When the Light was separated from the Darkness¹, the King of the Sun wrote to the King of the Moon:
I shall guard the Day, and thou will guard the Night².
But the King of the Moon answered:
Not so, for I am not the the sovereign of the Night, which is ruled by the Queen of the Shadows. My troopers are riders of swift horses galloping more than dozen times faster than your battalions can march. So I shall guard the Evening for one week, and then I shall help to the Queen of the Shadows to guard her Night for another week, and then my troops shall guard the Morning for another week, and then they shall help thee to guard thy Day for the last week.
And it was so. The troops of the Moon passed through the Evening, and through the Night, and through the Morning, and were approaching the camp of the battalions of the Sun. But the King of the Sun was displeased with this, and he feared that they could try to seize his throne. So he summoned his scouts and said to them:
Go and see if the army of the Moon is less numerous than our and thus whether we can stop them by our powers.
And his scouts went, and they came back, and they said:
Our army has three battalions, which is 36 troops, and the Moon army has 37 troops, thus one troop more than we have. But they pass around our camp in the distance of five daymarches³.
And the Moon army passed around the camp in peace, but the King of the Sun nevertheless commanded his craftsmen that more weapons shall be wrought, and he summoned more warriors.
And the troops of the Moon again passed through the Evening, and through the Night, and through the Morning, and were again approaching the camp of the battalions of the Sun. And the King of the Sun again sent his scouts, and they went, and they came back, and they said:
Our army has now five battalions, which is 60 troops, and the Moon army has 62 troops, thus two troops more than we have. And they will pass around our camp in lesser distance than last time.
And the Moon army again passed around the camp in peace, and the King of the Sun again commanded his craftsmen that still more weapons shall be wrought, and he summoned still more warriors.
And the troops of the Moon again passed through the Evening, and through the Night, and through the Morning, and were again approaching the camp of the battalions of the Sun. And the King of the Sun again sent his scouts, and they went, and they came back, and they said:
Our army has now whole two regiments, which is eight battalions, which is 96 troops, and the Moon army has 99 troops, thus 3 troops more than we have. And this time they are aiming directly to our camp⁴.
And the King of the Sun said:
Alas, so they are more numerous than us.
But one of the scouts, who saw the troops of the Moon more closely than the others, said:
It is not so, their and our powers are nearly equal.
Our squads consists of three fireteams and one decurion commanding them, that is together ten warriors; but their squads consists only of two fireteams and one septurion commanding them, that is together only seven warriors.
And our troops consists of three squads, that is 30 warriors; but their troops consists of four squads and one commander, that is only 29 warriors.
And the King of the Sun awaited in the front of his regiments the arrival of the Moon troops, and then addressed their leader:
Be welcome, King of the Moon, if thou art coming in peace.
But when the leader of the Moon troops lifted the visor and took off the helmet, the King of the Sun beheld in astonishment a beautiful woman.
And she said:
Doest thou not know that my brother is commanding our troops fifteen nights while I am resting, and then he rests and I take over the command for fifteen days?
And the King of the Sun knelt before the Queen of the Moon and said to her:
Graceful lady, will thou marry me?
And the Queen of the Moon answered:
I do like thee, but would we get married and settle down, who would then guard the Day?
And just then a winged dragon landed there⁵ and said to them:
Twice a year I or my sibling shall come here and shall guard the Day, and in such times ye may put away your weapons and in safety enjoy each other.
And it is so since yon times that whenever in a place guarded by a dragon the King of the Sun meets the Lady of the Moon, and also whenever in such place the Lord of the Moon meets the Queen of the Shadows, they cease their work of shining, disappear from the sky, and in privacy devote themselves to their matrimonial matters.
Each squad of the Sun consists of three fireteams
and one decurion, that is together ten warriors.
And each troop of the Sun consists of three squads, that is together 30 warriors.
And each squadron of the Sun consists of three troops and one captain, that is together 91 warriors.
And each battalion of the Sun consists of four squadrons and one commander, that is together 365 warriors.
And each regiment of the Sun consists of four battalions and one colonel, that is together 1461 warriors.
And each brigade of the Sun consists of two regiments, that is together 2922 warriors.
And the legion of the Sun consists of two brigades, that is together 5844 warriors.
The squads of the Moon consist of two fireteams
and one septurion, that is together seven warriors.
And the troops of the Moon consist of four squads and one commander, that is together 29 warriors.
And the squadrons of the Moon consist of two troops and one captain, that is together 59 warriors.
And the battalions of the Moon consist of four squadrons, that is together 236 warriors.
And the regiments of the Moon consist of four battalions with one colonel⁶, that is together 945 warriors.
And the brigades of the Moon consist of three regiments with one headquarter squadron, that is together 2894 warriors.
And the legion of the Moon consists of two brigades with one headquarter squadron, that is together 5847 warriors.
So the legion of the Moon has 3 more warriors
than the legion of the Sun.
(1) Gen.1:
4. And God saw the light that it was good; and God separated the light from the darkness.
(2) Gen.1:
14. And God said again, Be the lights in the heavenly sky, that it may divide day by night, and be a sign and measure of times, days, and years.
16. And God made two great lights, a greater light to hold the rule over the day, and a smaller light to keep the control over the night; also stars.
(3) The Sun passes through 360 degrees of ecliptic per year,
slightly more than one degree per day.
The orbit of the Moon is inclined by about 5 degrees to the ecliptic,
thus, in a mythical concept, five daily marches.
(4)
The story tells of the Moon's three approaches to the Sun
not only because the triple repetition is a traditional epic element,
and not only because it describes three variations of the lunisolar calendar,
but also because after a quarter of a year
the passages in five-degree distances
alternate with the close passages in the proximity of lunar path nodes.
(5)
The lunar path nodes were referred to as two dragons
or as dragon head and dragon tail.
The origin of these designations was the idea
that during an eclipse the moon or the sun are bitten by a dragon.
However, in the Bothflench culture, dragons are perceived as benevolent beings,
and eclipses were not seen as a crisis
in which is needed by a noise to scare away a dangerous intruder,
but as an opportunity to celebrate.
(6)
The lunar calendar periodically alternating months of 30 and 29 days
is one day ahead the actual cycle of approximately 29.5306 days,
in 1 / (29.5306 - 29.5) = 32.68… months.
By inserting a leap day every 32 months,
the average month length increases to 29½ + 1/32 = 29.53125 days.
Such a calendar will be one day behind the actual cycle
in 1 / (29.53125 - 29.5306) × 29.53125 / 365.25 = 124.39… years.
This is almost the same time in which the Julian Calendar
lags behind against the actual solar cycle, 1 / (365,25 - 365,2422) = 128,2… years.
If we skip a surplus day from the solar and lunar calendar every 128 days,
we would get an average length of calendar year of 365¼ - 1/128 = 365,2421875 days;
and an average calendar month of 29½ + 1/32 - 1 / (128 × 365,25 / (29½ + 1/32)) = 29,5306… day.
From a practical point of view, however,
it is preferable to let the four-year solar cycle and the 32-month lunar cycle
run freely without further corrections
and to shift the seasonal holidays one day earlier every 128 years.
(On the contrary, the sidereal feasts move one day later once every 160 years,
so the seasonal holidays together divide with the sidereal ones
9 days in 5 × 128 = 4 * 160 = 640 years.
This implies an approximate precession period of 640/9 × 360 = 25600 years.)
The story gives a mythical description of three variations of the lunisolar calendar:
Comparison of the structure of the year with the structure of the army:
| level | unit | men | days | period | years |
| 0 | soldires | 1=3×0+1 | 1=3×0+1 | days0 | years |
| 1 | fireteam | 3=3×1 | 3=3×1 | ||
| 2 | squad | 10=3×3+1 | 10=3×3+1 | ||
| 3 | platoon/troop | 30=3×10 | 30=3×10 | month | |
| 4 | company/squadron | 100=3×30+10 | 91=3×30+1 | season | ¼ |
| 5 | battalion | 300=3×100 | 365=3×91+1 | year | 1 |
| 6 | regiment | 1000=3×300+100 | 1481=4×365+1 | quadriennium | 4 |
| 7 | brigade | 3000=3×1000 | 2922=2×1481 | octoennium | 8 |
| 8 | division | 10000=3×3000+1000 | 8766=3×2922 | generation | 24 |
| 9 | corps | 30000=3×10000 | 43830=5×8766 | life | 120 |
Comparison of solar and lunar calendar:
| jednotka | standardní | sluneční | měsíční | měsiců |
| voják | 1=3×0+1 | 1=3×0+1 | 1=3×0+1 | |
| tým | 3=3×1 | 3=3×1 | 3=3×1 | |
| družstvo | 10=3×3+1 | 10=3×3+1 | 7=2×3+1 | ¼ |
| četa | 30=3×10 | 30=3×10 | 29=4×7+1 | 1 |
| rota | 100=3×30+10 | 91=3×30+1 | 59=2×29+1 | 2 |
| prapor | 300=3×100 | 365=3×91+1 | 236=4×59 | 8 |
| pluk | 1000=3×300+100 | 1481=4×365+1 | 945=236×4+1 | 32 |
| brigáda | 3000=3×1000 | 2922=2×1481 | 2894=3×945+59 | 98=3*32+2 |
| legie | 6000=2×3000 | 5844=2×2922 | 5847=2×2894+59 | 198=2*98+2 |