Zodiac Symbols And Animals
The Chinese calendar has a entirely different system of dating as compared to the west. They follow a lunar calendar which shows a cycle of 12 years unlike the west where we use a linear calendar to show the time concept. As far as Zodiac calendar is concerned the Chinese use animal images to stand for each Zodiac sign.
Since the Chinese calendar is dependent on the cycles of the moon it is known as a lunar calendar and functions diametrically opposite to that of the western solar calendar. On comparing the Chinese New Year to the western one we find that it begins somewhere close to the end of January and beginning of February.
The present day China still stick to the lunar calendar for its traditional events and festivities though formally it had adopted the western calendar by 1911. To give an example the Chinese New Year is still celebrated as per the lunar calendar. The calendars which are printed in China today show both lunar and solar dates.
The Chinese followed the idea of popular folk custom of representing every year physically with some animal. A particular animal will represent a particular year. Thus twelve years show twelve different animals with their own characteristics. As the calendar is cyclic the same animals keep coming back once in every twelve years.
Even though it was a yearly representation the animals concerned had similar connotation as that of the western monthly or daily horoscope. The difference lied in the yearly representation. According to Chinese Zodiac assumption people born in a particular year will have qualities of that particular animal representing the year.
Apart from the personality traits that Chinese zodiac symbols are supposed to portray which may or may not be taken seriously; they play another important function. One can use the Chinese lunar calendar to decide the age of an individual. Once you know the person’s animal sign then you can easily calculate their age by using a bit of common sense and basic math.
The other function which the Chinese calendar performs is to show the age of a person. By knowing the animal sign of an individual you can calculate the age applying basic math and common sense.
You may wonder why the Chinese allocate each twelve years to twelve different animals. The ancient tales show that there was a quarrel between twelve animals as to who would control the cycle of changing years. It was decided that the first animal to reach the opposite bank of a river in a race would lead and the rest would follow as they completed the race.
In the race the Ox took the lead and the rat rode on the Ox’s back. As the Ox almost reached the opposite bank, the rat being sly jumped off the Ox’s back on the bank and got the first position. So the rat leads the cycle of year till today with the ox being the second. The last is the pig to depict the last month.
Chinese zodiac symbolism are fascinating in their meaning. To learn more about Chinese New Year symbols follow the hyperlinks.
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