The greatest number of references to the sun’s daily journey occur in the _Purgatory_, and we shall quote them in a later chapter. His yearly journey through the zodiac is also very often referred to. When relating his first meeting with Beatrice, Dante names his age, not by simply saying that he was nearly nine years old, but by counting the number of the times that the “heaven of light,” that is, of the sun, had returned to the same point since his birth:— “Nove fiate già, appresso al mio nascimento, era tornato lo cielo della luce quasi ad un medesimo punto, quanto alla sua proprio girazione.”[220] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [220] “Nine times already since my birth had the heaven of light returned to the selfsame point almost, as concerns its own revolution.” _V. N._ ii. 1-4. (_Rossetti_). ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The sun’s “own revolution” is of course its apparent yearly movement, as distinct from the diurnal movement which it shares with all the heavenly bodies. The same thought is expressed in a sonnet: “Io sono stato con Amore insieme Dalla circolazion del Sol mia nona.”[221] We know further that Dante was born in either May or June, because he says, when he finds himself among the stars of Gemini, that the sun was rising and setting in this sign at the time of his birth.[222] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [221] “I have dwelt with Love since my ninth revolution of the sun.” _Son._ xxxvi. 1, 2. [222] See diagram on p. 276. “O gloriose stelle Con voi nasceva e s’ascondeva vosco Quegli ch’è padre d’ogni mortal vita, Quand’ io senti’ da prima l’ aer tosco.”[223] [223] “O glorious stars ... With you was born, and hid himself with you, He who is father of all mortal life, When first I tasted of the Tuscan air.” _Par._ xxii. 112-117. (_Longfellow_). At this date the sun entered the _constellation_ of Gemini on June 1 (Old Style), but was in the _sign_ from May 11 to June 11, and it is always to the signs that Dante refers in the _Divine Comedy_. The anonymous fourteenth century commentator known as “l’Ottimo” interprets this passage as indicating the time “between the middle of May and the middle of June.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Boccaccio tells us that a Mayday feast, given by the father of Beatrice, was the occasion of Dante’s first meeting with her, and also that not long before his death in Ravenna he told a friend that he had completed his fifty-sixth year in the preceding May, so we may conclude that May was the month of his birth.