month in commemoration of the exodus (Exod. xii, 2); Zif, the second month (1 Kings vi, I, 37); Bui, the eighth (1 Kings vi, 38) ; and Ethanim, the seventh (1 Kings viii, 2) — the three latter being noticed only in connection with the building and dedication of the Tem- ple, so that we might almost infer that their use was re- stricted to the official documents of the day, and that they never attained the popular use which the later - names had. Hence it is not difficult to account for their having been superseded. In the second place we have the names which prevailed subsequently to the Baby- lonian captivity ; of these the following seven appear in the Bible : Nisan, the first, in which the Passover was held (Neh. ii, 1 ; Esth. iii, 7) ; Sivan, the third (Esth. viii, 9 ; Bar. i, 8) ; Elul, the sixth (Neh. vi, 15 ; 1 Mace. xiv, 27) ; Chisleu, the ninth (Neh. i, 1 ; Zech. vii, 1 ; 1 Mace, i, 54) ; Tebeth, the tenth (Esth. ii, 16) ; Sebat, the eleventh (Zech. i, 7 ; 1 Mace, xvi, 14) ; and Adar, the twelfth (Esth. iii, 7 ; viii, 12 ; 2 Mace, xv, 36). The names of the remaining five occur in the Talmud and other works; they were lyar, the second (Targum, 2 Chron. xxx, 2) ; Tammuz, the fourth (Mishna, Taan. iv, 5) ; Ab, the fifth, and Tisri, the seventh {liosh Hash, i, 3) ; and Marchesvan, the eighth (Taan. i, 3 ; Jose- phus, .4 nf. i, 3, 3). The name of the intercalary month was Veadar, i. e. the additional Adar, because placed in the calendar after Adar and before Nisan. The opin- ion of Ideler {Chronol. i, 539) that the first Adar was regarded as the intercalary month, because the feast of Purim was held in Veadar in the intercalary year, has little foundation.
The first of these series of names is of Hebrew origin, and has reference to the characteristics of the seasons — a circumstance which clearly shows that the months returned at the same period of the year; in other words, that the Jewish year was a solar one. Thus Abib (3'^3S<) was the month of" ears of corn," Zif the month of "blossom" (It or T^T, or, more fully, as in the Tar- gum, N'^lllJS I'^T, "the bloom of flowers;" another ex- planation is given in Eawlinson's Herodotus, i, 622 ; viz. that Ziv is the same as the Assyrian Giv, "bull," and answers to the zodiacal sign of Taurus), and Bui the month of "rain" (b^3; the name occurs in a recently discovered Phoenician inscription [Ewald, Jahrb. 1856, p. 135]. A cognate term, ^^13^, is used for the "del- uge" [Gen. vi, 17, etc.] ; but there is no ground for the inference drawn bj' Von Bohlen \_rntrod. to Gen. ii, 156] that there is any allusion to the month Bui). With regard to Ethanim there may be some doubt, as the usual explanation, " the month of violent or, rather, in- cessant rain," is decidedly inappropriate to the seventh month. Thenius, on 1 Kings viii, 2, suggests that the true name was D'^SrS, as in the Sept. 'A^aviji, and that its meaning was the " month of gifts," i. e. of fruit, from nin, " to give." There is the same peculiarity m this as in Abib, viz. the addition of the definite article (D'^iri'^Xil). In the second series, both the origin and the meaning of the terms are controverted. It was the opinion of the Talmudists that the names were intro- duced by the Jews who returned from the Babylonian captivity (Jerusalem Talmud, Bosh Hush, i, 1), and they are certainly used exclusively by writers of the post-Babylonian period (see Benfey and Stern, Monats- namen einiger alter Volker, Berlin, 1836). It was there- fore perhaps natural to seek for their origin in the Per- sian language, and this was done some years since by Benfey (3fonafsnamen) in a manner more ingenious than satisfactory. The view, though accepted to a cer- tain extent by Gesenius in his Thesaurus, has since been abandoned, both on philological grounds and because it meets with no confirmation from the monumental docu- ments of ancient Persia. The names of the months, as read on the Behistun inscriptions, Garmapada, Buga- yadish, Atriyata, etc., bear no resemblance to the He-
MONTH
548
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brew names (Rawlinson's Herodotus, ii, 593-6). The | portions of two of the latter. It must therefore be un- names are probably borrowed from the Syrians, in whose ] derstood that the following remarks apply to the gen- regular calendar we find names answering to Tisri, Se- , eral identity on an average of years. As the Jews still bat, Adar, Nisan, lyar, Tamrauz, Ab, and Elul (Ideler, retain the names Nisan, etc., it may appear at first sight Chronvl. i, 430). The names of the Syrian months ap- needless to do more than refer the reader to a modern near to have been in many instances of local use: Ur almanac, and this would have been the case if it were instance, the calendar of Heliopolis contains the names , not evident that the modern Nisan does not correspond of Ag and Gelon (Ideler, i, 440), which do not appear in to the ancient one.— Smith. We are indebted to J. D. the 'regular Svrian calendar, while that of Palmyra, ] Michaclis for discovering the true state of this case, again, contains names unknown to either. Chisleu and after tlic rabbinical writers had so universally estab- lY'betli ajjpear on the Palmyrene inscriptions (Gesenius, j lished an erroneous opinion that it has not even yet dis- T/iM'/'c. J). 702, 543). The resemblance in sound be- ! appeared from our popular books. His dissertation, tweon Tebeth and the Egyptian Tobi, as well as its j "De Mensibus Hebraeorum" (in his Coinmentatioms per correspondence in the order of the months, was noticed wmus 17G3-G8 ohlaioi [Bremen, 17G9], p. IG; translated by Jerome {ad Ezel: xxxix, 1). Sivan may be bor- [ by W. Bowyer, Lond. 1773; also in the Crilica Biblica rowed from the Assyrians, who appear to have had a [London, 1827], iii, 324-340), proceeds on the following montli so named, sacred to Sin or the moon (Rawlinson, chief arguments: First, that if the first moiitli Ixgaii with i, C15). Marchesvan, coinciding as it did with the J the new moon of J/(;>c//, as was commonly asserted, the rainy season in Palestine, was probably a purely He- climate of Palestine would not in that month iicrniit the brew term. Yon Bohlen connects it with the root rd- | oblation of the sheaf of barley, which is ordered on the