Others again consider that the whole cycle is a metamorphosis which, beginning in the Heterocotylea as a direct development, has become complicated in the Holostomidae by a larval history, and finally in the Malacocotylea has acquired additional complexity by the intercalation of two larval forms, and is thus spread over several generations.
The Greeks of Alexandria formerly employed the era of Nabonassar, with a year of 365 days; but soon after the reformation of the calendar of Julius Caesar, they adopted, like other Roman provincials, the Julian intercalation.
The Egyptian intercalary year, however, does not correspond to the Julian leap year, but is the year immediately preceding; and the intercalation takes place at the end of the year, or on the 29th of August.
Before the end of that year the Julian intercalation takes place, and the beginning of the following Egyptian year is restored to the 29th of August.
Hence to reduce a date according to this era to our own reckoning, it is necessary, for common years, to add 283 years and 240 days; but if the date belongs to the first three months of the year following the intercalation, or, which is the same thing, if in the third year of the Julian cycle it falls between the 30th of August and the end of the year, we must add 283 years and 241 days.
