Clepsydra

 

Entry No. 105 in Sei Shōnagon’s book records in passing the Time Office of the imperial palace in Kyoto, visited on that certain day circa 1000 CE by inquisitive ladies-in-waiting who wish to hear within earshot the unusual sound of the Office’s gong. Time is kept by clepsydrae, as Note 392 explains. This job was one of the functions of the Bureau of Divination in the Ministry of Central Affairs, the Time Office being “staffed by two Doctors of the Clepsydra assisted by twenty Time Watchers.” Clepsydra is the translator’s Greek equivalent for water clock, one of the oldest kinds of clock in the world. During the day, a Time Watcher every two hours would “inscribe” an updated time on a board in the palace courtyard. Note 392 to Entry No. 105 concludes: “During the course of each of the night watches an officer would strum his bowstring to keep away evil spirits; then, after naming himself, he would announce the time in a stentorian voice.” Reading her book, we become strongly aware of how the festivals kept the time for everyone, including new year, as they marked the progress of each year through the changing seasons. Irrigation kept the hours while high days, which were plenteous, kept the months for the majority of the people, who did not have access to a clepsydra. Dew, fog, rain, sleet, and snow mark the passage of time in Sei Shōnagon’s entries, while the sound, sight, taste, touch and movement of water feature in her lists of minor pleasures of life. That said, her attention is not taken by the viscous activities of water, in other words its quickness or slowness as clockwork. Nor does she seem concerned by ice and what happens when a clepsydra freezes in the winter. Perhaps the answer is on our iphone.  Anyone with an iphone may check their World Clock day and night, catch news of festivals worldwide, and be woken by a choice of Boing, Popcorn, or Locomotive. We are not reliant on a Time Watcher to give the stentorian two-hourly update based on the flow of water from one vessel into another vessel. We do though have alternative choices of Raindrops, Ripples, or Waves on our devices, if we so desire. Our iphone may be five minutes ahead of the weather, or five days, with some people quibbling if these predictions are not accurate to within an inch of a hailstorm. Springtime floods brought on by Pacific climate change cause one to wonder if the Earth is not its own clepsydra. Melting of ice caps causes us to ponder measurements in geological time, time spans over which we have no control, where guesswork is useless as seas rise and tip into new ocean basins, evaporating with fierce sun and deluging continents for months on end. Not even a Doctor of the Clepsydra can explain such ends of time, finding perspective and consolation by reading the sutras.