The History and Development of Ganzhi Calendar

The year, month, date and time when the main branch appeared in China are different. In ancient times, when people used branches to mark days or months, they might only use branches or branches at the beginning. In the future, the main branches will be used together.

The trunk calendar is the longest calendar in today's history. Since its establishment, it has been used in the ancient Xia Dynasty in China. There are many records of branches and branches used to record the days in Oracle Bone Inscriptions of Yin Ruins. However, due to the lack of materials, we can't completely connect the dates of the trunks and branches of the Shang Dynasty. Later, the trunk and branches of auspicious days were determined according to the time of the solar eclipse recorded in the ancient historical classic Spring and Autumn Annals, that is, from February 4th, the third year of Lu Yingong in Spring and Autumn Annals (720 BC) to the present.

Then, in the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, December of the lunar calendar was adopted. Later, in the Book of Rites, Historical Records, Huai Nan Zi Shi Ze Xun and other ancient books, it was recorded: "Spring builds Chen, summer builds in the afternoon, autumn builds, and winter builds Haizi ugly moon."

However, the overtime system of the twelfth birthday was adopted at the latest in the Western Han Dynasty. From the end of the Western Han Dynasty to the present, we have been using dry branches to record the years. After the Tang Dynasty, the names of the calendars of the Five Dynasties (that is, the Yellow Calendar) began to be marked with branches. In the Northern Song Dynasty, the ten branches and twelve mornings were combined to mark the time. So far, all the calendars are marked with dry branches, and the dry branch calendars are becoming more and more complete.

Take the Northern Song Dynasty unearthed in Dunhuang as an example. The starting point of each month is not the new moon in the calendar, but the solar terms of each month. Therefore, February is defined as the day before awakening (February Festival) to Tomb-Sweeping Day (March Festival) and so on. There is a custom in Dunhuang that the solar term is the beginning of each month, or it has a long history. Because of this, we can see from the existing calendar of Han bamboo slips that the new moon is not the starting point of each month.

The 29th chapter of Jin Ping Mei Hua thorn in Wanli period of Ming Dynasty: The immortal said, "Please look at your creation first, then your face, and respect your face." Ximen Qing said in these eight big characters: "Tiger is 29 years old and was born on July 28th." The immortal secretly pinched his finger to find the pattern, and said for a long time, "Your official name is Bing Yinnian, Xin Youyue, Noon Day, and Bing Zishi. July 23rd is the White Dew, which has been handed over to August for fortune telling ..... and the palace has ordered a visit to Ma, but I will see it in July. " It can be seen that dry calendars were used in folk and book writing at that time.

See also the ninety-fifth chapter of A Dream of Red Mansions written by Cao Xueqin during the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty: "beginning of spring on December 18th of Jiayin Year, and Yinyue Year on December 19th of Yuan Chunnian", which clearly points out the transition point of the calendar year.

Records of the Qing Dynasty is a compilation of chronological historical materials compiled by the Qing government. All books adopt the calendar year of the official branch, and the calendar year of the official branch takes beginning of spring as the dividing point: Zhonghua Book Company photocopied Volume 17 of The Qing Shi Lu, Volume 9 of The Shi Lu of Gan Long, page 573, beginning of spring, 2007122 February (Geng Xu), and The Shi Lu was recorded as "Geng Xu. This is the beginning of last spring. " Book 28 of Records of the Qing Dynasty, Book 1 of Records of Renzongrui (Jiaqing), page 1044, beginning of spring, December 21st, Jiaqing five years, recorded: "Keith. The New Year is the beginning of spring. " Records of the Qing Dynasty (Volume 31) Records of Ren Zongrui (Jiaqing) (Volume 4), page 408, beginning of spring, December 23rd, 16th year of Jiaqing (Ding Mao), recorded as Ding Mao. The spring of Ren Shennian has arrived. There are too many examples to enumerate.

Unfortunately, in ancient times, the number of days in the calendar was mostly coordinated with the calendar time, and its role in the calendar was not well understood. In fact, the chronological system of China calendar is a unique solar calendar system in China. Since 2000, the chronology of China cadres and branches and the chronology (such as the current lunar calendar) have cooperated with each other to form their own systems. It should be fully noted that there is no direct correspondence between the dry calendar and the law of the moon's profit and loss. The dry calendar directly corresponds to the four seasons, which is no stranger to academic circles. Just because the lunar calendar has been used since the Zhou Dynasty, there are few very clear discussions on the beginning and middle of each month in the December calendar in the twelfth century. Although scholars are quite clear about this, there are also cases that ignore the essential differences between the twelve calendars and the current lunar calendar.

1989, the comparison table of Gregorian calendar and lunar calendar compiled by Beijing Observatory of Chinese Academy of Sciences (now the headquarters of National Astronomical Observatory of Chinese Academy of Sciences) was published, which clearly showed three sets of calendars: Gregorian calendar, lunar calendar and trunk calendar. It takes the Gregorian calendar as the main line, the dry calendar as the secondary focus, and the lunar calendar corresponds to it one by one. As can be seen from the comparison table, the official calendar is expressed as follows: (Take the 19th year of 1893/ Guangxu as an example) Jiayin in the first month, Mao Yi in February and Chen Bing in March ...! The "first month, February, March" here is by no means the month of the lunar calendar, but only as a number sequence. The months of the lunar calendar are also marked in this way. However, the lunar calendar is characterized by a leap moon, and the trunk calendar absolutely does not exist. So every year when we look through the whole book, the months of the calendar are all expressed like that, only 12 months, and there is no repetition. The second feature of the comparison table is that the correspondence between the trunk calendar and the Gregorian calendar is relatively stable, because both belong to the Gregorian calendar. (But the definition of calendar in this book is not rigorous, which is easy to cause misunderstanding. )

In 2008, China Ancient Calendar, a national key book publishing planning project in the 11th Five-Year Plan, was published. In the preface, the book clearly expounds the definition and development history of the calendar, and expresses deep regret that China finally used the Gregorian calendar.

The National Time Service Center of Chinese Academy of Sciences is the time authority in China. Since the early 1970s, it has officially undertaken the broadcasting task of China's standard time and frequency, and provided reliable and high-precision time service for many industries and departments such as aerospace technology, surveying and mapping, earthquake, transportation, communication, meteorology and geology. Risuo perpetual calendar is a perpetual calendar provided by the national time service center for free use in the whole network. There is a calendar showing the trunk calendar on the sundial calendar, which takes beginning of spring as the dividing line of the year.

Nowadays, especially with the wide application of computer, Internet and cloud technology, the calculation and popularization of calendars is no longer a problem. Purple Mountain Observatory is not the only institution in China that can compile almanac. Some ethnic minorities can also compile their own unique almanac. Therefore, most online calendars provide complete and standard calendars. For example, Baidu can display the "perpetual calendar", PC platform's daily perpetual calendar and other software, auspicious day, mobile phone application's one-code perpetual calendar and so on (some can accurately display the time). However, some perpetual calendars and yellow calendars are not strictly marked with official calendars. For example, the calendar year and month are only marked generally or wrongly (marked on the first day of the lunar month), which is extremely misleading. However, most lunar calendars simply mark the date and approximate date (on the cover or the first page), which is a very strict method of calendar discipline, and it is quite troublesome to try to infer the date and month. This has created obstacles to the healthy development of the calendar.

Since ancient times, the Ganzhi calendar has been widely recognized by the government and people. It has been applied to astronomy, geomantic omen, numerology, choice and traditional Chinese medicine, and recorded in the official almanac of past dynasties (namely the Yellow Calendar). As an important part of China traditional culture, Ganzhili should be reasonably protected.