China's Lunar Calendar 2020 07-22

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

⇦⇦⇦⇦⇦ From right to left: ⇦⇦⇦⇦
7/24..................................................7/21........Monthly Calendar Information

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
二

三期星

Seventh Month, Twenty-Second Day 
Wednesday July 22
————

Section Two
Beneficent Stars 

(top to bottom, right to left)
天五金歲
恩富匱馬

Generational Equinity
Golden Cupboard
Five Abundances
Heavenly Kindness

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

中中吉
23:00-01:00 Auspicious

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

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

15:00-17:00  Inauspicious
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
祈祭作修
福祀灶廚

Repairing Kitchens
Stove Work
Venerating Ancestors
Inquiring-into Fortune

Section Five 
Cosmological Information

初
二
丙

寅
火
參
危

Second Day (Sixth Lunar Month)

Cyclical day: bingyin (3/60)

Phase (element): Fire
"Constellation Personality" Cycle: Gathering (21/28)
"Day Personality" Cycle: Danger (8/12)

————

Section Six

Appropriate Activities

and Miscellaneous Information  

(top-to-bottom; right to left)
暑大
三十申
十六正
七時   
分     
宜

成開納會
服倉采友
安安移嫁
葬牀徙娶
螢為草腐
俱游刀債
將禍砧不

————

Great Heat
Precisely at the shen hour; 16:37 o'clock
(the twelfth of twenty-four fifteen-day solar periods on the agricultural calendar)

Appropriate Activities

Meeting Friends
Marriage Alliances
Grain Payments
Moving Residences
Opening Granaries
Positioning Beds
Completing Clothing
Positioning Graves

Rotted Weeds Transform Into Fireflies
(the thirty-fourth of seventy-two five-day solar micro-periods on the agricultural calendar)

Baleful Astral Influences

Debt Not
Sword Anvil
Natatorial Disaster
Everything General

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

White
————

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)

爐 灶 廚

Furnace, Stove, Kitchen