seventy-three moons

The seventy-three moons constitute a fixed temporal threshold in the legal code of Lilliput, representing roughly five and a half years by European reckoning. This period is the central requirement of the Lilliputian reward system, a distinctive institution that sets the empire apart from the legal practices Gulliver knew in Europe. Under this system, any person who can bring sufficient proof that he has strictly observed the laws of his country for seventy-three moons acquires a claim to certain privileges according to his quality and condition of life, together with a proportionable sum of money from a fund appropriated for that use. He likewise receives the title of snillpall, or legal, which is added to his name but does not descend to his posterity.

The Reward System and Its Rationale

The seventy-three moons requirement is embedded in a broader legal philosophy that Gulliver found remarkable. He observed that although reward and punishment are usually called the two hinges upon which all government turns, he could never see this maxim put into practice by any nation except that of Lilliput. When he told the Lilliputians that English laws were enforced only by penalties without any mention of reward, they thought it a prodigious defect of policy. This philosophy is reflected in the very image of Justice in their courts of judicature, which is formed with six eyes—two before, as many behind, and on each side one, to signify circumspection—with a bag of gold open in her right hand and a sword sheathed in her left, to show she was more disposed to reward than to punish.

Contrast with Other Lilliputian Laws

The seventy-three moons standard stands in notable contrast to other Lilliputian legal provisions that rely on severe punishment rather than positive incentive. Crimes against the state are punished with the utmost severity, but if the person accused makes his innocence plainly appear upon his trial, the accuser is immediately put to an ignominious death, and the innocent person is quadruply recompensed for his losses, danger, imprisonment, and legal costs. Fraud is looked upon as a greater crime than theft and seldom fails to be punished with death, on the grounds that honesty has no fence against superior cunning. Ingratitude is a capital crime, for whoever makes ill returns to his benefactor must be a common enemy to the rest of mankind. The seventy-three moons reward system, by contrast, offers a path to honor and material benefit through sustained lawful conduct, a mechanism Gulliver presents as a more enlightened approach to governance.

Thematic Significance

The seventy-three moons period functions as a satirical device through which Swift contrasts Lilliputian legal idealism with the corrupt practices that have since overtaken the original institutions. Gulliver is careful to note that he means the original institutions, not the most scandalous corruptions into which these people have fallen by the degenerate nature of man. The infamous practice of acquiring great employments by dancing on the ropes, or badges of favor by leaping over sticks and creeping under them, were first introduced by the grandfather of the reigning emperor and grew to their present height by the gradual increase of party and faction. The seventy-three moons requirement thus represents a lost ideal of civic virtue, a legal mechanism designed to reward genuine merit and lawfulness, standing in implicit judgment against both the Lilliputian court's subsequent degeneracy and the European systems that lacked any such provision.