Note 332 — Chapter XLIX · FROM THE BEGINNING OE THE SECOND YEAR DOWN TO THE END OF THE THIRD YEAR OF THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR.

Thucyd. ii, 78. καὶ ἐπειδὴ πᾶν ἐξείργαστο περὶ Ἀρκτούρου ἐπιτολάς, etc. at the period of the year when the star Arcturus rises immediately before sunrise,—that is, sometime between the 12th and 17th of September: see Göller’s note on the passage. Thucydidês does not often give any fixed marks to discriminate the various periods of the year, as we find it here done. The Greek months were all lunar months, or nominally so: the names of months, as well as the practice of intercalation to rectify the calendar, varied from city to city; so that if Thucydidês had specified the day of the Attic month Boêdromion (instead of specifying the rising of Arcturus) on which this work was finished, many of his readers would not have distinctly understood him. Hippokratês also, in indications of time for medical purposes, employs the appearance of Arcturus and other stars.