Talk:Chinese constellation

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is part of WikiProject China, a project to improve all China-related articles. If you would like to help improve this and other China-related articles, please join the project. All interested editors are welcome.

Start

This article has been rated as Start-Class on the quality scale. (add comments)

[edit] Subaru

Is Japanese Subaru the same as Chinese Mao? Or are Japanese constellations different from Chinese ones? --Error 01:53, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] The Order, a serious problem

The correct order goes EAST, NORTH, WEST, and then SOUTH. It might sound counterintuitive, but there's substantial reason why this is THE order. I just corrected the table, and you can see that the last one (Ji) in the East matches with the first one Dou in the North as they both belong to Saggitarius. In fact, if put in the coorect order, the 28 constellation should complete a cycle roughly along the ecliptic, and hence roughly match the 12 zodiac constellations, in order. I suppose every serious book on this topic should have it in the correct order. (I know it is for Modern Chinese Dictionary, from which I myself memorized the 28 Xiu.) So there's no question. Sadly even the Chinese Wikipedia has it wrong. The Japanese got it correctly though.

By calling it counterintuitive, I mean what Chinese today tend to think is not the traditional way. If you speak Chinese, east-south-west-north (dong-nan-xi-bei) should unquestionably be the correct saying. There must have been a complete flip sometime in history when we started to see maps oriented with north upward. However, if you are a Chinese, especially a Northerner, you should have a sense of direction with the south being the forward direction, and sun rises from your left hand side and sets in your right hand side. The Forbidden City is facing south (where Tiananmen sits); Emperors used to be crowned facing south; and many buildings both in urban and rural areas are positioned facing south. It seems a trivial matter, but it is of fundamential importance. The modern way of drawing maps with north up and calling east-south-west-north the right order really is against the traditions.

Anyways. We certainly would like it in the correct order. I corrected the table in this article, but I don't know how to modify the template appearing in other articles

Chinese constellations
Three enclosures (三垣):
Purple Forbidden enclosure (紫微垣) \| Supreme Palace enclosure (太微垣) \| Heavenly Market enclosure (天市垣)
Four Symbols (四象) and Twenty-eight mansions (二十八宿):
East: Azure Dragon (青龍): Horn (角) \| Neck (亢) \| Root (氐) \| Room (房) \| Heart (心) \| Tail (尾) \| Winnowing Basket (箕)
South: Vermilion Bird (朱雀): Well (井) \| Ghost (鬼) \| Willow (柳) \| Star (星) \| Extended Net (張) \| Wings (翼) \| Chariot (軫)
West: White Tiger (白虎): Legs (奎) \| Bond (婁) \| Stomach (胃) \| Hairy Head (昴) \| Net (畢) \| Turtle Beak (觜) \| Three Stars (參)
North: Black Tortoise (玄武): Dipper (斗) \| Ox (牛) \| Girl (女) \| Emptiness (虛) \| Rooftop (危) \| Encampment (室) \| Wall (壁)

-Liuyao

Fixed. To edit yourself, go to Template:Chinese constellation. 71.102.186.234 11:38, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree with you. But I don't think this is a traditional-modern problem. I've done some research at some ancient astronomical text, when talking about constellations, they also use EAST-NORTH-WEST-SOUTH order. Yao Ziyuan 00:27, 27 November 2006 (UTC)