LuniSolar Calendar
The Chinese CalendarFirst, let's get the basics of calendars right! Gregorian Calendar or Solar Calendar - 阳历 「Yáng Lì 」This is the calendar we see on our computer. The dates are arranged in accordance to the movement of the Earth around the Sun. Each solar year is 365 days and is divided into 12 months, with 30 or 31 days each, with the exception of February. Every 4 years, there is a leap year whereby February gets 29 days instead of 28. The calendar system currently in use by the United States and much of the world is the Gregorian calendar. This calendar, based upon the length of the Earth's revolution around the Sun (and hence called a solar calendar) was instituted in October 15th, 1582 AD by Pope Gregory XIII as a reform to the previously used Julian calendar. Under the Gregorian calendar, a solar year is divided up into 12 months of 30 or 31 days (with February having 28 or 29 depending on if the year is a leap year). This gives a year of 365 or 366 days. However, the true period of the Earth's revolution around the sun (measured from vernal equinox to vernal equinox) is 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes and 46 seconds. Over time this discrepancy would cause the official calendar to be out of sync with various celestial events such as the equinoxes and solstices. To rectify this, a series of leap years were added into the calendar. On a leap year an extra day is added to the end of February, February 29th. According to the Gregorian calendar, leap years occur in every year divisible by 4, execept those that are divisible by 100 but not 400. So 1900 was not a leap year, but the year 1996 was a leap year and 2000 will be. These leap years keep the calendar in sync with the solar year to an accuracy of about 1 day in 2500 years. Before the Gregorian calendar, the Julian calendar had been in use since it was instituted by Julius Ceasar around 45 BC. The principal difference between the Julian and Gregorian calendars is the frequency of leap years. Under the Julian system, every fourth year is a leap year. This causes an error of about 1 day every 128 years. When the Gregorian calendar was begun in 1582, this error had accumulated to 10 days. Hence, the last day of the Julian calendar, October 4th, 1582 AD, was followed the next day by the first day of the Gregorian calendar, October 15th, to rectify this error. Of course, it is possible to extrapolate the Julian calendar forward and the Gregorian calendar backward, to find a correspondence for days on either calendar, as the above converter does. The Julian period is sequence of days starting at day 0 on January 1st, 4713 BC of the Julian calendar. Each day after this can be associated with a unique Julian day. This system is useful in astronomy and provides a useful starting point for conversion amongst different calendar systems. The Julian day for December 31st, 1996 is 2450449. Be careful not to confuse the Julian period with the Julian calendar. Lunar calendar - 阴历 「Yīn Lì 」Known as the traditional Chinese Calendar, it is based on the moon's orbit around the Earth. The new moon day is the 1st day of a lunar month. The length of a lunar month is the length between two new moon days which is 29 or 30 days. The traditional Chinese agricultural calendar is primarily lunar, in that the lunar cycle (a lunation) between new moons is a principal part of the calendar. This cycle averages 29.53 days, but can vary by several hours for any given time of the year. A Chinese year normally consists of 12 months where a month corresponds to one lunar cycle. Each month starts on the day of the new moon. Since the cycle is not an even number of days, a month in the lunar calendar can vary between 29 and 30 days and a normal year can be 353, 354, or 355 days. Lunisolar calendar - 阴阳历 「Yīn Yáng Lì 」This is a combination of the Lunar and Solar calendars. It indicates both the moon phase and the time of the solar year and is used to track seasonal changes. There is a 13th month, or intercalary month 閏月 「Rùn Yuè 」 in every 3 years. The Chinese agricultural calendar is also partially solar though because 7 times in a 19 year cycle, an extra leap month (Rùn Yuè) is be added to the year to bring it back into line with the longer solar year. To explain the basis for determining when leap months are added, one must first understand the Chinese system of solar terms. 24 dates, made up of 12 principal terms and 12 sectional terms, divide the solar year into 24 periods that are based on the earth's position around the sun. These include the equinoxes and the solstices. According to the Chinese calendar, the winter solstice must occur in month 11 of the year. A lunar month in which a principal term does not occur becomes a leap (or intercalary) month and is assigned the number of the month that preceded it but is designated as a leap. If this happens to occur twice in one year, only the first month in which it occurs in a leap month. The Chinese new year itself starts on the second new moon after the winter solstice. Chinese years, months, and days are also assigned a name based upon the Chinese system of the heavenly stems and earthly branches. In this cyclical system, each year, month, and day is associated with one of the 10 heavenly stems and 12 earthly branches. Each successive time period will have a new stem and branch, until going through the stems 6 times and the branches 5 times, to give 60 unique combinations. In the case of years and dates, this gives a continuous cycle for thousands of years. This is similar for months, but in the case of a leap month, it is assigned its previous month's branch/stem combination with the leap designation added. This is why the combination is so easily calculated for years and days, but requires tables or complicated astronomical calculations to find months. Farmers' Calendar 农历 「Nóng Lì 」The Farmers' Calendar 农历 「Nóng Lì 」 or originally called 夏历 「Xià Lì 」 (which means Summer Calendar) is a Lunisolar Calendar and is used in 《 紫微斗数 》. The calendar divides the year into 24 节气 Jie Qi for agriculture (which was the principal economy of the country). It is not normally used in day-to-day activities, but more for dating of holidays and Chinese Astrology. It was based on a "19 年 7 闰 法" which means, in every 19 years, 7 of the years have 13 months (the extra month is 闰月 「Rùn Yuè 」), and the years which have 13 months are called 闰年 「Rùn Nián 」. The first month of the year is called 正月 「Zheng Yue 」. The rest of the months are simply numbered as second, third, fourth, etc etc. The numbering of the months varied with different dynasties. 夏 Xia Dynasty sets 寅 「Yin 」 as the 1st month whereas it was 丑 「Chou 」 during the 商 Shang Dynasty, 子 「Zi 」 during the 周 Zhou Dynasty and 亥 「Hai 」 during the 秦 Qin Dynasty. It was however reverted back to 寅 「Yin 」 as the 1st month during the 汉 Han Dynasty and remained so till today. ![]() The Intercalary Month 闰月 「Rùn Yuè 」In China there are two sets of calendars, one solar and the other one lunar = two different calendars. The solar calendar is longer, consisting of more days, than the lunar. Therefore, in order to avoid the lunar calendar lagging behind, an intercalary month is added every two or three years to keep the two calendars in sync. When a lunar month does not contain a Qi of the 24 solar 节气 Jie Qi, it becomes a leap month. The use of the intercalary month furthermore ensures that the Solstices and Equinoxes always fall in the same months in both the solar and the lunar calendars: the Spring Equinox in the 2nd (卯), the Summer Solstice in the 5th (午), the Autumn Equinox in the 8th (酉), and the Winter Solstice in the 11th (子). 紫微斗数 uses the lunar calendar, and when calculating a horoscope for someone born during a leap month, the intercalary month is divided in two, the first half belonging to the preceding month, and the second half to the succeeding one. Though this is one of those things in astrology where not everyone sticks to the same rule and chooses to do things differently. But I'll go with the cut the month in half formula. Example: in the year 1968 there was an extra 7th month appended, including 24th August - 21st September. A person born 27th August (first half of the intercalary month) would have been born on the 4th day of the 7th month (same as July 28th). But if the person were born September 18th (second half), that would have meant being born on the 26th day of the 8th month (same as October 17th). The Chinese Time Concept 时辰 「 Shí Chén 」A day has 12 时辰 「 Shí Chén 」 and begins at 2300 hours or 11 pm. Each Shi Chen is 2 hours and is named after each of the 12 Earthly Branches. The hour of 午 「 Wu 」 is midday from 11 am to 12 pm, which is why till today, midday is called 中午 in chinese. Ancients also made use of sundials to track time which were arranged in this manner: It is not hard to guess the hours each branch corresponds to since the dial looks pretty much like our modern clocks, except now, we are looking at a 24-hour clock face. Directional traits are also factored into the interpretion of charts.
![]() You will discover the uses of Branch-directions if you tour around in China. For example, the southern gate of the Imperial Palace in Beijing is called Wu Men 午門, corresponding to the branch which represented the direction of South. To summarise,
Sundial TimePlease be sure to note that Chinese astrology makes use of sundial time, i.e. what the time would have been using a sundial. Whether you're doing 紫微斗数 (the lunar calendar), or BaZi (the solar calendar), a birth time recorded by a standard hand watch, for example, will have to be converted into true solar time. In order to obtain sundial time you have to take into account the following:
Example: Steve Jobs, February 24th 1955, 19:15 (standard time) (Rodden Rating: AA); San Francisco, CA, 37N46, 122W25.
From this you can see that even though Steve Jobs' birth certificate says 19:15, he was not born in the 11th hour, but, due to corrections with respect to the true solar time, in the 10th. He has 命宫 (Mìng Gōng) in 午 (Wǔ) within which are 廉貞 (Lián Zhēn) and 天相 (Tiān Xiàng). Lunisolar Calendar OriginsJyotisha 1: An introduction to Jyotisha Shastra and the other Vedangas in Vedic timesJyotisha 2: Calculation of the Solar day or Ahoratram of the Hindu calendarJyotisha 3: Calculation of the Lunar day or Tithis of the Hindu calendarJyotisha 4: Unique Hindu Luni-solar calendar, Months, Years and the reason for the Adhika MasaJyotisha 5: What are Uttarayana, Dakshinayana and Rtus? What is the significance traditionally?Jyotisha 6: Uttarayana or Makara Shankranthi. Winter Solstice and Wobble of Earth.Busting the myth of Muhurta - Introduction. Are we blindly following an oudated custom? Myth or ScienceANCIENT INDIAN Secrets - Distant Galaxies & Apocalyptic Stories - Raj VedamLunar Eclipse as well as Hindu Observances for the period.
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