China's Lunar Calendar 2018 10-23

Click here for the introduction to the Round and Square series "Calendars and Almanacs" 

⇦⇦⇦⇦⇦ From right to left: ⇦⇦⇦⇦
10/29............................................................................................................10/21

This is one in a never-ending series—following the movements of the calendar—in Round and Square perpetuity. It is today's date in the Chinese lunar-solar (or "luni-solar" calendar; I call it the "lunar" calendar in order to distinguish it from the kinds of calendars most Westerners use. It has a basic translation and minimal interpretation. Unless you have been studying calendars (and Chinese culture) for many years, you will likely find yourself asking "what does that mean?" I would caution that "it" doesn't "mean" any one thing. There are clusters of meaning, and they require patience, reflection, careful reading, and, well, a little bit of ethnographic fieldwork. The best place to start is the introduction to "Calendars and Almanacs" on this blog. I teach a semester-long course on this topic and, trust me, it takes a little bit of time to get used to the lunar calendar. Some of the material is readily accessible; some of it is impenetrable, even after many years.

As time goes on, I will link all of the sections to lengthy background essays. This will take a while. In the meantime, take a look, read the introduction, and think about all of the questions that emerge from even a quick look at the calendar. You will likely find that several of the translations seem quite "fanciful" in English. I am simply trying to convey that they also sound fairly fanciful in Chinese.

Section One

Solar Calendar Date
廿
三

二期星

Tenth Month, Twenty-Third Day  
Tuesday, October 23

————

Beneficent Stars 

(top to bottom, right to left)

福時歲
德德德

Generational Exemplarity
Timely Exemplarity
Fortunate Exemplarity

Section Three
Auspicious Hours
(top to bottom, right to left) 
申辰子
吉凶中
酉巳丑
吉吉吉
戌午寅
中凶凶

亥未卯
中中吉

23:00-01:00 In-Between
01:00-03:00 Auspicious
03:00-05:00 Inauspicious
05:00-07:00 Auspicious

07:00-09:00 Inauspicious
9:00-11:00 Auspicious
11:00-13:00 Inauspicious
13:00-15:00 In-Between

15:00-17:00 Auspicious
17:00-19:00 Auspicious
19:00-21:00 In-Between
21:00-23:00 In-Between

 ————

Section Four 
Activities to Avoid  
(top-to-bottom; right to left) 

忌
除置買
服業田

Buying Land
Setting-up Industry
Discarding Clothing

Section Five 
Cosmological Information

十
五
戊
子
火
翌
滿

Fifteenth Day (Ninth Lunar Month)

Cyclical day: wuzi (25/60)

Phase (element): Earth
"Constellation Personality" Cycle: Wings (27/28)
"Day Personality" Cycle: Fullness (3/12)

————

Section Six

Appropriate Activities

and Miscellaneous Information  

(top-to-bottom; right to left)

降霜
二十戌
十九除
二十    
分        
宜

安納祭

牀財祀

結入理

網倉髮

收祭乃豺 

陽復歸

將喪忌

 ————

Frost's Descent
At the beginning of the xu hour; 19:22 o'clock

(the eighteenth of seventy-two fifteen-day solar period on the agricultural calendar)

Appropriate Activities
Venerating Ancestors
Patterning Hair
Grain Payments
Entering Granaries
Positioning Graves
Binding Nets

Wolf Sacrifices Beasts
(the fifty-second of seventy-two five-day solar micro-periods on the agricultural calendar)

Baleful Asterisms

Return Taboo
Repeat Mourning
Yang General

 ————

Section Seven

丫 地

Bifurcation, Earth
 ————

Section Eight 
Miscellaneous Activities

房
碓 牀

Edifice
Pestle, Bed