The Kali-yug. HE moft ancient era of India is the Kaliyug, which dates from Friday the 18th day of February (fo interpreted), 3102 B.C. It begins with the entrance of the fun into the Hindoo fign Afwin, but on account of the precession of the equinoxes it advances at the rate of a day in fixty years. For example,-If in the year 1600 of the Chriftian era the Kali-yug began on the 28th of March Old Style the 7th of April New Style, it would in 1869 begin on the 1st of April Old Style --the 13th of April New Style. = [Note.-Preceffion of the equinoxes. As the earth goes round the fun, we observe that at the end of a fidereal year the fun occupies the fame pofition among the fixed stars as at the beginning of it. The fidereal year confifts of about 365 days, a day meaning the time of one rotation of the earth on its own axis, or the average time in which the fun twice paffes the fame meridian. An equinoctial year is the time that elapses between two paffages of the sun through the vernal equinox; and if the vernal equinox were a fixed point, the equinoctial year would be of the fame length as the fidereal year; but as the vernal equinox has a flight perpetual movement in a direction oppofite to the fun's annual course, the sun annually reaches it sooner by about 20 minutes than it would if the point were fixed, and thus the equinoctial year is so much shorter than the fidereal year. This movement of the equinox, to meet the fun in his annual course, is called the preceffion of the equinoxes, and was discovered by Hipparchus about 150 years before I A.D. It has amounted to about 30°, one month, in 2000 years.] = T The Era of Sáliváhana. HIS era is reckoned from 78 A.D. and may be joined with the Kali-yug, as the names of the months, divifions and commencement of the two, are identical. The years of the Era of Sáliváhana are called Sáka. The Era of Vikramaditya. HIS era obtains its name from a Sovereign of Malwa; it began 57 years before I A. D., that number muft therefore be deducted for years of the Christian era. The years are called Samvat; the months are the fame as those used with the two preceding eras. UBLIC documents in England, from the time of Richard the Firft, down to the present day, have been usually dated with the year of the reign of the fovereign, and not with the year of our Lord. [We muft, however, except the years following the death of Charles the First, until the restoration of Charles the Second [1648-9 to 1660], when the name of the fovereign giving place to "The Keepers of the Libertie of England by authority of Par"liament," during the first five years, and afterwards, "Oliver Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England "Scotland & Ireland and the Dominions thereto belonging," the year of our Lord, the month, and the day of the month were the only dates given], confequently, to be able to determine the year of our Lord for any year of a fovereign's reign, we must have a chronological lift, fhowing the first and laft date of the reign of each fovereign. In the early years of the English hiftory, after the Norman Conqueft, it appears that the reign of the fovereign did not commence until fome act of fovereignty had been performed; the commencement of the reign. being sometimes reckoned from the day of the coronation, of which practice there is evidence amongst the memoranda taken from the "Black Book" of the Exchequer, under the date" 16 November" [fee p. 76], where the years of the reign of Henry III. have been counted from his coronation. It is obvious, however, that the dates given in the "Public Records" for the commencement and termination of each fovereign's reign, must alone be recognized, to the exclufion of all other fyftems, when our object is to verify written dates to be met with in the Legal Records. A queftion concerning the date of the acceffion of the fovereign was taken into confideration in the first year of the reign of Elizabeth, in Michaelmas term, when the judges, Chief Baron, Attorney-General, and Solicitor-General formed feveral refolutions in relation to the ftatute [1 Edward VI, c. 7] for the discontinuance of certain offices on the demife of the king; the first being, that "the king, who is heir or fucceffor, may write "and begin his reign the faid day that his progenitor or predeceffor died." |