[edit] Practical uses -- Seasoned Greetings

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Date Posted: Monday, December 06, 06:30:21pm
Author: The Chinese calendar remains culturally essential today.
Subject:

[edit] Practical uses
In reply to: A personal appeal from 's message, "255¡ã ´óÑ© d¨¤xu¨§ December 7 major snow season of snowstorms in full swing" on Monday, December 06, 06:25:20pm

[edit] Practical uses
The original practical relevance of the lunisolar calendar for date marking has largely disappeared. First, the Gregorian calendar is much easier to compute and more in line with international standards. Its adoption for official purposes has meant that the traditional calendar is rarely used for date marking. This, in turn, means that it is more convenient to remember significant events such as birth dates by the Gregorian rather than the Chinese calendar.

Second, the 24 solar terms were important to farmers who would not be able to plan agricultural activities without foreknowledge of these terms. However, the 24 solar terms (including the solstices and equinoxes) are more predictable on the Gregorian calendar than the lunisolar calendar since they are based on the solar cycle. It is easier for the average Chinese farmer to organize their planting and harvesting with the Gregorian calendar.

However, one practical advantage of using a calendar where the months are lunar months is that the phases of the moon, and astronomical and tidal phenomena associated with them, such as spring and neap tides, fall on approximately the same day in each lunar month, and the times of high and low water and the tidal streams experienced in a certain location on a certain day of the lunar month are likely to be similar to those for the same place and lunar day in any month. For many years, therefore, mariners in East and South-East Asia have related their tidal observations to the Chinese calendar, so as to be able to provide quick, rule-of-thumb approximations of tides and tidal conditions from memory, based on the day of the Lunar month, without needing to refer to tide tables. Certain inshore passages on the China coast, for example, where there are strong tidal streams associated with spring tides, were regarded by mariners to be passable on certain days of the lunar month, and impassable on others.

[edit] Cultural issues
The Chinese calendar remains culturally essential today. For example, most of the traditional festivals, such as Chinese New Year and the Mid-Autumn Festival, occur on new moons or full moons. The traditional Chinese calendar, as an element of traditional culture, has much cultural and nationalistic sentiment invested in it.

The calendar is still used in the more traditional Chinese households around the world to pick 'auspicious dates' for important events such as weddings, funerals, and business deals. A special calendar is used for this purpose, called Huang Li (traditional Chinese: 皇曆; simplified Chinese: 皇历; pinyin: huánglì), literally "Imperial Calendar", which contains auspicious activities, times, and directions for each day. The calendar follows the Gregorian dates but has the corresponding Chinese dates. Every date would have a comprehensive listing of astrological measurements and fortune elements.

[edit] Influence
Other traditional East Asian calendars are very similar to if not identical to the Chinese calendar: the Korean calendar is identical; the Vietnamese calendar substitutes the cat for the rabbit in the Chinese zodiac; the Tibetan calendar differs slightly in animal names, and the traditional Japanese calendar uses a different method of calculation, resulting in disagreements between the calendars in some years. The Thai lunar calendar also share a lot of similarities with the Chinese calendar.

The twelve year cycle, with the animal names translated into the vernacular, was adopted by the Göktürks (its use there is first attested 584), and spread subsequently among many if not most Turkic peoples, as well as the Mongols. A similar calendar seems to have been used by the Bulgars, as attested in the Nominalia of the Bulgarian Khans and in some other documents. The main differences between the Bulgar and the Chinese calendar are the different calculating system, the tiger has been replaced with a wolf, and the dragon and monkey—with an unknown animal. Also, the Bulgar calendar is a solar one.[8]

[edit] Chinese-Uighur calendar
In 1258, when both North China and the Islamic world were part of the Mongol Empire, Hulagu Khan established an observatory in Maragheh for the astronomer Nasir al-Din al-Tusi at which a few Chinese astronomers were present, resulting in the Chinese-Uighur calendar that al-Tusi describes in his Zij-i Ilkhani.[9] The twelve year cycle, including Turkish/Mongolian translations of the animal names (known as sanawat-e turki سنوات ترکی,) remained in use for chronology, historiography, and bureaucratic purposes in the Persian and Turkish speaking world from Asia Minor to India and Mongolia throughout the Medieval and Early Modern periods. In Iran it remained common in agricultural records and tax assessments until a 1925 law deprecated its use.

[edit] See also
Culture of China
East Asian age reckoning
Sexagesimal cycle
Chinese calendar and history
[edit] References
1.^ Calendars, Time, & Numerology - Egyptian Roots & Mathematical Precision of Our Modern Calendar
2.^ Deng, Yingke. (2005). Ancient Chinese Inventions. Translated by Wang Pingxing. Beijing: China Intercontinental Press (五洲传播出版社). ISBN 7-5085-0837-8. Page 67.
3.^ F. Richard Stephenson and Liu Baolin, "A brief contemporary history of the Chinese calendar" (unpublished paper, 1990)
4.^ Helmer Aslaksen, The mathematics of the Chinese calendar pages 18 & 28.
5.^ The Mathematics of the Chinese Calendar
6.^ The following link provides conversion of Chinese calendar dates to Western calendar dates: [1]
7.^ The Mid-Autumn Festival is called the Lantern Festival in Singapore and Malaysia, the same name given to another festival on month 1 day 15 in the Chinese homeland.
8.^ Перипетиите на календара, проф. Никола Николов
9.^ Benno van Dalen, E.S. Kennedy, Mustafa K. Saiyid, "The Chinese-Uighur Calendar in Tusi's Zij-i Ilkhani", Zeitschrift für Geschichte der Arabisch-Islamischen Wissenschaften 11 (1997) 111–151.
[edit] External links
[edit] Calendars
Chinese Calendar (many years)
Chinese months
Chinese day with auspicious times
Gregorian-Lunar calendar years (1900–2100)
Make your own Chinese calendar (since 1645)
[edit] Calendar conversion
Chinese Lunar calendar with Chinese Festivals (1901 - 2049)
Western-Chinese calendar converter (since 1912)
Ten thousand year calendar converter (1924–2024)
[edit] Rules
Rules for the Chinese Calendar
The Structure of the Chinese Calendar
[edit] Miscellaneous
The 24 Solar Terms of Jieqi
Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches
Zodiac animal signs and dates of birth
Vietnamese Stems-Branches
Baby Gender
Calendar Cycles: Chinese Stem-Branch
[show]v • d • eCalendars (list)

Wide use Astronomical · Chinese · Gregorian · Hijri · Solar Hijri · ISO
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