The twelve zodiac animals

The twelve animals

The Chinese zodiac, or shengxiao (生肖), names the positions in a repeating twelve-year animal cycle. Its sequence begins with Rat and ends with Pig. Each animal corresponds to an earthly branch, the second component of a Ganzhi, or stem-and-branch, designation. An animal therefore identifies part of a year's cyclical name rather than its complete date.

English labels vary without changing the sequence. Mouse is an alternative to Rat, while goat, sheep and ram are familiar renderings of yang. The Chinese names help identify the intended position when translations differ.

An animal returns after twelve years, but it accompanies five different heavenly stems before the complete sixty-part cycle returns. Thus “Dragon year” cannot identify a historical date by itself. Even “Jia-Chen year” repeats after sixty years and needs an era, generation or other context.

Zodiac imagery and the race story

Animal–branch associations appear in Wang Chong's Lunheng, an Eastern Han collection of critical essays. In the chapter Wu shi, Wang discusses pairings including Yin–Tiger, Zi–Rat and Wu–Horse while questioning arguments about animals and the five phases.

A familiar legend explains the order through a race. The Jade Emperor invites the animals to cross a river, and Rat rides on Ox before jumping ahead at the finish. Other episodes account for the remaining places and Cat's absence. Details vary between tellings. The race is a storytelling explanation of the sequence, rather than a historical account of how it was established.

Zodiac imagery takes both animal and humanised forms. Tang-dynasty tomb figures can have animal heads above bodies dressed in official robes. Decorative carvings also depict the animals in their own bodily forms. The full set represents the cycle, while a single animal can stand for one year or a person's birth-year sign.

The year boundary

A birth-year animal cannot always be found from the Gregorian year alone. In the Chinese calendar, the animal and Ganzhi year change at Chinese New Year, the first day of the first lunar month. Some divinatory traditions instead use Lichun, Beginning of Spring. Neither convention changes the animal on January 1.

For an ordinary birth-year zodiac, identify the Chinese calendar year containing the birthday. A Bazi chart, which assigns stem–branch pairs to the birth year, month, day and hour, may use a different annual boundary. Near the transition, the same birthday can consequently receive different year labels under the two conventions.