Chinese Lunar Dates Explained

Chinese lunar dates are derived from the traditional lunisolar calendar, which combines lunar cycles with the solar cycle to guide agricultural activities. This calendar occasionally adds a leap month to align with the solar year, ensuring that festivals such as Chinese New Year match seasonal changes.

Historically, years were recorded based on an emperor's reign. For instance, 1742 was the "seventh year of the Qianlong emperor," starting on 5 February 1742 and ending on 25 January 1743, as the New Year varies annually, typically falling in January or February. Reading these dates requires an understanding of the emperor's era and the lunar year's shifting cycle.

Sexagenary CycleGanzhi Years

If you have ever seen dates written in a jiapu or carved on a gravestone, you have likely encountered lunar dates written using ganzhi years. The ganzhi cycle, also known as the "sexagenary cycle," is a traditional Chinese system for tracking years, months, days, and hours. Ganzhi is a collective term for the "heavenly stems" (天干, Tiangan) and "earthly branches" (地支, Dizhi). It combines the 10 heavenly stems (Jia, Yi, Bing, Ding, Wu, Ji, Geng, Xin, Ren, Gui) with the 12 earthly branches (Zi, Chou, Yin, Mao, Chen, Si, Wu, Wei, Shen, You, Xu, Hai) to form 60 unique names that complete one cycle in a fixed sequence. Each pairing of a heavenly stem and an earthly branch corresponds to a specific year in the lunar calendar. This system has been used in Chinese culture for centuries to record time, organize historical records, and more. Even in modern times, the ganzhi system remains significant in traditional practices such as feng shui and selecting auspicious dates.

Japanese Era Dates in Taiwan (1895-1945)

During the period of Japanese rule from 1895 to 1945, official documents in Taiwan used the Japanese imperial calendar. During this time, Taiwan adopted the year names of three Japanese eras: Meiji, Taishō, and Shōwa.