Calendars of ancient people
As a result of archaeological research conducted in various parts of the globe, it was established that ancient people used for calendar calculations such unremarkable objects as pieces of mammoth tusks, bones, stones, various ornaments or simple clay vessels. We confine ourselves here to just a few examples.
So, in Ukraine, near the village of Gontsi, an elephant fang is found, on which a notch is marked with a jeweler's precision. By their number, it can be established that we are talking about fixing the change in the phases of the moon for four months. The sample age is 12-17 thousand years.
Even more interesting are bracelets from the tusk of a mammoth found in the Mezin paleolithic site near the Mizun river. The gums near Chernigov. One of them consists of five plates adjoining one another, on which groups of identical short parallel straight dashes are arranged in the form of a pattern, and the direction of the dashes in each group changes by 90 °.Of the 24 surviving groups, 17 contain 14 dashes, 3 - 13 and 4 - 15. In total, five plates have about twice the number of days( in fact, days and nights) in ten lunar months - about 280 days.
But the ornaments on clay vessels for water, made in the II-IV centuries.n.e.and found during excavations in Ukraine, contain quite definite information about the alternation of agricultural work and the most important holidays of ancient people. So, in the ancient sanctuary found in the village of Lepesovka in Volhynia, fragments of large clay bowls were found. The corolla of one of them, making a full circle, is divided into 12 parts, each of them has an almost rectangular pattern, apparently, these are symbols of the calendar months. In particular, the images of oblique crosses are repeated three times in the figure. According to BA Rybakov( USSR), they can be compared with the terms of the solar holidays of the ancient pagans - December 25, March 25, and June 24.The other drawings depict: an agricultural implement( a plow), ears of wheat and plaited weeds. The first of these may correspond to April, the second to August, and the third to October. It is assumed that such a cup could serve as a vessel for New Year's divination about the harvest.
More symbolic symbols on the pit of the IV century, found in the village of Romashki, Kiev region. In this case, the drawings are made with two horizontal belts. The upper one consistently shows: 1) wavy vertical streams resembling rain, 2) the sign of the tree, 3) the crosses are symbols of fire and the sun, 4) the wheel with six spokes is a symbol of lightning, the sign of the god Perun, and 5) the image of two sickles and sheaves. Below are two rows of squares( altogether there are 96), interrupted by signs of wood, crosses and wheels. According to BA Rybakov, each of the squares is a sign of a separate day, the breaks are the dates of the ancient Slavonic holidays in honor of the Sun God and the fertility of Yarila, the deity of the plant force of Kupala and Perun the Thunderer. According to BA Rybakov, the count of days here began on May 2 and ended on August 7 and covered the most important interval in the annual agrotechnical cycle - from the rise of spring crops to the end of the harvest. It will be quite plausible that the people who used these drawings for their calendar calculations knew and used the solar calendar. ..
It would be appropriate to recall the so-called runic calendars that appeared in Scandinavia and neighboring countries somewhere in the XIV century.and used before the XIX century."Runes" were special signs for the designation of sounds, days of the week, etc. Runic calendars were of the most diverse form - in the form of a hexagonal length of about one meter of staff or a wooden hexagonal sword, a wooden book( fig.), Etc. On the sameThe figure shows one of the variants of the day and moon runes.
Fig. Calendar ornament on a pitcher( IV century AD)
The meaning of these signs is obvious. The seven day runes, which are repeated cyclically throughout the 365-day year, are the letters of letters that were mentioned above. The lunar runes placed next to them( there are only 19 of them by the number of years and the metonic cycle!) Indicate the day of the new moon and the specific year of the 19-year lunar cycle( these are the same golden numbers)."The binding of the calendar to the specific numbers of the months of the Julian calendar was carried out with the help of additional signs, which denoted church holidays. Different types of runic calendars are described in detail in the works of LE Maistrov.
These are just a few examples we tried to illustrate, however, the obvious fact that ancient people satisfied their need for accounting for time in a variety of ways. Interested in literature on folk calendars made of wood and bone, we suggest that you turn to the book: Butkevich AV and Zelikson MS Eternal Calendars. - Moscow: Nauka, 1984.