[tied] Re: Why borrow 'seven'? (was: IE right & 10)

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, enlil@... wrote:

>
> Loreto:
> > And of course the seventh day as another layer of renewal? After
> > three of three days? That was maybe before we named the seven

days in

> > accordance with the sun, moon and the five planets.
>
> I think everybody now is going off focus.

Well maybe. But that is the tendency. Everybody is trying to prove
and/or disprove something.

Back to the neolithic,

> we see the first agriculturalists. If hunter-gatherers didn't have
> use for calendars or astronomy (which may be debated against, btw),
> farmers most certainly did. It's inevitable that astronomers will
> observe the repetition of the lunar cycle. The lunar cycle is

nothing

> other than the revolution of the moon around the earth. It's also
> inevitable that they will find that the only whole numbers that
> will divide the month up the best are 7 and 4. Whether we think

that

> four-day weeks or seven-day weeks are the oldest is, I think, moot.

Actually it probably is that the oldest calendars have several-
numbered days in a week. Four and seven are not the favourites.
http://members.tripod.com/~INUG/Kala.htm
http://www.balix.com/calendar/
http://www.xentana.com/java/calendar.htm
http://webexhibits.org/calendars/calendar-mayan.html
http://www.crystalinks.com/incan3.html

And the most probable thing is that the efficiency of the seven-day
week was attested after several milleniums of experimentations and
perhaps tribal struggles (i.e Semitic, IE etc.)
Therefore the development of 'seven' could have been later than the
others say "four".

> The point is that these two numerals in some way figured into the
> division of the monthes in ancient cultures. How could it not? You

do

> the math.
>
>
> = gLeN

First the lunar cycles. Then the solar cycles (the seasons in each
geographical settings). Solar cycles synthesized with the lunar
produces either 12 or 13 moons in a year. The moons have four
cycles. If you talk of the fourth in relation to the calendars and
as a taboo word the choices are that the fourth is the dying phase.
Or as I speculated on the importance of the number of days/nights in
a new/(no) moon (3 to 4). But rightly also.. each one has some other
issues to consider before each reason could be attested.
How could it not? The maths are not that complex and the people can
invent and disseminate. See the above calendars.

Loreto