from the rising or setting of Vergilia" (Pleiades), and this constellation occupied an equally important position in the astronomical systems of Eastern Asia.* The Mexicans and other nations of Anahuac, as we have seen, marked the termination of their great cycles by these stars, and celebrated their passage over the meridian by rejoicings. The Peruvians appear to have regarded the same constellation with veneration,† and the Araucanians knew and named these stars. The Tapuyas, the oldest race in Brazil, watched the rise of the Pleiades, and worshipped them with songs and dances. The Abipones, says Dobrizhoffer, think the Pleiades "to be the representation of their grandfather, and as that constellation disappears at certain periods from the sky of South America, upon such occasions, they suppose that their grandfather is sick, and are under a yearly apprehension that he is going to die; but as soon as those seven stars are again visible in the month of May, they welcome their grandfather as if returned and restored from sickness, with joyful shouts and the festive sound of pipes and trumpets."|| Intermediate America and Asia, the same stars were watched by the Polynesian islanders, and their rising (heliacal) divided the year of the Society islands into two seasons.¶ All the nations of the East, appear to have hailed with re § Southey's Hist. Brazil, vol. i. p. 380. Dobrizhoffer, vol. ii. p. 94. || Ibid. vol. ii. p. 65. ¶ Polynesian Researches, vol. i. p. 79. The Javanese anciently regulated the season of sowing by the appearance of the Pleiades.-Crawfurd's Ind. Archipelago, vol. i. p. 300. joicings the appearance of the first new moon of the year, or the first new moon after the vernal equinox. In the fourth Mexican month, which lasted from the ninth to the twentyninth of March, was celebrated the Cohuailhuitl, or festival of the Snake. This was the season of the vernal equinox, and the festival was in honor of the goddess Cihuacohuatl, or the woman serpent. Now the moon was often anciently denoted by the figure of a dragon, which was a known emblem of light in its darting motion. Accordingly, even among the barbarous tribes of America, when eclipses occurred, they superstitiously believed that the sun was attacked by a great dragon or serpent, an idea probably derived from the figure of the animal by which the moon was usually represented. In relation to the Egyptian legends, wherein it is said that the body of Osiris was cut into pieces by Typhon, Plutarch remarks, that "those who join with the physiological accounts, certain mathematical matters relative to astronomy, suppose Typhon to mean the orb of the sun, and Osiris that of the moon." So likewise in the Mexican mythology, we read of the woman serpent or the Moon, devoured by the Sun, a myth probably descriptive of the change in the phases of the moon. It thus appears probable that in the Mexican, as well as in the ancient astronomy, the serpent was one of the emblems of the moon; and as in Mexico, the woman serpent or moon, was styled "mother of our flesh," so in Egypt, that luminary was called "mother of the world."+ * Landseer's Sabæan Res., p. 78. Humboldt's Res., vol. i. p. 290. Clavigero, vol. i. p. 246. Hymns of Callimachus. Pritchard's Egyptian Mythology, p. 72. The Egyptians appear to have know the constellation of the Great Bear by that name. The superstition just referred to, appears to have been common to nations in both continents. The Mexicans believed when there was an eclipse of the sun or moon, that one of those bodies was being devoured by the other. On these occasions they displayed great grief, and to terminate the conflict, discharged their arrows towards the heavens; they also beat their dogs and servants, in hopes that by their howling and cries the same result would be produced. The Peruvians believed these phenomena portended some great calamity; that the eclipsed body was sick and about to die, in which case the world would perish. As soon as an eclipse commenced they made a dreadful noise with their musical instruments; they struck their dogs and made them howl, "in the hope that the moon, which they believed had an affection for those animals in consequence of some signal service which they had rendered her, would have pity on their cries."* The Araucanians called eclipses the "deaths" of the Sun and Moon.† The Remos, on the banks of the Ucayale, have similar notions, and discharge arrows towards the heavens, believing that some wild beast is devouring the eclipsed body. "If an eclipse happens," says Charlevoix, speaking of the Indians of Canada, " they imagine there is some great combat in the heavens, and they shoot many arrows into the air, to drive away the pretended enemies of the sun and The Hurons, when the moon is eclipsed, fancy that she moon. -Drummond's Origines, vol. ii. p. 176. Saulnier's Observations on the Zodiac of Denderah. The Indians of Canada, says Charlevoix, "give the name of the Bear to the four first of those we call the Great Bear." Voyage, vol. ii. p. 172. Tanner's Narrative, p. 321. † Molina, vol. ii. p. 84. * Vega, vol. i. p. 108. Smyth's Narrative, etc., p. 230. is sick, and to recover her from this sickness, they make a great noise, and accompany this noise with many ceremonies and prayers; and they never fail to fall upon the dogs, with sticks and stones, to set them a yelping, because they believe the moon loves those animals.”* The Chinese, Malays, and Hindoos had similar superstitions. In China, according to Grosier, when an eclipse occurs, a frightful noise of drums and cymbals is made; the Chinese "think that by such a horrid din, they assist the suffering luminary, and prevent it being devoured by the celestial dragon.”† In every improved language of the Indian archipelago, says Mr. Crawfurd," an eclipse is called Grahana, and the dragon which the Hindus suppose attempts to devour the luminary, Rahu, both of them pure Sanscrit words." "The Malays sometimes call an eclipse, the devouring by the dragon,' makan Rahu. There is to this day hardly a country of the archipelago, in which the ceremony of frightening the supposed monster from his attack on the luminary is not performed. This consists in shouting, in striking gongs, but above all, in striking their stampers against the sides of the wooden mortars." The astronomical analogies which have been thus briefly detailed are of great extent, and indicate an origin at some ancient epoch. They do not prove that the civilized Americans came either from Egypt, Etruria, or Hindoostan, but at the same time, they give rise to the idea, that many of these affinities were derived from some primitive and common source. * Voyage. vol. i. p. 173. † Grosier's China, vol. ii. p. 438. Barrow, p. 191. Crawfurd's Indian Archipelago, vol. i. p. 305. Marsden's Sumatra, p. 194. They increase in weight, however, as we approach Oriental Asia; there we find among the Siamese and Javanese the months divided into light and dark halves; and there also, is the only appearance of a method of computing time similar to the Mexican. The Mexican week was composed of five days, and on every fifth day, their fair or great market was held.† The week in Eastern Asia, as derived from Hindoostan, consisted of seven days, and as such was known to the Javanese and Siamese. But it is curious that the original native Javanese week consists of five days, and its principal use "is to determine the markets or fairs;" this week is called Pakanan, or market-time. Of the etymology of the words designating the five days, nothing is known; but the week appears to form a part of an ancient civil calendar, existing before they had any communication with the Hindoos, the relics of which are insufficiently understood. It seems clear, however, that the divisions into which the year was divided, in this system, related to no astronomical period, but were of arbitrary duration like the Mexican months. The year was divided into thirty months, which Mr. Crawfurd thinks each expressed half lunations; and one of the native cycles, probably related to the same calendar, like the Maya age consisted of twenty years.‡ The examination of the astronomical knowledge of the Mexicans and other American nations, satisfactorily indicates not only the existence of accurate ideas of the movements and *They reckoned according to the days of the divisions, and not of the whole month. Crawfurd's Siam, vol. ii. p. 19. † Clavigero, vol. i. p. 293. Crawfurd's Indian Archipelago, vol. i. pp. 292, 304. |