If the twentieth year of king Artaxerxes began in the spring, Nisan, which is a spring month, could not follow Chisleu, which is a month of late autumn. But Artaxerxes may have dated his accession, and therefore his regnal years, from some month between Nisan and Chisleu; or the civil year may have been reckoned at the court of Shushan as beginning with Tishri. It may be noted that Nehemiah does not define either of these months in terms of the Jewish. Elsewhere, when referring to the Jewish Feast of Tabernacles, he attributes it to the seventh month, in accord with its place in the Mosaic calendar. An alteration of the beginning of the year from the spring to the autumn was brought about amongst the Jews at a later date, and was systematized in the Religious Calendar by the Rabbis of about the fourth century A.D. Tishri begins the Jewish year at the present day; the first day of Tishri being taken as the anniversary of the creation of the world. The Mishna, "The Law of the Lip," was first committed to writing in 191 A.D., and the compilation of the Babylonian Talmud, based on the Mishna, was completed about 500 A.D. In its commentary on the first chapter of Genesis, there is an allusion to the year as beginning in spring, for it says that-- "A king crowned on the twenty-ninth of Adar is considered as having completed the first year of his reign on the first of Nisan" (_i. e._ the next day). "Hence follows (observes some one) that the first of Nisan is the new year's day of kings, and that if one had reigned only one day in a year, it is considered as a whole year."[311:1] It is not indicated whether this rule held good for the kings of Persia, as well as for those of Israel. If so, and this tradition be correct, then we cannot explain Nehemiah's reckoning by supposing that he was counting from the month of the accession of Artaxerxes, and must assume that a civil or court year beginning with Tishri, _i. e._ in the autumn, was the one in question.