Page 179 - Lokmanya Tilak Samagra (khand 2)

164 SAMAGRA TILAK- 2 • THE ORION

to the aclual facts, as they saw them, and introduced the change
without atkmpting to discover its real cause.
The Ve .. Lnga Jyoti$ha introduces the third change, when the
seasons had further fallon back, not by a month, but by a fort-
night. It w:1s probably during this interval that the beginning of
the month \·, e~s altered from the full-moon to the new-moon, and
when this beginning of the nK·nth was so altered, advantage was
taken of the receding of the seasons by a fortnight, to commence
the year \Vith the new-moon in Dhani~htha as the Vedanga
.lyoti~ha has done.
From this the next recorded step is to Ashvini. There is, how-
ever, an interesting story related in the Mahabharata which evi-
dently refers to an abortive attempt to reform the calendar when
the seasons had again fallen back by a fortnight. In the 7lst
chapter of Adiparva we are told that Visvamitra attempted to
create a new world,* and make the Nak~hatras commence with
Shravapa, instead of Dhani~htha, and the same story is alluded
to in the Ashvamedha Parva, chapter 44. The tradition can also
be found iii other Puri:q1as where Visvamitra is represented as
endeavouring to create a new celestial sphere. It appears, how-
ever, that he did not succeed, and the Krittika-system, as modi-
fied by the Vedanga Jyoti~ha, continued to regulate the calender-
until the list of the Nnkshatras was quietly made to begin, as
noticed in the third chap.ter. with Ashvin~ in later times.
We have thus an almosL continuous record of the year-
beginning from the oldest time down to the present in the litera-
ture of India, and in the face of this evidence it is useless to
indulge in uncertain speculations about the antiquity of the Vedas.
I have already referred to the occurrence of the pitri-pak~ha in
Bhadrapada as a relic of the time when the year commenced with
the Phalguni full-moon. Our Shra vapi ceremony appears to have
been once performed in Bhadrapada (Manu iv. 95 ); and as it
marked the beginning of the rains, when the herbs appear anew
( Ashvalayana Grihya Sfttra iii. 5. 2 ), we can here trace the reces-
• Maha .. \cti. ; 1. 3 ~-
"!Cfii\F~ "! it<fi ~ ~oil:) <la_i'Sffi~l I
lifu'l>l"ITf'('IJJ'ii'J <l~ful 'q<liT{ f!: II
;tnd ~gam in the .\,ln. -!4· 2
ali[: 't" ~m uf"f: >l'r~r: w.:ji~lf: ~~m:
~<!ITfl?.J!<f ':T.[a_illUr ;r.;;tq: ~~~U~lf: II