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CHAPTER II
Appendix

THE ECLIPSES DURING THE REIGN OF EMPEROR HUI

i. During these seven years, two eclipses were recorded. In the
seventh year, the first month, on the day hsin-ch'ou, the first day of the
month, the first of these eclipses is recorded (2: 6a). This date corresponds
to Feb. 21, 188 B.C. HS 27 Cb: 13a adds, "It was 13 degrees
in [the constellation] Wei1"' whose stars were then in R.A. 299°-305°.
The Han-chi (5: 14b) gives the cyclical day as hsin-yu, which was not
the first day of that month. There was no eclipse on that date, for
Oppolzer lists none.

Of the 22 eclipses in the 10 years since the last previously recorded
eclipse in 198 B.C. and the 4 months before the next eclipse, only 4 were
visible in China.[1] In this period five umbral eclipses were visible or
seemingly visible in China: (1) no. 2404, on July 26, 197 B.C., 12 days
before a hsin-ch'ou day, sun in long. 118.8°, visible in north China;
(2) no. 2408, on June 6, 195 B.C., 52 days before such a day, sun in
long. 70.4°; (3) no. 2410, on May 26, 194 B.C., 2 days after such a day,
sun in long. 60.3°; (4) no. 2417, on Sept. 29, 192 B.C., 41 days before
such a day, sun in long. 182.1° = 181.9° R.A.; (5), no. 2420, on Mar. 14,
190 B.C.; the magnitude of this eclipse was calculated and it was found
invisible in China, visible only in western and central Siberia.

The fourth umbral eclipse, that of Sept. 29, 192 B.C., was very likely
the one referred to in the text. This eclipse was not recorded in the SC,
which was Pan Ku's chief source, so that he must have copied it from
some list of eclipses. If that list was partly illegible, it is natural that
Pan Ku or an editor of the list of eclipses might have misplaced this
eclipse, especially as two eclipses coming close together might be understood
to predict the Emperor's death. Thus this eclipse was put about
one eclipse season before the next eclipse. Then the hsin-ch'ou [OMITTED] of
the text is an error for hsin-yu [OMITTED] (a quite natural mistake), and Hoang's

calendar is one day in error. Hsin-yu may indeed have been the original
reading in the HS Annals, for the Han-chi today has that reading,
although hsin-yu was not the first day of the month in which the eclipse
is dated. HS 27 Cb: 16a says that this eclipse was on the same month
and day as that of Feb. 15, 2 B.C., so that ch. 27 certainly read hsin-ch'ou.
Conflation of the day in the Annals with that in ch. 27 probably
came later. If we adopt this assumption, the eclipse happened in
the third year, the ninth month, the first day. The location of the
eclipse in the heavens is however greatly in error.

ii. In the seventh year, the fifth month, on the day ting-mao, a second
eclipse, which is said in the "Annals" to have been total, is recorded
(2: 6a). This date was July 17, 188 B.C., on which Oppolzer calculates
his solar eclipse no. 2425. He charts the path of totality as passing
through Ning-hsia, northern Shensi, a little north of K'ai-feng, and the
present Shanghai. Calculation shows that at Ch'ang-an the eclipse
reached a magnitude of 0.92 (sun's diameter = 1.00), at 3:12 p.m., local
time. Hence the statement of the text in the "Annals" that the eclipse
was total must have been taken from reports of places outside the capital.
HS ch. 27 however says it was "almost total."

HS 27 Cb: 13a adds that the eclipse was "in the beginning of [the
constellation], the Seven Stars," whose stars τ2 and α Hydrae were then
in 114.6° and 114.8° R.A. respectively. The longitude calculated for
the sun is 110.1° = 111.8° R.A.

HS ch. 27 dates the eclipse on the day before the last day of the
month. Hoang's calendar dates it on the last day of the month, whereas
Chavannes' calendar (T'oung pao, VII, p. 25, cf. also p. 520) is a day
in error in the other direction.