When I received the welcome invitation to take part in this tribute to Sir Henry Stuart Jones, I realized, to my great regret, that other pressing obligations would not leave me time to prepare a paper worthy of the occasion. But, as altogether to miss this opportunity of expressing my respect and admiration would have been most distasteful, I have ventured to offer him the notes which follow, slight and modest though they are.
It had long been known that in Egypt under Augustus dates were given, in accordance with age-old custom, by his regnal years; but the papyri have revealed, as I was able to show with the help of two examples in 1895, that side by side with this system there existed another method of dating by the years τῆς Καίσαρος κρατήσεως θεοῦ υἱοῦ, both systems alike reckoning from the Egyptian New Year's day in 30 B.C. ( I Thoth = 29 August).