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AsianConnections
Proudly Presents
Dragon Gate's Online Chinese Almanac
By Grand Master Yap Cheng Hai
An
Introduction to the Chinese Almanac
The oldest Chinese documents ever discovered were the Oracle
bones. These Oracle bones were later interpreted and their meanings
unearthed; they were the first basic calendars used by the ancient
Chinese.
They were based on a system that represented a ten-day week.
These were then correlated to the different phases of the moon by
which the Chinese then measures the passing of seasons and time.
A day within the Chinese calendar was made up of 12 hours.
Which when examined is hardly surprising since in those days work
was only done in the day and the nights devoted to rest.
Later these were represented by the 12 animal signs that
have become common place in Chinese culture throughout the world.
In this manner a month was taken to have 60 days rather than the
30 days that the average Gregorian calendar prescribes. The
twelve lunar months that were adopted by the Chinese meant that
a year would be 720 days.
The Chinese maintained their years more closely tied with
the ruling period of each emperor rather than by any stringent mathematical
formula. This was natural since almanacs in China were issued
by the Emperor himself. Believing that the emperor was deemed to
be the son of god, these almanacs were treated as sacred and possessed
a certain amount of power.
The almanac which in theory is similar to the Chinese calendar
came into existence not too long afterwards. The almanac, which
is a virtual necessity within any Chinese household, is used for
a host of reasons.
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Reprinted with special permission by Dragon-gate.com
Grand
Master Yap Cheng Hai is one of the world's most renowned Feng Shui
masters. Grand Master Yap Cheng Hai and Managing Director Joey Yap,
have founded the Yap Cheng Hai Feng Shui Center of Excellence, a resource
center for Feng Shui practitioners.
For
Grand Master Yap Cheng Hai's Daily Online Chinese Almanac at Dragon-gate.com
please click here.
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