China's Lunar Calendar 2020 07-17

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

⇦⇦⇦⇦⇦ From right to left: ⇦⇦⇦⇦
7/20............................................................................................................7/12

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

十
七

五期星

Seventh Month, Seventeenth Day 
Friday, July 17
————

Section Two
Beneficent Stars 

(top to bottom, right to left)
月天福
恩倉德

Fortunate Exemplarity
Heavenly Granary
Lunar Kindness

Section Three
Auspicious Hours
(top to bottom, right to left) 
申辰子
中吉中
酉巳丑
凶吉凶
戌午寅
中凶吉
亥未卯

中中凶
23:00-01:00 In-Between

01:00-03:00 Inauspicious
03:00-05:00 Auspicious
05:00-07:00 Inauspicious

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

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

 ————

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

忌
針造合
灸酒醬

Mixing Sauces
Fermenting Beverages
Cauteriziation and Moxibustion

Section Five 
Cosmological Information

廿
七
辛
酉

木
婁
滿

Twenty-Seventh Day (Fifth Lunar Month)

Cyclical day: xinyou (58/60)

Phase (element): Wood
"Constellation Personality" Cycle: Mound (16/28)
"Day Personality" Cycle: Fullness (3/12)

————

Section Six

Appropriate Activities

and Miscellaneous Information  

(top-to-bottom; right to left)
宜

結掃祭
網舎祀
入建嫁
倉屋娶
伐安裁
木門衣
安開理
葬光髮
摯始鷹
血灾債
忌煞不

————

Appropriate Activities

Venerating Ancestors
Marriage Alliances
Cutting-out Clothing
Patterning Hair (Haircuts and Styling)
Sweeping Rooms
Establishing Rooms
Positioning Gates
Consecration Ceremonies
Binding Nets
Entering Granaries
Felling Timber
Positioning Graves

 Hawks Begin to Clutch
（the thirty-third of seventy-two five-day solar micro-periods on the agricultural calendar)

Baleful Astral Influences

Debt Not
Calamitous Balefulness
Blood Taboo

Section Seven
Inauspicious Stars
(the Chinese should be read right to left, 
but the English translation is underneath each character)
丫 山

Bifurcation, Mountain
————

Section Eight
Miscellaneous Items 
(the Chinese should be read top-to-bottom, and right-to-left;
the English translation for is under the bottom characters)

廚
門 灶

Kitchen
Gate, Stove