Page:Hindu astronomy, Brennand (1896).djvu/15

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Contents.
vii.

Other important stars mentioned.

Names of the twenty-seven Lunar Asterisms, with figures representing them.

Table of Apparent Longitudes and Latitudes of the twenty-seven Yugataras.

Observations on Phenomena occurring near the Ecliptic-.

Eclipses, and their return in succession in periods of every eighteen years and ten or eleven days.

Eclipses supposed, by the ignorant, to presage dreadful events.

Extracts from Hindu Writings showing that the causes of eclipses were well understood.

The point marking the "origin" of Apparent Longitudes.

The modern origin fixed when the Vernal Equinox was in the first point of Aswini, or Mesha (circ. 570 A.D.)

Meaning of the term "precession."

Methods of determining the date 570 A.D.

Date when the Vernal Equinox coincided with the first point of Crittica.

Confirmation of such date found by Bentley in the Hindu Allegory of the birth of four planets (1528—1371 B.C.)

Extract from the Varaha-Sanhita, with reference to the date when the Solstitial Colure passed through the first point of Dhanishtha (circ. 1110 B.C.)

CHAPTER IV.

THE HINDU MONTHS, etc.

Different Methods of Measuring Time.

Astronomy of the Vedas described in a treatise entitled Jyotisha. for the adjustment of the ancient Hindu Calendar.

Birth of Durga (a personification of the year).

Formation and Names of the Months.

Extracts regarding the Months from the Institutes of Menu.

Months called, in the Institutes, Daughters of Daosha (the Ecliptic), and Consorts of Soma (the Moon).