Happy Chinese New Year (Year 4702 or Year Jia-Shen).

The Chinese Calendar, like the Hebrew one, is a combined solar/lunar calendar.

It was invented by Emperor Huangdi in 2637 B.C. The first year in this calendar is 2698 B.C.

Here is how dates, months and years are counted.

a) The date of a new moon ( or completely "black" moon) is the first day of a new month.

b) Dates of Principle Terms (12 all together) are used to name each month. On these dates the sun's longitude is

a mulltiple of 30 degrees.

c) Years have names that are repeated every 60 years. Each year is assigned to a name consisting of two components

Celestial Stemm (Tian-Gan ) Terrestrial Branch (Di-Zhi)

1. Jia 1. Zi (rat)

2. Yi 2. Chou (ox)

3. Bing 3. Yin (tiger)

4. ding 4. Mao(Rabbit)

5. Wu 5. chen (dragon)

6. Ji 6. Si (Snake)

7. Geng 7. Wu (horse)

8. Xin 8. Wei (Sheep)

9. Ren 9. Shen (Monkey)

10. Gui 10. you (Rooster)

11. Xu (dog)

12. Hai (pig)

The current cycle starts on Feb 2, 1984.

In the Chinese Calendar, Year 2003 is year 4701 and today Jan 21 is the last day of 20th year of 78th cycle.

Year 2004 which is year 4702 and 21st of the 78th cycle starts tomorrow Jan 22. It is named as

Jia-Shen ------- The year of Monkey.

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