General Literary Chinese from Scratch/Tell the Time with Earthly Branches

By the end of this lesson, you will have a vague idea of what this image is: center|300px The Earthly Branches are closely linked with the Heavenly Stems from the previous lesson. Be sure to brush up on that: It is very important, as we will be applying it here. As we saw with those, we know that Heavenly Stems are used for defining the 10-day week in the Shang dynasty. Here, we will be telling the time within each day, which is a bit vaguer compared to the modern 24-hour day. Instead, Earthly Branch time defines itself with a set 2-hour period. For example, when used in timekeeping, 子 defines time between 23:00 and 01:00 (that is 11 PM - 1 AM for the pre- and ante- midday folks). List of Earthly Branches Each Earthly Branch, save for two, has its own lexical meaning, and will sometimes be used to imply that meaning instead of time. Where relevant, these have been noted. Earthly BranchHoursLexical meaning1zh 子23:00–01:00Prince; son; master (epithet)2zh 丑01:00–03:00Ugly-looking3zh 寅03:00–05:00To respect; reverence; respectfully4zh 卯05:00–07:00Sacrifice involving splitting someone or something in two5zh 辰07:00–09:00Time; star (e.g. North Star 北辰)6zh 巳09:00–11:00None7zh 午11:00–13:00Mark an X; criss-crossing; go everywhere (e.g. wasps going every which way = 蜂午); zenith, high point, e.g. the moon's zenith 月午8zh 未13:00–15:00"still not," "not yet," can be used to form a future aspect like "will" in English; "or not?" in word-final positions9zh 申15:00–17:00Stretch out (opp. 屈); to state, declare, divulge; to do smth. repeatedly10zh 酉17:00–19:00Mature wine11zh 戌19:00–21:00Used in 戌削 (fittingly-fashioned clothes)12zh 亥21:00–23:00None Each of these words also developed associations with the Chinese zodiacs, wuxing, and yin-yang, which is worth looking at, especially if you are interested in Taoism. As one may notice, many of the lexical meanings here are quite obscure. For example, 丑, 寅, 卯, and 酉 are almost never used in their lexical forms. It is nevertheless useful to know and identify when these meanings occur, and they can expand your currently limited vocabulary regardless. Play with them, get used to them, remember them. Telling the time The best way to tell when an Earthly Branch is being used to tell the time is whether or not 時 is being used. Here is an example using all but one word you already know. 甲日。申時。帝辛名杏曰果。 On the first day of the week, at around 15:00–17:00, Di Xin named a fruit an apricot. What word do you think you were missing here? Knowing this, the structure for telling the time is simply: 甲時。 If we use the 左右 construction from our Gongsun Long lesson, we can be even vaguer: 酉時左右。公孫龍與十人辯。 At around 17:00–19:00, Gongsun Long argued with 10 people. You should be able to narrow down what "argued with" is here, too! As we arrive closer to the global era, the Earthly Branches begin to become disused, slowly pushed into Zodiac signs and compass directions. Thereafter, it is more common to see Sinitic numerals used instead. Using 未 As we are introducing 未, it is worth discussing its use as a verb. This is a highly flexible verb in Literary Chinese! It is most commonly used to mean "still not," or "not yet."Linguistically speaking, this is a negative future aspect. It can also mean "will not." 公孫龍未辯 Gongsun Long has still not argued. There is nuance here: It could be that Gongsun Long intends to argue, and just hasn't yet, or he refuses to argue. Context is key here. 帝辛未于林 Di Xin has still not gone to the woods. Additionally, similar to the German oder, or "or..?" in English, 未 can be used to articulate "or not?" if used after a verb. 人夨未？ The person tilted their head...or did they? Try using this with the characters you already know! Exercises First, convert these times to Earthly Branches: 13:00 8:00 18:00 5:00 00:00 Next, identify the times in these sentences. They use characters you already know, so try looking at them! 卯時。孔子曰：「政者，正也。可乎？」 子時左右。鴆行于東。 戌時。王亥夨。 Bonus: Try to guess the meanings of these sentences: 帝辛未觀杏 鴆于商國未？ 顒者，異獸也。未物。 Don't be afraid to go back through lessons or use your dictionaries if there are words you do not understand! Now, try looking at that Vietnamese image I showed above. What does it mean to you? What is it describing? You now know enough information to go into one of the most-debated texts in Chinese history. See you in the next lesson, where you will get to wrangle with it yourself! Cangjie codes 子: 弓木 (ND) 丑: 弓土 (NG) 寅: 十一中金 (JMLC) 卯: 竹竹尸中 (HHSL) 辰: 一一一女 (MMMV) 北: 中一心 (LMP) 巳: 口山 (RU) 午: 人十 (OJ) 蜂: 中戈竹水十 (LIHEJ) 未: 十木 (JD) 申: 中田中 (LWL) 屈: 尸山山 (SUU) 酉: 一金田一 (MCWM) 戌: 戈竹一 (IHM) 削: 火月中弓 (FBLN) 亥: 卜女竹人 (YVHO) 時: 日土木戈 (AGDI) 甲: 田中 (WL) 帝: 卜月中月 (YBLB) 辛: 卜廿十 (YTJ) 名: 弓戈口 (NIR) 杏: 木口 (DR) 果: 田木 (WD) 左: 大一 (KM) 右: 大口 (KR) 公: 金戈 (CI) 孫: 弓木竹女火 (NDHVF) 龍: 卜月卜尸心 (YBYSP) 與: 竹難卜金 (HXYC) 辯: 卜十卜口十 (YJYRJ) 于: 一木 (MD) 林: 木木 (DD) 夨: 女大 (VK) 孔: 弓木山 (NDU) 政: 一一人大 (MMOK) 者: 十大日 (JKA) 正: 一卜中一 (MYLM) 也: 心木 (PD) 可: 一弓口 (MNR) 乎: 竹火木 (HFD) 鴆: 中山竹日火 (LUHAF) 行: 竹人一一弓 (HOMMN) 東: 木田 (DW) 王: 一土 (MG) 觀: 廿土月山山 (TGBUU) 商: 卜金月口 (YCBR) 國: 田戈口一 (WIRM) 顒: 田月一月金 (WBMBC) 異: 田廿金 (WTC) 獸: 口口戈大 (RRIK) 物: 竹手心竹竹 (HQPHH) References Kroll, Paul W., William H. Baxter, William G. Boltz, et al. 2017. A Student’s Dictionary of Classical and Medieval Chinese. Revised edition. Edited by Stephen F. Teiser, Martin Kern, and Timothy Brook. Brill. ISBN: 978-90-04-32513-5 Wu, Zhongxian, and Karin Taylor Wu. 2016. Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches: TianGan DiZhi, The Heart of Chinese Wisdom Traditions. 1st ed. With Bingxun Fei and Farong Ren. Singing Dragon. ISBN: 978-1-84819-208-9 Category:Book:General Literary Chinese from Scratch