468 years before Christ, or to the reign of Sesostris. The number of nineteen boats, however, placed under each band, furnished him with the idea that the solstice might probably have been at the nineteenth degree of the sign, which would make it 288 years older[215].

Mr Hamilton[216] having remarked, that, at Dendera, the Scarabæus belonging to the side of the ascending signs is smaller than that of the other side, an English author[217] has concluded from this that the solstice may have been nearer its actual point than the middle of the Cancer, which would carry us back to a period of 1000 or 1200 years before Christ.

The late M. Nouet, judging that the globe, the rays, and the horned head, or head of Isis, represent the heliacal rising of Sirius, supposed that it was intended to mark an epoch of the Sothian period, but that it was intended to mark it by the place which the solstice occupied. Now, in the last but one of these periods, that which elapsed between 2782 and 1322 before Christ, the solstice had passed from 30° 48′ of the constellation of the Lion to 13° 34′ of Cancer. At the middle of this period, it was therefore at 23° 34′ of cancer. The heliacal rising of Sirius happened then some days after the solstice; and this is nearly what has been indicated, according to M. Nouet, by the repetition of the Scarabæus, and by the figure of Sirius with the rays of the sun placed at the commencement of the band to the right. Calculating upon this basis, he concludes that the temple of Dendera was built 2052 years before Christ, and that of Esne 4600[218].

All these calculations, even admitting that the division marks the solstice, would still be susceptible of many modifications; and, at first, it appears that their authors have supposed the constellations all of thirty degrees like the signs, and have not reflected that it is far from being the case that they are thus equal, at least as they are represented at the present day, and as the Greeks have transmitted them to us. In reality, the solstice, which is at present on this side of the first stars of the constellation of Gemini, could only have left the first stars of the constellation of Cancer forty-five years before Christ, and had left the constellation of Leo only 1260 years before the same era.

* * * * *

My distinguished and learned colleague, M. Delambre, has favoured me with the following table and remarks, which illustrate what has been above said.

_TABLE of the Extent of the Zodiacal Constellations, as they are designed upon our Globes, and of the Times required by the Colures to traverse them._

+------------------------------------------------------+
| |
| ARIES. |
| |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Stars. |Longitudes in 1800.|Year of the|Year of the|
| | | Equinox. | Solstice. |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| γ | 1^s 0° 23′ 40″ | -389 | 6869 |
| β | 1 1 10 40 | -441 | 6921 |
| α | 1 4 52 0 | -710 | 7190 |
| η | 1 5 18 50 | -742 | 7222 |
| 2 θ | 1 6 14 16 | -810 | 7290 |
| ζ | 1 19 8 50 | -1739 | 8219 |
| τ tail. | 1 20 51 0 | -1862 | 8342 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Dur. | 20 27 20 | 1473 | 1473 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| |
| TAURUS. |
| |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| ξ | 1^s 19° 6′ 0″ | -1735 | -8215 |
| η | 1 27 12 0 | -2318 | -8798 |
| α | 2 6 59 40 | -3024 | -9504 |
| β | 2 19 47 0 | -3944 | -10424 |
| ζ | 2 22 0 0 | -4104 | -10584 |
| a Coch. | 2 24 42 40 | -4300 | -10780 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Dur. | 35 36 40 | 2565 | 2565 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| |
| GEMINI. |
| |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Propus. | 2^s 28° 9′ 20″ | -4547 | -11027 |
| η | 3 0 39 0 | -4727 | -11207 |
| γ | 3 6 18 40 | -5134 | -11614 |
| δ | 3 15 44 0 | -5813 | -12293 |
| Castor. | 3 17 27 30 | -5937 | -12417 |
| Pollux. | 3 20 28 9 | -6154 | -12634 |
| φ | 3 22 27 10 | -6926 | -12776 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Dur. | 24 17 40 | 1749 | 1749 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+

+------------------------------------------------------+
| |
| CANCER. |
| |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Stars. |Longitudes in 1800.|Year of the|Year of the|
| | | Equinox. | Solstice. |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| 1 ω | 3^s 24° 21′ 55″ | 6475 | +45 |
| ζ | 3 28 32 0 | 6734 | -254 |
| β | 4 1 28 20 | 6906 | -426 |
| γ | 4 4 45 0 | 7182 | -702 |
| 1 α | 4 10 18 50 | 7583 | -1103 |
| 2 α | 4 10 50 36 | 7621 | -1141 |
| χ | 4 13 23 0 | 7804 | -1324 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Dur. | 19 1 5 | 1369 | 1369 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| |
| LEO. |
| |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| χ | 4^s 12° 30′ 0″ | -7740 | -1260 |
| α | 4 27 3 10 | -8788 | -1908 |
| δ | 5 8 30 0 | -9612 | -3132 |
| β | 5 18 50 55 | -10357 | -3877 |
| ... | .. ... ... ... | ..... | ..... |
| ... | .. ... ... ... | ..... | ..... |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Dur. | 36 20 55 | 2617 | 2617 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| |
| VIRGO. |
| |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| ω | 5^s 19° 2′ 22″ | -10371 | -3891 |
| β | 5 24 19 0 | -10750 | -4271 |
| η | 6 2 2 40 | -11307 | -4827 |
| δ | 6 8 41 40 | -11786 | -5306 |
| α | 6 21 3 15 | -12676 | -6196 |
| λ | 7 4 9 50 | -13620 | -7140 |
| μ | 7 7 17 40 | -13845 | -7365 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Dur. | 48 15 18 | 3474 | 3474 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Mean | | | |
| Dur. | 30 0 0 | 2160 | |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+

+------------------------------------------------------+
| |
| LIBRA. |
| |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Stars. |Longitudes in 1800.|Year of the|Year of the|
| | | Equinox. | Solstice. |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| 1 α | 7^s 11° 0′ 44″ | -14113 | -7633 |
| 2 α | 7 12 18 0 | -14246 | -7926 |
| β | 7 16 35 0 | -14514 | -8034 |
| γ | 7 22 20 34 | -14929 | -8449 |
| γ Scorp. | 7 27 41 0 | -15312 | -8832 |
| ξ | 7 28 30 15 | -15372 | -8892 |
| ... | .. ... ... ... | ..... | ..... |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Dur. | 17 29 31 | 1259 | 1259 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| |
| SCORPIO. |
| |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| 1 Α | 7^s 28° 50′ 6″ | -15396 | -8916 |
| β | 8 0 23 48 | -15508 | -9028 |
| α | 8 6 57 38 | -15980 | -9500 |
| ζ | 8 12 35 30 | -16387 | -9907 |
| λ | 8 21 47 27 | -17049 | -105569 |
| ... | .. ... ... ... | ..... | ..... |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Dur. | 22 57 21 | 1653 | 1653 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| |
| SAGITTARIUS. |
| |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| γ | 7^s 28° 28′ 20″ | -17530 | -11050 |
| λ | 9 3 32 56 | -17895 | -11415 |
| ζ | 9 10 50 28 | -18421 | -11941 |
| ψ | 9 14 15 15 | -18667 | -12187 |
| ω | 9 23 2 19 | -19299 | -12819 |
| g | 9 25 39 25 | -19487 | -13007 |
| ... | .. ... ... ... | ..... | ..... |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Dur. | 27 11 50 | 1957 | 1957 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+

+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| |
| CAPRICORN. |
| |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Stars. |Longitudes in 1800.|Year of the|Year of the|
| | | Equinox. | Solstice. |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| 1^{er} | 9^s 29° 39′ 15″ | -19775 | -13295 |
| 2 α | 10 1 3 58 | -19877 | -13397 |
| β | 10 1 15 30 | -19891 | -13411 |
| ι | 10 14 53 30 | -20872 | -14392 |
| γ | 10 18 59 28 | -21166 | -14586 |
| μ | 10 23 1 12 | -21458 | -14978 |
| ν | .. ... ... ... | ..... | ..... |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Dur. | 23 21 17 | 1683 | 1683 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| |
| AQUARIUS. |
| |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| ε | 10^s 8° 56′ 0″ | -20444 | -13964 |
| β | 10 20 36 30 | -21285 | -14805 |
| α | 11 0 34 0 | -22001 | -15521 |
| ζ | 11 6 7 0 | -22400 | -15920 |
| 2 ψ | 11 13 56 12 | -22963 | -16483 |
| 5 Α | 11 18 3 28 | -23260 | -16780 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Dur. | 39 7 28 | 2816 | 2816 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| |
| PISCES. |
| |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| β | 11^s 15° 49′ 0″ | 23095 | 16615 |
| λ | 11 23 49 0 | 23675 | 17195 |
| δ | 12 11 22 0 | 24939 | 18459 |
| σ | 12 24 26 0 | 25879 | 19399 |
| α | 12 26 34 58 | 26034 | 19554 |
| |... ... ... ... | ..... | ..... |
| |... ... ... ... | ..... | ..... |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| Dur. | 40 45 58 | 2939 | 2939 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+
| | | 0° | 270^s |
|Sirius | 3 11 20 10 | -5487 | -18447 |
+----------+-------------------+-----------+-----------+

_Construction and Use of the Table._

“The longitudes of the stars, for 1800, have been taken from the Berlin Tables, and are those of Lacaille, Bradley, or Flamstead. The first and the last of each constellation have been taken, as well as some of the brightest of the intermediate stars. The third column indicates the year in which the longitude of the star was 0′, that is to say, that in which the star was in the equinoxial colure of spring. The last column indicates the year when the star was in the solstitial colure, whether of winter or of summer.

“For Aries, Taurus, and Gemini, the winter solstice has been chosen; for the other constellations the summer solstice has been chosen, for the sake of not receding into too remote antiquity, and of not approaching too near modern times. It will be easy to find the opposite solstice, by adding the semiperiod of 12,960 years. The same rule will serve for finding the time when the star has been, or will be, at the autumnal equinox.

“The sign - indicates the years before our era, the sign + the year of our era; and the last line, at the end of each sign under the title of _duration_, gives the extent of the constellation in degrees, and the time which the equinox, or the solstice, occupies in traversing the constellation from one end to the other.