An Etymological Dictionary of Astronomy and Astrophysics
English-French-Persian

A manuscript text in book form which was common before the invention of printing. The codex is the earliest known form of a bound book which replaced the scroll. It was a Roman invention. → Dresden codex.

From L. codex "book," → code.

Nebigân, from nebi / nepi / nevi "book, scripture," from Mid.Pers. nibêg "writing, scripture, book," related to neveštan, → write, + -gân suffix denoting collective nature.

A pre-Colombian Maya manuscript consisting of numerous calendar and astronomical data, probably dating from the 12th century. It seems that it is an updated copy of a document from the period of the old Maya Empire (4th-9th centuries). It contains a table which covers over 32 years, grouping 45 successive → lunations, divided into 69 groups of 5 or 6 lunations. The data are calculated in days and correspond remarkably to the intervals in an eclipse table: each group ends at the probable date of a solar eclipse (M.S.: SDE).

Dresden refers to the Dresden Library where the original document is preserved. It was bought in 1739 by the library director, Johann Christian Götze, who found it in a private library in Vienna. Its earlier history is unknown; codex, from L. codex earlier caudex "book, book of laws," literally "tree-trunk, book (formed originally from wooden tablets);" → codex.