From Round to Square (and back)

For The Emperor's Teacher, scroll down (↓) to "Topics." It's the management book that will rock the world (and break the vase, as you will see). Click or paste the following link for a recent profile of the project: http://magazine.beloit.edu/?story_id=240813&issue_id=240610

A new post appears every day at 12:05* (CDT). There's more, though. Take a look at the right-hand side of the page for over four years of material (2,000 posts and growing) from Seinfeld and country music to every single day of the Chinese lunar calendar...translated. Look here ↓ and explore a little. It will take you all the way down the page...from round to square (and back again).
*Occasionally I will leave a long post up for thirty-six hours, and post a shorter entry at noon the next day.

Sunday, January 7, 2024

China's Lunar-Solar Calendar 2024 01-07

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

⇦⇦⇦⇦⇦ From right to left: ⇦⇦⇦⇦
1/10......................................................................................................................................................1/3


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. 

As for interpreting the translation, 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 tha"it" doesn't "mean" any one thing (almost any "it" you will see). 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 calendarSome of the material is readily accessible; some of it is impenetrable, even after many years. And do not assume that people from China understand the traditional calendar particularly well, either. I have encountered confusion and furrowed brows for countless items in the calendar. It can seem "remote," in other words, from the world we live in these days, and yet it is printed anew every single year.

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
                                              (top to bottom, right to left)
Twelfth Month, Seventh Day
Sunday, January 7
————

 Section Two
Beneficent Stars 
(top to bottom, right to left)
解月天
神德德
Heavenly Exemplarity
Lunar Exemplarity
Unleashing Spirits
————

Section Three
Auspicious Hours
(top to bottom, right to left

申辰甲
酉巳丑
中吉
戌午寅
亥未卯
23:00-1:00 Inauspicious
1:00-3:00 Auspicious
3:00-5:00 Auspicious
5:00-7:00 In-Between

7:00-9:00 In-Between
9:00-11:00 In-Between
11:00-13:00 Auspicious
13:00-15:00 Inauspicious

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

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

塔苫結
厠蓋網
Binding Nets
Thatched Coverings
Building Toilets

Section Five 
Cosmological Information
廿
Twenty-Fifth Day (Eleventh Lunar Month)
Cyclical Day: gengwu (7/60)
Phase (element): Earth
"Constellation Personality: Asterism (25/28)
"Day Personality" Cycle: Grasp (6/12)
————

Section Six
Appropriate Activities
and Miscellaneous Information
(top to bottom; left to right)
動嫁祭
土娶祀
上納祈
樑采福
納移會
畜徙友
安理出
葬髮行
不債
陽五水
將虛痕
Appropriate Activities
(top down, starting on the right; two characters each)
Venerating Ancestors
Inquiring-into Fortune
Meeting Friends
Going Out (and about)
Marriage Alliances
Grain Payments
Moving Residences
Patterning Hair
Moving Soil
Raising Beams
Livestock Payments
Positioning Beds

Debt Not

Baleful Asterisms
(top down, starting on the right; two characters each)
Water Scar
Five Voids
Yang General

Section Seven
Inauspicious Stars
(the Chinese is read from right to left; the English, however, "fits" directly below each character)
丫 地
Bifurcation, Earth
————

Section Eight
Miscellaneous Items
(the Chinese is read from right to left; the English,
however, "fits" intuitively in the configuration of characters)
磨 碓
Divination
Mortar, Pestle

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