Chinese Lunar Calendar

Chinese Lunar Calendar

发表日期：

2003

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1

月

21

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There are two basic sources for calendars presently in use:

the monthly motion of the

Moon (Lunar Calendar) and the yearly motion of the Sun (Solar Calendars).

The difficulty

with the Lunar calendar is that the seasons correlate with the Sun, not the Moon.

Thus,

Lunar calendars require elaborate adjustments or translations to relate to the

seasons.

The fact that calendars correlate with seasons is now primarily a matter of

convenience, but in more ancient cultures, keeping track of the seasons was serious

business: it could be a matter of survival to know things like the proper time to plant to

ensure a bountiful harvest.

The Chinese Lunar New Year

is the longest chronological record in the history, dating

from 2600 B.C., when Emperor Huang Ti introduced the first cycle of the zodiac(

黄

道

).

Like the Western calendar, the Chinese Lunar Calendar is a yearly one, but with the

start of the lunar year based on the cycles of the moon.

Because of this cyclical dating,

the beginning of the year can fall anywhere between late January and the middle

February.

A Chinese calendar consists of both the Gregorian(

罗马教皇的

) and a lunar-solar

cylindrical systems, with the latter dividing a year into twelve months, and each month in

turn being equally divided into thirty-nine and a half days. The well-coordinated dual

system calendar reflects Chinese ingenuity.

Even with the two cylindrical systems, the Chinese calendar will not be complete without a

twenty-four solar terms closely related to the changes of Nature -- a very useful tool for

farmers, providing information on the proper time for planting and harvesting.

The Twenty-Four Terms(

二十四节气

)

The first fifteen days of the Chinese lunar month makes the first term, namely:

Beginning of Spring(

立春

)

usually starts from the fourth or fifth of February. The first day is the Chinese New

Year or the onset of the Spring Festival. Incidentally, New Year's Day of 2000 is

February 5th.