The Tibetan calendar (lo-tho, ་ལོ་ཐོ) is a lunisolar calendar, that is, the Tibetan year is composed of either 12 or 13 lunar months, each beginning and ending with a new moon. A thirteenth month is added approximately every three years, so that an average Tibetan year is equal to the solar year.

The Tibetan New Year celebration is Losar (lo-gsar). The Tibetan civil year starts with the 1st day of the 1st Hor-month. During the Yar-lung Dynasty the Tibetan year started already in summer. According to the almanachs the year starts with the 3rd. hor-month. There were many different traditions in Tibet to fix the beginning of the year.

[edit] Years (lo,་ལོ་)

There were different traditions of naming years in Tibet. During the time of the Yar-lung Dynasty the years were named by the 12 animals of the Chinese zodiac. From the 12th century onwards, we observe the usage of two sixty years cycle. The 60 year cycle is known as the Bṛhaspati (or Vṛhaspati) cycle and was first introduced into Tibet by an Indian Buddhist by the name of Chandra Nath and Chilu Pandit in 1025 CE.^[1] The first one is the so called rab-byung cycle. The first year of the first rab-byung cycle started in 1027 A. D. This cycle was adopted from India. The second cycle derived from China and was called drug-cu skor. The first year of the first drug-cu skor cycle started in 1024 A. D. The cyles were counted by ordinal numbers, but the years within the cycles were never counted but referred to by their special name. The structure of the drug-cu skor was as follows:

Each year is associated with an animal and an element. This is similar to the Chinese zodiac. The animals alternate in the following order:

The elements alternate in the following order:

Each element is associated with two consecutive years, first in its male aspect, then in its female aspect. For example, a male Earth-Dragon year is followed by a female Earth-Snake year, then by a male Iron-Horse year. The sex may be omitted, as it can be inferred from the animal.

The element-animal designations recur in cycles of 60 years(Sexagenary cycle), starting with a (male) wood-mouse year. These big cycles are numbered. The first cycle started in 1024. Therefore, 2005 roughly corresponds to the (female) Wood-Bird year of the 17th cycle. The first year of the sixty years cycle of Indian origin (1027) is called rab-byung (same name as the designation of the cycle) and equivalent to the (female) fire-hare year.

[edit] Months (zla-ba, ཟླ་བ་ )

Already during the time of the Tibetan Yar-lung Dynasty (7th – 9th century A. D.) Tibetan month were named according to the four seasons:

1st spring month (dpyid-zla ra-ba), middle spring month (dpyid-zla ´bring-po), last spring month (dpyid-zla mtha´-chung), 1st summer month (dbyar-zla-zla ra-ba), middle summer month (dbyar-zla ´bring-po), last summer month (dbyar-zla mtha´-chung), 1st autumn month (ston-zla ra-ba), middle autumn month (ston-zla ´bring-po), last autumn month (ston-zla mtha´-chung), 1st winter month (dgun-zla ra-ba), middle winter month (dgun-zla ´bring-po) and last winter month (dgun-zla mtha´-chung).

From the 12th century onwards we observe the usage of naming month by the 12 animals of the Chinese zodiac:

stag (Tiger), yos (hare), ´brug (dragon), sbrul (snake), rta (horse), lug (sheep), spre´u (monkey), bya (bird), khyi (dog), phag (pig), byi (mouse) and glang (ox).

With the introduction of the calendar of the Kalacakratantra in the second half of the 11th century A. D. months were also named in accordance with the lunar mansions in which roughly spoken full moon took place each month:

mchu, dbo, nag, sa-ga, snron, chu-stod, gro-bzhin, khrums, tha-skar, smin-drug, mgo and rgyal.

In the second half of the thirteenth century the famous ruler chos-rgyal ´Phags-pa introduced the system of counting the month by ordinal numbers, the so called Hor(=Mongolian)-month:

1st hor-month, 2nd hor-month, 3rd hor-month, 4th hor-month, 5th hor-month, 6th hor-month, 7th hor-month, 8th hor-month, 9th hor-month, 10th hor-month, 11th hor-month and 12th hor-month.

All these systems of counting or naming month were used up to modern times.

[edit] Days (zhag)

There are three different types of days (zhag), the khyim-zhag, the tshes-zhag and the nyin-zhag.

The first two of these days are astronomical days. The time needed by the mean sun to pass through one of the twelve traditional constellations of the zodiac (the twelve khyim) is called khyim-zla (solar month). One-thirtieth of one solar month (khyim-zla) is one khyim-zhag, which we might call a zodiacal day, because we do not have an equivalent in the Western terminology.

The time needed by the moon for the elongation of 12 degrees is one lunar day (tshes-zhag, Sanskrit thiti). The lengths of such lunar days vary considerably due to the anomaly in the movement of the moon and the sun.

30 lunar days form one lunar or synodic month (tshes-zla), the period from new moon to new moon. This is equal to the time needed by the moon for the elongation of 360 degrees. The natural day (nyin-zhag) is defined by the Tibetans as the period from dawn to dawn. Strictly speaking, the months appearing in a Tibetan almanac, called by us Tibetan calendar months, are not the same as lunar or synodic months (tshes-zla). In Tibetan there is no special term for calendar month. These calendar months are just called zla-ba (month).

A Tibetan calendar month normally starts with the week day or natural day (gza´ or nyin-zhag) in which the first lunar day (tshes-zhag) ends. A Tibetan calendar month normally ends with the week day or natural day (gza´ or nyin-zhag) in which the 30th lunar day (tshes-zhag) ends. In consequence, a Tibetan calendar month (zla-ba) comprises 29 or 30 natural days. In the sequence of natural days or week days, there are no omitted days (chad) or days that occur twice (lhag). But since these days are also named by the term tshes together with a cardinal number, it happens that certain numbers or dates (the corresponding lunar day numbers) do not occur at all or appear twice. The lunar day numbers are counted from 1 to 30 and it can happen that a Monday with the lunar day number 1 (tshes gcig) is followed by a Tuesday with the moon day number 3 (tshes gsum). On the other hand, a Monday with the lunar day number 1 (tshes gcig) may be followed by a Tuesday with the lunar day number 1 (tshes gcig). In other words, it happens quite often that certain dates do not appear in the Tibetan almanac and certain dates occur twice. But there are no natural days or week days that occur twice or which are omitted.

The days of the week (gza´, གཟའ) are named for celestial bodies.

Nyima "Sun", Dawa "Moon" and Lhagpa "Mercury" are common personal names for people born on Sunday, Monday or Wednesday respectively.

[edit] History

During the time of the Yarlung Dynasty the Tibetan years were named after the 12 animals common for the Chinese zodiac. The month were named according to the four seasons of a year and the year started in summer.

The translation of the Buddhist Kalacakratantra in the second half of the 11th century A. D. marked the beginning of a complete change for the calendar in Tibet. The first chapter of this book contains among others a decription of an Indian astronomical calendar and descriptions of the calculations to determin the length of the five planets and the sun and moon eclipses.

According to the Buddhist tradition, the original teachings of the Kalacakra were tought by Buddha himself. Nevertheless it took more than twohundred years until the Kalacakra calendar was officially introduced as the official Tibetan calendar by the ruler Chos-rgyal ´Phags-pa in the second half of the 13th century. Although this calendar was changed many times during the subsequent centuries, it kept its original character of a luni-solar calendar of Indian origin.

[edit] Notes

[edit] Primary sources

• (Sanskrit) Kalacakratantra. (Tibetisch) mChog gi dang-po sangs-rgyas las phyung-ba rgyud kyi rgyal-po dus kyi ´khor-lo.
• Grags-pa rgyal-mchan: Dus-tshod bzung-ba´i rtsis-yig
• sde-srid Sangs-rgyas rgya-mtsho: Phug-lugs rtsis kyi legs-bshad mkhas-pa´i mgul-rgyan vaidur dkar-po´i do-shal dpyod-ldan snying-nor
• karma Nges-legs bstan-´jin: gTsug-lag rtsis-rigs tshang-ma´i lag-len ´khrul-med mun-sel nyi-ma ñer-mkho´i ´dod-pa ´jo-ba´i bum-bzang

[edit] Secondary sources

• http://www.math.uu.se/~svante/papers/calendar/tibet.pdf
• Norbu, Thubten & Harrer, Heinrich (1960). Tibet Is My Country. London: Readers Union, Rupert Hart-Davis. 
• de Körős, Alexander Csoma (1834). A Grammar of the Tibetan Language. Calcutta. 
• Laufer, Berthold (1913). The Application of the Tibetan Sexagenary Cycle. T´oung Pao, Vol. 14, pp. 569-596. 
• Petri, Winfried (1966). Indo-tibetische Astronomie. Habilitationsschrift zur Erlangung der venia legendi für das Fach Geschichte der Naturwissenschaften an der Hohen Naturwissenschaftlichen Fakultät der Ludwig Maximilians Universität zu München. München. 
• Pelliot, Paul (1913). Le Cycle Sexagénaire dans la Chronologie Tibétaine. Paris: Journal Asiatique 1, pp. 633-667. 
• Schuh, Dieter (1973). Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der Tibetischen Kalenderrechnung. Wiesbaden: Steiner Verlag. 
• Schuh, Dieter (1974). Grundzüge der Entwicklung der Tibetischen Kalenderrechnung. Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft, Supplement II. XVIII. Deutscher Orientalistentag vom 1. bis 5. Oktober 1972 in Lübeck. Vorträge, pp. 554-566. 
• Tsepon W.D. Shakabpa (1967). Tibet: A Political History. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. 
• Tournadre, Nicolas & Sangda Dorje (2003). Manual of Standard Tibetan: Language and Civilization. trans. Ramble, Charles. Ithaca: Snow Lion Publications. ISBN 1-55939-189-8. 
• Yamaguchi, Zuiho (1973). Chronological Studies in Tibet. Chibetto no rekigaku: Annual Report of the Zuzuki Academic foundation X, pp. 77-94. 
• Yamaguchi, Zuiho (1992). The Significance of Intercalary Constants in the Tibetan Calendar and Historical Tables of Intercalary Month. Tibetan Studies: Proceedings of the 5th Seminar of the International Association for Tibetan Studies, Vol. 2, pp. 873-895: Narita. 

[edit] External links

• Explanations of Dharma Practice Days - 2008
• PDF calendar for the Earth Bull Year 2136