Articles

Notes on the question on account of time in Central Asia

Vostok/Oriens '2016, №6

 
The paper investigates the calendar and astronomical representations of Kirghiz-Cossacks, Uzbeks, and mountain Tajiks. All these people used the lunar-stellar calendar. This calendar calculates the duration of the month by observing conjunctions of the Moon with the Pleiades. The authors argue that the lunar-stellar calendar has the same precision as the lunar-solar calendar, although both calendars were uncomfortable to agriculturalists because the beginning of the year corresponded to the different dates of the solar calendar. Among all the mentioned peoples, the lunar-stellar calendar worst of all has been preserved in the Pamir Mountains. Therefore it presumably was invented by nomadic pastoralists.

Keywords: Central Asia, the lunar calendar, the lunar-stellar calendar, the Moon, the Pleiades, the Scorpio, Kirghiz-cossacks, Uzbeks, mountain Tajiks

Pages: С. 6–16