Читать книгу The Myths of Mexico & Peru - Lewis Spence - Страница 38

The Mexican year was a cycle of 365 days, without any intercalary addition or other correction. In course of time it almost lost its seasonal significance because of the omission of the extra hours included in the solar year, and furthermore many of its festivals and occasions were altered by high-priests and rulers to suit their convenience. The Mexican nexiuhilpililztli (binding of years) contained fifty-two years, and ran in two separate cycles—one of fifty-two years of 365 days each, and another of seventy-three groups of 260 days each. The first was of course the solar year, and embraced eighteen periods of twenty days each, called “months” by the old Spanish chroniclers, with five nemontemi (unlucky days) over and above. These days were not intercalated, but were included in the year, and merely overflowed the division of the year into periods of twenty days. The cycle of seventy-three groups of 260 days, subdivided into groups of thirteen days, was called the “birth-cycle.”