Calendars and festivals

II The Celestial Calendar

A The Content and Form of the Celestial Calendar

The Celestial Calendar consists of a year of three hundred and sixty-six days without the use of intercalation; a single month (first, third, fifth, seventh, ninth, and eleventh) is large on the 31st day of the year, and a double month (second, fourth, sixth, eighth, tenth, and twelfth) is small on the 30th day of the year. Each month has one section and one qi. The festival is the first day of the month. Starting from the first day of the first month, the big month on the 16th (spring, Mingming, Mangchang, Autumn, cold dew, six sections of snow), the small month on the 15th (hibernation, summer, small summer, white dew, winter, six sections of small cold); qi for the middle of the month, the big month from the 17th (rain, rain, summer solstice, the first summer heat, frost, winter solstice, six qi), the small month from the 16th (the spring equinox, the fullness of a small, great summer, the autumnal equinox, snow, six qi of the cold), the club fifteen days The small month begins on the sixteenth day (spring equinox, small fullness, big summer, autumn equinox, small snow, big cold), all fifteen days. I hereby list the new calendar of the third year of the new calendar volume end of the fifth king to offer the calendar of this chapter and the royal seal of the King of Heaven and the calendar of the first month, in order to see the content and form of the heavenly calendar:

Front deputy military division of the South King Feng

Wo Nai Shi redemption of the sick Lord Yang

Left auxiliary of the positive military division of the East King

Right and the positive military division of the West King Su

Rear protection and deputy military division of the North King Wei

Cum the main left general of the army The left army general, the king of the wings, Shi

Preaches out to my

Lord, my brother, the king of heaven, long live ten thousand years for the rule of the calendar: today

The heavenly father, the emperor of the Lord, opened a great grace, sent my

Lord to descend to earth as a world of peace, it is really

Peaceful heaven, even and complete, without some deficiencies also. Therefore, the ministers and so on to create the calendar to three hundred and sixty-six days for a year, a single month 31st, 30th bi-monthly, spring, Qingming, Mangyao, Autumn, Cold Dew, Daxue are sixteen days, the rest of the fifteen days. My heavenly kingdom of heaven forever rivers and mountains for ten thousand years, there is no poor fly, is the heavenly father on the Lord emperor sent me

The Lord descended to the will of the mortal also.

The rest of the previous books, all the evil sayings, all demonic trickery, trap the world, I delete all of them.

Covering the year, month, day and hour are all

The Heavenly Father scheduled, the year is auspicious and good, month is auspicious and good, day and hour is also always auspicious and good, there is no good or bad, there is no need to choose. All

People who can sincerely honor

The Heavenly Father and the Emperor, with the care of Heaven, will always act with great fortune and prosperity. Now that the calendar has been completed, I would like to dedicate it to our Lord. I would like to dedicate this calendar to our Lord, who is long live, long live, and long live.

Royal approval.

The new calendar was created for the first three years of the Decalogue to be promulgated to the world.

Beginning of the first month to build the A Yin cattle host

First non Yin cattle spring

First two Kui Rong female

First three A Chen virtual worship

First four B Si dangerous

First five C Wu room

First six D Wei Bibi

First seven W Shen Kui

First eight Heiyou Lou

First nine G Xu stomach

First ten Xin Kai Pleiades

First ten Xin Kai Pleiades

First ten Xin Kai Pleiades

First ten Xin Kai Pleiades

This is a new calendar.

The tenth Xin Kai Pleiades worship

The eleventh Non Zi Bi

The twelfth Dec Hao Cui

The thirteenth A Yin Sen

The fourteenth B Rong Jing

The fifteenth C Chen Kui

The sixteenth D Si Liou

The seventeenth W Wu Xing Yu Shuai worship

The eighteenth He Wei Zhang

The nineteenth Geng Shen Yi

XX Xin You Square

21 Nixu Angle

22 Dec Kai Kang

23 A Zi Ji

24 B Good Room Worship

25 C Yin Heart

26 Ding Rong Tail

27 W Chen Ji

28 F Si Dou

29 G Wu Niu

XXX Xinwei female

XXI Nonshen virtual worship

Dedication of the CalendarThis chapter gives a brief description of the rationale for making the calendar and the revolution of the old calendar. It is followed by the calendar, which is organized from the first month of the year to the twelfth month of the year, one month after the other. Its content is very simple: the numbers and the stems and branches are the order of the days. The twenty-eight constellations are for worship. Lichun is the first "festival" of the year, which falls on the first day of the first month of the year, so the word "Lichun" is written under the first day of the first month of the year. Rain is the first "gas" of the year, and the distance between the first spring and the rain is sixteen days, so the word "rain" is also noted under the seventeenth day of the first month. The day when the twenty-eight constellations are lined up in the room, the void, the star, and the Pleiades is a day of worship. On the third day of the first month of the lunar year, when the twenty-eight constellations are lined up to the Void, the tenth day of the first month to the Pleiades, the seventeenth day of the seventeenth month to the Star, and the twenty-fourth day of the twenty-fourth month to the Room, it is the day of worship. The "nonnyin" and "kuirong" are stem and branch, and the stem and branch calendar has been in use since the Yin Dynasty, and has been continuous and one day is not bad, so the Celestial Calendar has preserved it. As for the old calendar, all the superstitious ideas of good and bad luck, birth and death, etc. were deleted. The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom also changed "丑" to "好" because it sounded close to "丑", "亥" to "開" because it sounded close to "冇", and "卯" to "冇" because it sounded close to "没", and "冇" in the dialect of Guangzhou, which means "no", and "荣". Yang Xiuqing, the king of the East, replied to the British's thirty-one and questioned the British's fiftieth enjoinment, saying, "The names in the stems and branches have been changed because they sound indecent". And because the word "Ghost" was a taboo word for the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, the word "Ghost" in the twenty-eight constellations was changed to "Kui"; to avoid the taboo of Yang Xiuqing, the Eastern King, the Ching Ming Festival was written as the Ching Ming Festival. This is a different place in the celestial calendar with different words. To nine years after the jiwei, and ordered the historians to make the order of the month, the annual festival, grass sprouting are recorded, attached to the next year of the same month calendar, for farmers to cultivate reference, such as Xin You 11 years after the calendar of the month of April attached to the month of April Geng Shen ten years sprouting order of the month:

Lixia a southern ground warming, fell two to make the cereal seed, fall sweet potato seedling, planting paste [high] beam corn.

The second summer of white beans, the north is cold, but also to this day began to fall grain seeds.

Lixia eight honeysuckle blossoms, peony blossoms.

Lixia nine kinds of green and blue. The first ten seeds of jute were planted in the summer.

Rising summer fourteen rains.

Small fullness of a cold northern ground began to insert the field. The Basic Laws of the B-day

The celestial calendar is a solar calendar that sets the time of the year in terms of the seasons, and can be called the calendar of the four seasons. The seasons are called Setsubuns because they are organized into twenty-four seasons on an even basis according to the changes in climate during the year.

The Earth orbits the Sun at a tilt of 23 1/2 degrees around the Sun's annual orbit according to the ecliptic, so there are differences in the length of the day and night and the altitude of the Sun in a year, which gives rise to the four seasons of spring, summer, fall, and winter. The day with the longest day and the highest sun at noon is called the "summer solstice"; the day with the shortest day and the lowest sun at noon is called the "winter solstice"; and the two days sandwiched in the middle, where day and night are equally divided, are called the "spring equinox" and the "fall equinox".

The week of the ecliptic is 360 degrees, so the spring equinox, summer solstice, fall equinox, and winter solstice each occupy ninety degrees on the ecliptic: the spring equinox is zero degrees on the ecliptic, the summer solstice is ninety degrees on the ecliptic, the fall equinox is 180 degrees on the ecliptic, and the winter solstice is two hundred and seventy degrees on the ecliptic. In each of these four seasons of ninety degrees, each evenly divided into six seasons, each interval of fifteen degrees of the yellow meridian, each year then *** there are twenty-four seasons.

The twenty-four solar terms are indicative of the position that the Earth reaches as it travels in its orbit, which is the position of the Sun on the ecliptic. The time when the sun is at the vernal equinox, that is, when the sun is at a degree of ecliptic longitude equal to zero is called the vernal equinox. From the vernal equinox, every fifteen degrees of the ecliptic is a festival, the order is called Qingming, rain, summer, small full, mango, summer solstice, small summer, summer, autumn, summer, white dew, autumn equinox, cold dew, frost, winter, snow, snow, winter solstice, small cold, cold, spring, rain, hibernation.

The twenty-four solar terms are further divided into two types: "Setsubun" and "Mid-universal"; the ancients regarded every thirty degrees of yellow longitude from the Little Cold as a Setsubun; and every thirty degrees of yellow longitude from the Winter Solstice as a Mid-universal. There are twelve solar terms and twelve zhongqi in a year. Each month has one festival and one mid-qi. The festival qi is scheduled at the beginning of the month, and the mid-qi is scheduled at the middle of the month.

The main purpose of the solar terms is to indicate changes in climate. The most important factors of climate are "temperature" and "rainfall"; rain, dew, frost, and snow, also known as "precipitation", are all included in the broader term "rainfall". Analyzing the twenty-four solar terms, we can see the relationship between them and the climate.

(1) Regarding the changes of the four seasons, there are spring, spring equinox, summer, summer solstice, autumn, fall equinox, winter, winter solstice, and *** eight solar terms. The spring and fall equinoxes are the two solar terms that indicate the equal division of day and night. The summer solstice and winter solstice are the two solar terms that indicate the arrival of hot summer and cold winter. Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter are the four solar terms that indicate the beginning of each of the four seasons: Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter.

(2) Regarding temperature, there are five solar terms, namely, Xiaohe (小暑), Dahe (大暑), Shihe (处暑), Xiaohan (小寒), and Dahan (大寒).

(3) Regarding rainfall (precipitation), there are seven solar terms: rain, grain rain, white dew, cold dew, frost, light snow, and heavy snow***.

(4) Others about farming are the four solar terms of hibernation, ching-ming, xiaoman, mango-seed, ***.

Temperature and rainfall, which are the main factors of climate, and the change of seasons, also belong to climate. Therefore, the festival is mainly based on the climate change of the sun in the ecliptic evenly divided into twenty-four equal positions, so that agriculture with the advent of each festival, they will do a certain amount of agricultural work. It is for the service of agriculture.

The twenty-four solar terms are the great creations and inventions of our ancient working people in astronomy and meteorology. Among them are the summer solstice and the winter solstice, known as the "two solstices", and the spring equinox and the fall equinox, known as the "two equinoxes". In Western Europe, there are also these four festivals, but they have no other festivals except these four. Only our motherland is one of the ancient civilized countries in the world, with a history of nearly 5,000 years, and it is a country with the most developed agriculture. Our ancestors were the most capable of grasping the climate, which is the most relevant to agricultural affairs. They studied the calendar and according to the changes in climate, they divided the year evenly into twenty-four seasons, in addition to the two to two minutes, more detailed and more precise than Western Europe and the countries with twenty more seasons.

Far away from more than four thousand years ago, China's ancient working people knew the method of using the appearance of the stars and constellations at dusk to determine the four seasons of the year. The book classic Yao Dian said: "The star bird in the sun, to Yin Zhongchun. ...... The star and fire in the daytime are used to determine the mid-summer. ...... The star in the middle of the night is the Void, which is Yin in mid-autumn. ...... day short star Pleiades, in order to correct the mid-winter". This is to determine the four seasons according to the Bird, Fire, Void, and Pleiades. These four star constellations were used as the middle stars in the twilight of mid-spring, mid-summer, mid-autumn and mid-winter. By the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, China already had the four seasons of the second solstice and the second equinox. Mencius Li Lou chapter said: "The sky is high, the stars are far away, if you seek the reason, the day of a thousand years to the day, you can sit down and also to". Ancient people called the winter solstice and summer solstice called "day to", winter solstice called "day short to", summer solstice called "day long to". From what Mencius said, we can see that during the Spring and Autumn period and the Warring States period, due to the method of measuring the sun's shadow by using the "earth-gui", the length of the solar year was already determined with certainty, and the dates of the winter solstice and the summer solstice were decided.

The four seasons of the year are in the middle of each season. Since there were four solar terms, due to the changes of the seasons and the needs of agricultural production, the remaining twenty solar terms were also established in the early years of the Western Han Dynasty [1]. By this time, the twenty-four solar terms, which could indicate climate change and provide a schedule for farming, were all complete.

The twenty-four solar terms occupy an important position in China's calendar, and are especially important for agricultural production. For more than two thousand years, our farmers plowing, sowing, harvesting, are in accordance with the festival, they are based on the festival to determine the season, the agricultural activities will have a basis for the use of observation of the sky again.

China since ancient times, the exercise of the summer calendar. The summer calendar to the moon around the earth as a week in January, the length of the calendar year does not match the return year, so the date of the summer calendar and climate change is not a fixed relationship, so in agricultural production is very inconvenient, so the summer calendar is set up both intercalary month, so that the average length of the calendar year is equal to the return year, and in the arrangement of the year, month, and then set up the twenty-four festivals to make up for the date of the date and climate change does not match the defects.

The summer calendar year is more than eleven days shorter than the solar calendar year, so the same festival in the summer calendar is moved back about eleven days each year compared with the previous year. The length of a leap month in the summer calendar is three hundred and eighty-four days, nineteen days longer than the solar year. After encountering the leap month, the festival of that year will be about twenty days earlier than the previous year. In this way, the difference between the same festival in different years of the summer calendar can be up to one month. Therefore, the 24 solar terms made up for the discrepancy between the dates of the summer calendar and the climate change, but they also highlighted the major shortcoming of the summer calendar, which was that the four seasons were out of place and the years were out of sync with each other.

It was said above that the solar terms are in accordance with the ecliptic of the Earth around the sun, which is evenly divided into 24 parts and arranged into 24 solar terms, that is, in accordance with the 360 degrees of the circumference of the heavens, which is evenly divided into 24 parts, and is listed as a solar term every 15 degrees on the ecliptic. The earth around the sun is a solar calendar year, according to the orbit of a year, the average arrangement of the twenty-four festivals, so the festivals are fully in line with the solar calendar. While the dates of the summer calendar have no fixed relationship with climate change, the twenty-four solar terms summarize the climate change of the four seasons of the year, and farmers have been engaged in agricultural production according to the solar terms for generations. "So, why not abolish the summer calendar? "Why don't we simply use the solar terms to determine the time of the year? After generations of practice, the ancient working people of China asked questions and made demands.

This question and request was answered by Shen Kuo, an outstanding scientist of the Northern Song Dynasty. He pointed out that the summer calendar, "the air and the beginning of the year, years of confusion, the four times out of position, counting is complicated and obscene," the major shortcomings. Recognized that "where accumulation of months as time, four times to become years, yin and yang birth and death of the festival of change, are the main gas" calendar theory. Therefore, he suggested, "For the art of counting, it would be better to use the twelve qi for a year, not to mention the twelve months. Directly to the day of spring for the first day of spring, hibernation for the first day of mid-spring. The big end of the 31st day, the small end of the 30th day, the years are all over, no intercalary balance. December is often a big one and a small one in between, even if there are two small ones together, but once a year". As for the moon has nothing to do with the seasons of summer and winter, as long as the calendar indicates "solstice" and "hope" for reference. He cited the spring and mid-spring of the first year of the Song dynasty (1086) as an example: "In the spring of the first year of the first year of the second year, the moon is small, with one day of nonnyin, three days of hope, and the 19th day of the solstice. Midsummer big, a day of non Shen, three days hope, eighteen days of the first day of the solstice". Shen Kuo divided the year into four seasons: spring, summer, autumn and winter. Each season was divided into three parts, namely, Meng, Zhong, and Ji, **** twelve parts. Each part contains two solar terms, one of which is the first and one of which is the middle. For example, Lichun is the first day of Mengchun, and rain resides in Mengchun; Hibiscus is the first day of Midsummer, and equinox resides in Midsummer. He used the qi to set the time of the year, not the solstice to set the time of the year, so he said, "I don't even need December," but he still borrowed the name of the month, twelve months a year, the big month is 31st, the small month is 30th, the size of the month, and there is no leap month. He thought that with this calendar, "the four seasons of the gas is always correct, the years of the government does not take away", "simple and level, in line with the heavenly fortune", and the four seasons and seasons are completely consistent, but also neat, easy to memorize, easy to calculate the [a].

Shen Kuo this a set the year with the festival of the calendar proposal, really is the abolition of the summer calendar and replace it with the solar calendar, no matter from the astronomy, meteorology, customs, habits of that aspect, are more reasonable than the summer calendar and much more convenient. However, in the feudal era, everything had to respect the sacred and ancient laws, and it would be a deviation from the scriptures if the ancient laws were lightly discussed. At that time, the general public thought that since emperor yao exercised the summer calendar, more than three thousand years, who can change the ancient law! Therefore, Shen Kuo's proposal only get "strange angry attack" result, and of course there is no possibility of implementation.

Shen Kuo proposed this new calendar seven hundred and sixty-five years after the Jintian revolt, anti-feudal spearhead on the cultural front first pointed to the summer calendar. The following year, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom issued the same new calendar, the Heavenly Calendar. The Tianli calendar adopted the seasons as the basic law of the calendar system, dividing the year into four seasons: spring, summer, autumn, and winter, with three months in each season, the twelve seasons as the beginning of the twelve months, the twelve qi as the middle of the twelve months, and spring as the first day of the year. The fact that the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom enacted this new calendar of the four seasons, which set the time of the year in terms of the seasons, shows that it reflected the demands of the Chinese peasants at that time and met their aspirations; it also shows that it was only in the anti-feudal Taiping Heavenly Kingdom that it was put into practice.

C Analysis of the Celestial Calendar

The Celestial Calendar is a calendar based on the cycle of the earth's orbit around the sun, which is a revolution of the Summer Calendar. This is the aspect of the celestial calendar that revolutionized the summer calendar. However, there are still some parts of the calendar that are inherited and borrowed from the Summer Calendar. Therefore, in order to understand the origin of each component of the Celestial Calendar, it is necessary to analyze and study it. The contents of the celestial calendar can be analyzed as follows:

Season (e.g., "Lichun")

Age (366 days in a year)

Year (e.g., "Kui Hao")

Month (e.g., "First month", "February")

Monthly (e.g., "K'a-yin")

Day (e.g., 1st day of the month "N'un-yin")

Day of the week (e.g., 1st day of the month "Ox")

Day of the week (e.g., 1st day of the month "N'un-yin") (e.g., the first day of the first month, nonin, "ox")

Monthly host (e.g., the first month of the first year, Koshin, "ox host")

Worship (e.g., the third day of the third month, Koshin, "worship")

Below is an exploration of each of the nine items, exploring their origins.

A Setsubun

Setsubun is the backbone of the solar calendar. The Taiping Heavenly Calendar was created by the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, which adopted Setsubun as the basic law of the calendar, and this is the most insightful and crucial place to grasp. In the Chinese calendar, there is a difference between "Shuo" and "Qi". Shuo is the relationship between Taiyin, which is determined by Taiyin every month; Qi is the relationship between the sun, which is determined by the sun every year. Because the Chinese calendar is counted from the winter solstice, the winter solstice is the middle of the month of November, represented by the winter solstice, so the festival is called qi.

There are two ways of determining the solar term. Ancient Chinese calendar is called "constant gas", that is, the age of the week evenly divided into twenty-four equal parts, each festival accounted for one twenty-fourth of the number of days of the year, about one-five - two-one-eight-seventy-five days, that is, fifteen days odd, so it is also known as the "flat gas". To the Qing Dynasty Shunzhi two years (1645) issued the constitutional calendar, began to change the "fixed gas" note calendar, to the time the sun actually prevail, such as the winter solstice, before and after the fourteen-day odd for a gas, before and after the summer solstice, sixteen days odd for a gas, and the rest of the festival is also different, so the number of days of each festival is not the average. Taiping Tian Tian system calendar, in order to seek uniformity and neatness for the sake of setting the festival gas does not have a fixed gas, and use the constant gas.

Tianli calendar using the constant gas, but also because of the transfer of twelve months of odd and even number of easy to memorize, so since the Han Dynasty, the distribution of the method of a slight change. The Han Dynasty people push the constant gas to four years as a group, because the number of days for each gas is one five - two one hundred and eighty-seven five, twenty-four gas in a year, there are odd zero, must be to four years and then become a whole day, week after week. Today, the number of days of the constant gas of the ancient tetrad calendar, compared with the celestial calendar, as follows:

The constant gas of the ancient tetrad, four years inside, the gas and the gas distance from the number of days is different. For example, the calendar of the Western Han Dynasty, Yongguang five years of non-nonwu (39 years ago), recorded by Liusha Falling Jane, has the injection of the winter solstice and the beginning of spring.

Ten [a] month xin chou shuo small and exquisite ten days gengxu winter solstice

December gengwu shuo big seven days chen spring

This time used for the beginning of the calendar, in the "Wu", "Hundred Days", "c" year, you should check the number of days in the second year of a line, but after the winter solstice, belonging to the next year, in the "not", "Oh", "Mao "The third year is from the winter solstice to the first day of spring, and the number of days in the line of the third year should be checked. The third year from the winter solstice to the spring, *** forty-six days (the first and second years are forty-five days), the permanent spectrum from the gengxu to the chengshen is from forty-six days. So the ancient use of constant qi are very strict. The celestial calendar to make the constant gas in a year each fixed number of days, it is difficult to seek the same as the ancient constant gas as accurate.

Knowing that the calendar of the year set by the constant gas and ancient different, the calendar of the day when the festival can not be more with the Qing Xianfeng with the fixed gas of the book of the time of the constitution of the festival of the gas all together, but the relationship between the study how, it is not difficult to know by the projections.

The first year of Qing Xianfeng, two years of the fixed gas winter solstice and spring as follows:

The first year of Qing Xianfeng, the first year of November, 壬子, Rongliu Sunday, two thirty-nine seventy-four seventy-nine winter solstice at 5:36 p.m.

A.D. 1851, the winter solstice of the 22nd of December

Tai Ping Tingguo Xinkaiyuan year of the 18th of November, the winter solstice of the early one day

Tai Ping Tingguo, the first year of the 15th of December

Tai Ping Tingguo, the first year of Qing Xianfeng. C Shen, Sunday, 2-3-9-7-5-23 Lichun, 10:29 p.m.

Lichun, February 4, 1852

Lichun, the first day of the first month of the second year of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom's reign

November 11, Qing Xianfeng 2, 11th day of the month, Ting Si, Sunday, 2-3-9-7-8-4, the winter solstice, 11:28 p.m.

Winter Solstice, December 21, 1852

Winter Solstice, December 21, 1852

Taiwan.

The winter solstice on November 17th, the second year of the reign of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom

Renyin on December 27th, the second year of the Xianfeng reign of the Qing Dynasty, Sunday, 2-3-9-7-8-8-9, Lichun, 4:02 a.m.

Lichun on February 4th, the fourth year of the reign of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, 1853 A.D.

Lichun on January 1st, the third year of the first lunar month of the reign of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom

The calendar of the Heavenly Calendar, which is the first day of the first lunar month in the year of the reign of the reign, is a good place to start spring, and this is a definite date for setting the weather. Coincidentally, the first day of spring in the third year of the reign of the Emperor, also met the first day of spring of the fixed qi. This can be seen in the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom arranged the celestial calendar is the beginning of the second year of the nonny, its starting point of the spring day, is borrowed from the book of the constitution and the solar calendar of the fixed qi of the spring, indeed with the celestial phenomenon. The spring of the second year, from the spring of the third year, in fact, is exactly three hundred and sixty-six days. But this is only a leap year phenomenon, not every year with this, so forward Xin Kaiyuan year of spring is one day earlier (usually Department of the solar calendar on the fourth day of the fourth month of February), backward A Yin four years of spring has been wrong one day, and about every four years thereafter increased by about three days after the wrong. Thus, in the ninth year of the Yiwei period, there was a revision method of "forty years and one dry". The first year of the Xin Kaiyuan year was the reverse, so the winter solstice and the day of the first spring were wrongly preceded by one day. A Yin four years after the wrong day. After every leap year in the solar calendar the following year, that is, less wrong one day, because the solar calendar leap year, the same is three hundred and sixty-six days.

B The actual number of years

The actual number of years is the actual number of days in a year. The celestial calendar uses 366 days as a year. Some people think that it is taken from the solar calendar of 1852 A.D., which is a leap year in the solar calendar, with a year of 366 days. In fact, the compilers of the celestial calendar knew the solar calendar (see Section 3 for details of the argument), and it is certain that they would not have mistakenly used the number of days in the leap year of the solar calendar as the year's reality. I used to think that the number of days in the Celestial Calendar was based on the number of days in a year of "three hundred and sixty days and six days" of the Book of Songs and the Yao Canon, because I saw that the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, before they established their capital at Tianjing, often assumed that the emperor referred to in the books of Confucianism was the God they worshipped. Now, it seems that the compilers of the Celestial Calendar were well versed in calendars, and they would not have taken the Yao Code as the base number of the year. The reason why the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom set 366 days as a year was clearly stated in the chapter of the dedication of the calendar: "The days of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom are even and complete, with no deficiencies. Therefore, the ministers made the calendar with three hundred and sixty-six days as one year". That is to say, because the celestial calendar requires evenness and perfection and opposes intercalary leaps, it is set at three hundred and sixty-six days a year.

C Name of the year

The name of the year of the celestial calendar is based on the ancient method of stem and branch chronology, which was used by Xianshu during the Qing Dynasty, and also used by the Taiping Heavenly Calendar. Tianli calendar was created with reference to the Xianshu in the first year of the Qing Xianfeng, this year's dry-branch chronicle named Xinhai, that is, according to the launch of the next year of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom in two years for the non-native, three years for the decalogue (ugly), and so on.

D month name

Ancient month name, according to the beginning of the year to the end of the year in the order of the month, which is the month of Taiyin, to a Taiyin rounding for a month. In the Yin and Shang dynasties, such as the time of Wu Ding, the names of the months were one, two, three to twelve, with a thirteenth month added in leap years. It was only in the first year of Zu Jia's reign (1273 B.C.) that January was changed to the first month, and it was used until the first year of the Republic of China's reign (1912) when the solar calendar was changed to the first month, and the name of the first month was used for more than 3,000 years. However, the name of the first month of the Celestial Calendar is the "month of festivals" of the Solar Calendar, which is different from the former "month of the Tai Yin" in name but in reality. The first month of the lunar month is the first moon of the spring of the year. The first month of the solar calendar is the first month of spring in a year, which is about one-third of the whole season, that is, the first part of spring, 31st of February, the middle part of March, the middle part of February, and the middle part of March. The 30th day of February is the middle section and the 31st day of March is the last section, and this is the meaning of the names of the months in the celestial calendar. The same is true of the seasons of summer, fall, and winter, and of the months from April to December. Therefore, the names of the months in the celestial calendar represent only one twelfth of the year, and its first day is not the first day of the month, nor is it the first day of the month of the sun and the moon. It calls a section a month, but it is just borrowing the name of the Taiyin month.

E Yuejian

Yuejian, that is, the stem and branch of the month, is also an ancient Chinese method. Before the Western Han Dynasty, there was the name of the month but not the month. Although the month is above the lunar month, it is the solar month, which is the month of festivals. Han Jane has been set up in the month of Jian, such as Liusha fell Jane recorded in the Western Han Yuankang three years (63 years BC) calendar spectrum "first month, 20 days A c" under the note a "Jian" word, that is, the first month of the month for the month of Jian c. The method of "Jian in addition to the full level of the month. The method is to "build in addition to the full flat, set the executive broken dangerous, into the harvest open and closed" twelve words with twelve branches, noted in the daily stem under the branch, in case of festivals will be reworded, so the twelve sections of the construction of the different. Ancient to build in addition to attached to the good and bad jinxiu, called build in addition to the family. But the so-called "month build", there is a branch without a stem. To match the stem and branch for the name of the month built, in the latter Tang Dynasty Tongguang four years (nine hundred and twenty-six years) with the note calendar, the year of the "first month of the small built Geng Yin". Monthly construction is the solar calendar of the month, not counting leap month (leap month is divided into two months before and after the month of construction), so to match the stem and branch, five years and a week (60 months), where A, F year from the first month of c c; B, G year from the e c; C, Cin year from the g g c; D, N year from the non-natural year from the non-non-native year; E, Ki year from the a c. The same light four years, that is, the first year of Tiancheng. Tongguang four years, that is, the first year of Tiancheng C Xu, so the first month built Geng Yin. However, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom made the new calendar in the second year of the reign of the Jinzi, but according to the first year of the first year of the Qing Xianfeng December to build Xinchou to the next deduction, depending on the first month of the construction of the non-non-yin. It can be seen that the calendar of the month build, is along the ancient example of the month of the stem and branch records, inheritance of the book of the Constitution.

F Name of the day

To one to thirty or twenty-nine, set the order of each lunar month, also began in the Han Dynasty. Zhou, Qin and above, but to do the day name of the stem and branch, do not remember the number of days. Stem and branch of the sun, is an excellent culture of ancient China, its origin is very ancient, when the study, is not yet available, and can be accurately assigned to the Yin dynasty oracle bone material, there is a long history for the world and the world's countries are not comparable to the. In the first 595 editions of the oracle bone inscriptions in the collection of the Ku and Fang Clans, a total eclipse of the moon was recorded in the 29th year of Yin Wuding, on the night of Geng Shen, the 15th day of the 12th month of the Yin dynasty, which corresponds to the 23rd day of the 11th month of the Julian calendar in the year 1311 B.C., and is dated in the week of the week of the Julian calendar, 1,242,907. From the day of this lunar eclipse geng shen counting, to the Republic of first year (1912), January 1, c son, Confucian week day two four 19 four 0 three, indeed reliable, continuous, and a day without error of the dry calendar, has used three thousand two hundred and twenty-two years, one hundred and seventy-thousand six hundred and forty-nine thousand four hundred and ninety-seven days. If we count from Pan Geng moved Yin, there are more than one million two hundred thousand days. This long period of time is really amazing. If further upward, since more remote. Stem and branch of the original date has nothing to do with superstition. When the Yin, Zhou era, but also only to the dry branch for the name of the day, absolutely no yin and Yang five elements of good and bad luck attached to it, after the Han is gradually added to the many superstitions, to the Qing Dynasty's book of the time constitution, can be said to be set of its great completion. Another purpose of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom to produce a new calendar is to eliminate superstition, so all the superstitious claims inside the calendar in one fell swoop and clear, can be said to be two thousand years on the calendar on a great thing. However, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom retained the valuable old method of the day of the stem and branch, the use of the stem and branch to do the name of the day. The use of the stem and branch as the representative symbol of the day, and the restoration of the original image of the ancient stem and branch solar calendar, this is the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom's critical acceptance of the past culture with the knowledge of the place. As for the days in the solar calendar, the order of the day is still inherited from ancient times and continued to be recorded. The new calendar created by the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom in the second year of the Imjin era, not only the name of the year, the name of the month, and the construction of the month were inherited from the Book of the Times, but also the stem and branch of the day were also inherited from the Book of the Times. A stem and branch is the name of a day, and this day, in the long and huge time line, has its fixed point, which cannot be moved. This is not only evidenced by the Ruler's Sunday, but also by the twenty-eight constellations and the festivals. The history of the Chinese calendar can be known. The Han Dynasty Calendar residue, absolutely no record of Sunday's shadow, now seen after the Tang Dynasty and the Northern Song Dynasty Calendar, before the injection of the "Mi" day, the Mi day is Sunday. After the Tang dynasty Tongguang four-year calendar in the "first month of the sixth day of the A Wu" on the note of a Zhu Shu "Mi" word, thirteen days of Xin Chou, twenty days of Wushen, twenty-seven days of B Mao are the same. The sixth, thirteenth, twentieth, and twenty-seventh days are precisely the Day of the Lord (日曜日). Northern Song Yongxi three years (nine hundred and eighty-six years old with note calendar, but also contains the push seven Yao value of the day of the lucky and lucky method, there are seven Yao name [a]. However, the seven Yao name is not fully loaded into the calendar, only to the "Yao" of the "Mi", Zhu Zhu Shu in the day above the stem, such as the first month of the third day of the non Shen, ten days of the hexa-mao, seventeen days of the Cixu and so on are. The above two kinds, are not contained "host" name, in fact, the predecessor of the host celebrity calendar.

After the Yongxi three years of the calendar where two hundred and thirty-two years, and the Southern Song Dynasty Jia Ding eleven years (1218 years) of the remnants of the calendar [2]. This remnant of the calendar only June side, from the sixteenth to the twenty-fourth, the nine days on which there is no "Mi" character?

References:

Luolzang< Taiping Heavenly Kingdom History, Book 2