Ancient Egyptian Calendars
By the late Reverend Harold Moss / Osiris
High Priest of Heru – Founding Father of the CES
Reprinted: originally printed in CAW Green Egg
THE EGYPTIAN CALENDAR
Green Egg Vol. V, No. 52 (Oimelc 1973)
Although human civilization has moved into arid and stormy areas of the Earth, in the beginning man lived in moderate climates, in grass and woodland, and his life depended on following herds of animals, and finding ripe fruit and grain At first the environment seemed very random; sometimes there was food, sometimes there wasn’t. The first great scientific and mathematical discovery must have been that the animals and fruit appeared in synchronous cycle every twelve full moons. Since twelve was the number of the segments of the four fingers of the hand - using the thumb as a counter - man could see the heavens, the earth, and his body united in a rational mathematical cyclican system. This first scientific discovery was also a discovery of religion.
Imagine one of our forebears with tattoos on the segments of his fingers to name the months of the year, one finger for each of the four seasons. He would wear a ring on his finger that he moves each full moon to keep track of the year, and advise the tribe when to harvest fruit, when to follow the heard, when the calves will be borne, when the floods and rain will arrive, and later, when to plant the crops. This is speculation, of course, but it is very likely. This was the invention of the calendar, one of the very first inventions.
Unfortunately, Mother Universe’s secrets are not so easily divined. Some of these early calendar priests probably lost their jobs rather soon. For the correct number of full moons in a year is not 12, but 12.37. That means that after three years, the herds would arrive or the grain would ripen one month late. If you didn’t save enough jars of grain or enough jerky, people will go hungry. That mysterious number thirteen was discovered, and a year requiring the extra - the thirteenth - month, might be unlucky indeed. But early man had not yet discovered the idea of perfect rational measurement. This irregularity in the cycle did not all into question the truth of the cycle itself. Twelve remained a holy number, established at the very basis of our counting and mathematics and religion. The mystery of the extra month remained just that; a mystery, to be pondered.
Some refinements in the calendar occurred in latter years. The moon appears full for about three days, so the time of the new moon became a more reliable measuring point. In Egypt, for example, the new month began on that day when the new moon was first visible after sunset. The phases of the moon remained the national standard time throughout the historic period. Really accurate water clocks became important only in Roman times, and spring clocks not until the middle ages. Until then, no one could check on the moon.
One way of keeping track of the successive full — or new — moons of the year is to notice which bright stars occur near them. In ancient Egypt, the harvest occurred when the full moon occurred near the bright star Spica; spica means “ear of grain” in Latin which no doubt translates an earlier Egyptian name.
This use of the motion of the sun and the fixed stars for time measurement must have come at a later date, for it requires keener observation and better record keeping. Since full moons occur about thirty days apart, twelve months give 260 days. Many ancient temples have large counters that were moved around a circle of markers to publicly record the date, to predict the beginning of the seasons. Eventually these giant calculators — such as Stonehenge and the Great Pyramid — became so accurate that they could predict eclipses. The idea of the wheel must have come from the vision of the lights spinning round the sky.
But as we have seen a 360-day calendar is not accurate enough. By counting the days and measuring the year more accurately, the 365-day year was discovered. In a lifetime, this calendar would be only a couple of weeks off, and the seasons and flood do not repeat so accurately that this would become too obviously apparent. History records that in Egypt, King Menes introduced the 365-day year calendar about 3000 BCE, when he united all of Egypt into history’s first nation. Without a good calendar to synchronize so large a country, communication would
be almost impossible.
The rapid increase in material wealth brought with it an increase in scientific research. After 300 years, the year was much more accurately measured. In 2767 BCE, history records that there were terrible floods, probably caused by inaccuracy in predicting the rise of the Nile. Also this year occurred a marvelous sight in the heavens; All the moving lights of the sky rose together at sunrise July 19, 2767 BCE. At this holy instant, the Egyptian calendar was reinstituted and reformed. The rising of the Nile was predicted each year when the bright star Sirius could first bee seen to rise with the sun. This star was identified with Isis, and as She rose with her consort Ra in the morning, so did the river rise, fill and irrigate the prepared fields, and assure another bountiful harvest. This beneficence of the goddess and the Land of Egypt was legendary for thousands of years.
The Egyptian calendar was a peculiar compromise among the many mysteries of the sky and earth; First, for convenience, each month began at new moon, was half over at full moon. New year for priests and farmers occurred when Sirius rose with the sun, but New Year for everybody else occurred at the next new moon, except for the civil service. The tax collectors continued to use the 365-day year. Every four years, it lost another whole day on the sun and moon. After 120 years, the civil calendar and the planting calendar would be one month off. After 1460 years, the two calendars would go through a whole cycle and come back together again.
The Egyptians were a very practical people. They saw at once that this wandering of the calendar could be put to use. Rather than numbering their years as we do, the would simply record any important date in two systems, and by calculating the difference between them, the event could be quickly located in the 1460 cycle of Sirius. We might find it confusing, but it worked perfectly, and the beginning of the calendar, the beginning of Western history, is July 19, 2767 BCE, the first date in Western history.
It was the Greek conquerors of Egypt, long tired of the Egyptians for being too impracticality religious, who abandoned the writing of words with pictures of animals and birds, and also abandoned the wandering calendar. Leap years were invented; every four years one day was added to the year to take up the slippage. This was the calendar that Julius Caesar introduced to Rome — under his own name, of course; but was the Egyptian calendar. Western Society used it continuously until Pope Gregory made a slight change in it in 1582 CE.
Most peoples of antiquity used lunar calendars with their alternating twelve and thirteen month years. The sidereal month can be used which measures the moon’s return to a particular bright star, and this gives a thirteen-month year with occasional years of fourteen months. All these systems are at heart irregular, and some device must be used to bring the months and years together. Today our Gregorian calendar used months of irregular length and adds a leap year in February of every fourth year. It is a hodge-podge calendar with no mystical or practical correlations. No one knows what the names of the months signify. Every date of any importance falls on a different day and date each year, in the middle of a month; except, of course for New Year’s Day, which is completely arbitrary, signifying nothing whatever.
In Egypt, the twelve-month year used equal 30 day months, and added five “epagomenal” (Greek for “left over”) or “intercalary” (Latin for “stuck in”) days at the end of the year. Everybody just stopped the clocks, took off work and threw a giant party. When leap years finally were devised the Egyptians added them to these special days, making six odd days in all. This is the calendar we use at the Church of the Eternal source.
Another important calendar approximates the revolution period of the moon — 27.32 days — to 18 days. Thirteen months of 28 days = 364 days, and only one day is left over in a year — except of course that leap years must be accounted for the same way; in a leap year, there would be two left over days. Theoretically, this calendar would begin each month when the moon returned to a particular bright star, which it does each 27.3 days. But the approximation to 28 days means that the month would actually begin when the moon was 9° further along, or practically one whole constellation further away each month. Not only do the months not correspond with any visual sky phenomenon, but the number thirteen is not practical for division into halves or quarters, and the months have no relation to the beginnings or endings of the seasons. Nevertheless, this calendar must have had extensive mystical use; there can’t be much doubt that the thirteen members of a Wicca circle represents the thirteen sidereal months of the year.
The twelve months took on the specific personalities of the parts of the year in which they occurred, and became associated with particular gods and festivals. Thoth was the god of time measurement, so New Year’s day was named after him. The festival was actually celebrated, however, on the following new moon, the beginning of the farmer’s month. This month is cognate with the sign Leo, ruled by the sun. The weather is certainly hot this time of the year, and since the year is a sun cycle, worship of the sun is appropriate for the first month. Thoth was occasionally described as the goddess Tekhi, and her name is also associated with this month. By the way, the word Thoth was pronounced Ta-HOO-ty by the Egyptians, more like T’Hooch by the later Greek times. Thoth as we say it is entirely an English word.
The second month Paopi was originally named Pen Apat and probably means “House of Ptah” or “The Way of Ptah.” Ptah was the creator God of Memphis, the first capital of all Egypt, and was identified later with Osiris and even later with Greek Kronos or Roman Saturn. This month occupies the sign Virgo, ruled by Mercury, and might also be related to the Sixth House, since Ptah was associated with the origin of government in Egypt.
The third month is named for the goddess of Love, Hathor (in Egyptian, “Hethara.”) This word is pronounced almost exactly like the Latin “Chitarra,” guitar or lute, and since Hathor was the goddess of Improvised Music, we can assume that Egyptians called their harps and lutes
“Hathors.”). This goddess was identified with a cow — in Egypt a symbol of joy, and was Goddess of Childbirth, as well as the Mother of Horus, hence her name. (Isis was also mother of Horus, but that’s another story — a long one.) Later Hathor was identified with the horizon by the
Greeks, who considered hills to be the teats of the earth and located their holy temples so that heavenly bodies rose between two hills; the cow horn emblem of Hathor may also have contributed to this association. This month occupies the sign Libra, ruled by Venus; The Autumnal equinox occurs about the sixth of Hathor.
Next is Koiak, or Khu-ikh, which was consecrated to Sekhmet, the Goddess of Anger (sometimes associated with Hathor). This sign is Scorpio, ruled by Mars and Pluto, with Uranus exalted; and also the eight house, dealing with death. Important festivals to Osiris, God of the Next World, were held in this month. This was the last month of the season of Inundation.
The Fifth month was the beginning of Spring and was called Tybi, which may mean “Stone tablet.” Jupiter rules Sagittarius, with Neptune exalted; both of these are aspects of Osiris as King and Mystic; the ninth house governs religion and ideals.
Mechir corresponds to Capricorn, ruled by Saturn; this name cannot be further translated at present. The Tenth house is with respectability and employment. During this month, the full moon is most nearly overhead.
Corresponding to Aquarius is the month Pamenot, “Pa Amenhotep” (The PA is a title of respect). Amenhotep was a great teacher, and many kings took their names from him; Aquarius symbolizes the bringer of wisdom and is ruled by Uranus the Magician and Saturn the Teacher, Osiris and Ptah.
“Parmuti” means “The Harvest” and is presided over by a harvest goddess, Rennutat; this month corresponds to Pisces, ruled by Neptune and Jupiter, again aspects of Osiris, who was also God of Nourishment. This month is the last one of Spring.
Pachons, the first month of Summer, was originally “Pa Shemat en Hara,” the “Procession of Horus.” This month is Aries and the name refers to the Vernal Equinox, the return of the King. Aries is ruled by Mars, corresponding to Horus, God of the Sunrise. There is probably some connection between the words “Pasch” (Passover) and “Pascua” (Latin for Easter) and Pachons.
Payni was originally “Pen Anat” which may mean the valley of Death, that canyon through which the deceased moved to the next world. The God Khenti, a God of the Next World presided over this month which corresponds to Taurus.
Epipi was originally “Apat-Apat,” probably meaning “Two Paths” or the “Two Houses,” and corresponds to Gemini ruled by Mercury.
The twelfth month corresponded to Cancer, sign of the Summer Solstice, and was named Mesore, originally “Mesut-Ra,” the Birthday of Ra. Horus ruled this month also, and the important festival of hara em Behutet which marked the rule of the Sun god in his supreme glory was held at the high Temple of Horus in Edfu. This month corresponds to the sign Cancer, which was in Egypt a beetle, “Khepera,” another name for Ra. The rulership of the moon for this last month of the year probably is symmetrical with the rulership of the Sun for Thoth, the first month of the year. The moon was the left eye of horus, God of the Sky.
The month of mesore corresponded to the birthday of Ra and the creation of the world. The Birthday of Osiris was the day immediately following Mesore 30. Then came the Birthdays of Horus, Setekh, Isis, Nephthys, and, as the first day of the New Year, Thoth 1 was the Birthday of Thoth. Thus each year tied into the next as another cycle of creation and the recelebration of the beginning of the world.
This is further underscored by the Egyptian division of the year into three seasons. The first beginning with the rise of the Nile was the “Inundation” Aschat or “Exalted appearance.” The second season, corresponding to Spring marked to retreat of the flood and the blossoming of the Earth, and ended with the harvest month Parmuti. The third season, beginning with the Vernal Equinox, was the intensely hot Egyptian Summer. Three is the number of creation and corresponds to the planet Jupiter, Osiris the King, and denotes by its imbalance the principle of
continuous cyclical motion.
The number four, corresponding to the Earth, to the planet Saturn, to the four elements, to the four winds, the four corners of the earth, is a number of stasis, of matter, of bondage. This combination of three with four to produce twelve was later generalized by Claudius Ptolemy, an Egyptian Greek and the greatest astrologer who ever lived when he discovered the tropical zodiac in the Egyptian calendar and assigned each sign to a function and an element. Since Egypt, the Christians have divided the year into four, and emphasized through their four armed cross the principle of stasis, bondage, matter and discipline.
But the Egyptians used a three armed “cross” attached to the circle of spirit in the Ankh, and divided the year into three seasons, thus emphasizing the principle of force, creation, cycle, and Divinity.
In our alignment of this ancient calendar with the modern one, we at C.E.S. insert an additional “Birthday of the gods” in the five “Days out of Time” and thus observe leap years in each year which is a Gregorian leap year.
It is speculated that the Egyptians may have divided each thirty day month into three “weeks” of ten days each. If they did, they probably named the days after the Great Gods as later peoples did:
Ra, Khepera, Isis, Thoth,
Horus, Nephtys, Osiris,
Setekh, Bast, Hathor, Ptah.
This list is conjectural, as no such list has been found. There are many published lists of Egyptian God assignments, to the seripah on the Tree of Life, to the Hours of the Day, to the successive moonrises through the month, to the finger breadths of the royal cubit, and so on. Many of
these lists do not agree with each other. It is not a question of which one is right, but of a basic principle of seeing the gods in every divine cycle, every natural process, of seeing every sequence as an assemblage of Gods. This Immanent Divinity, the basic experience of all old religions, of
Pantheism and Polytheism, requires a change in one’s whole way of thinking, to really get in tune with the ancients who live with the Earth.
EGYPTIAN CALENDAR (HISTORICAL)
Aschat -“Inundation”
July 19 Thuti 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 28 30
August 18 Paopi 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 28 30
September 17 Hethara 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 28 30
October 17 Koiak 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 28 30
Prayet - “Spring”
November 16 Tybi 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 28 30
December 16 Mechir 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 28 30
January 15 Pamenot 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 28 30
February 14 Parmuti 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 28 30
Shemu -“Summer”
March 16* Pachons 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 28 30
April 15* Payni 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 28 30
May 15* Epipi 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 28 30
June 14* Mesore 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 28 30
July 13* Mesore 30
July 14, 15, 16, 17, 18 Intercalary Days
For leap years subtract one from each of these dates.
Copyright July 19, 2010, Church of the Eternal Source
graphics by:
