Note 20 — Chapter II

The Japanese date by the years of the reign of the Dairi, or Mikado (of whom more hereafter), and they also, for ordinary purposes, employ the Chinese device of nengō. These are periods, or eras, of arbitrary length, from one year to many, appointed at the pleasure of the reigning Dairi, named by him, and lasting till the establishment of a new nengō. For convenience, every new nengō, and also every new reign, begins chronologically with the new year, the old nengō and old reign being protracted to the end of the year in which it closes. [See Notes G and H in Appendix.—Edr.]

The Japanese month is alternately twenty-nine and thirty days, of which every year has twelve, with a repetition of one of the months, in seven years out of every nineteen, so as to bring this reckoning by lunar months into correspondency with the course of the earth round the sun; this method being based on a knowledge of the correspondency of two hundred and thirty-five lunations with nineteen solar years. According to Titsingh, every thirty-third month is repeated, so as to make up the necessary number of intercalary months, the number of days in these intercalary months being fixed by the almanacs issued at Miyako. The commencement of the Japanese year is generally in February. The months are divided into two distinct portions, of fifteen days, each having a distinct name, and the first day of each of which serves as a Sunday, or holiday. This regulation of the Japanese calendar is borrowed from the Chinese, as also the use of the period of sixty years corresponding to our century. [See also paper on “Japanese Calendars,” in vol. xxx of the Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Japan.—Edr.]