Annual stars

Meaning

The annual stars are the Flying Stars of the year itself. Each solar year, from Lichun to Lichun, has a star in the centre, one less than the year before: the 1 White in 2026, the 9 Purple in 2027, the 8 White in 2028. From the centre the stars fly forward through the nine palaces along the Lo Shu’s path, and the year’s chart is laid over every home’s own chart and over every person’s eight directions.

The classics read the year’s stars as visitors. The 1, 4, 6, 8 and 9 are read as supportive where they pass, the 2 and the 5 as asking for calm, the 3 and the 7 as mixed. Where the year’s 5 lands, the 5 Yellow, they counsel quiet for the year; the year also brings the Grand Duke, the Year Breaker and the Three Killings, the other annual afflictions.

A year’s star does not replace a home’s own stars: it adds a layer, gentle or demanding, that lasts a year. The classics read a supportive year star over a timely home star as a good year for that part of the home, and a demanding one over a demanding pair as a year to keep it quiet.

In practice

• In the Home lens: the year’s stars appear small under each palace’s stars, on the left, with the month’s on the right; a list says what to leave quiet this year.
• In the Cycles lens: the year’s stars fall over your own eight directions, so that one of your supportive directions can be strengthened by a supportive star, or rest for the year.
• The change at Lichun: the year’s star changes around 4 February, not on the first of January; the Calendar marks the day.
• In 2026 the 1 White is in the centre, the 2 Black in the north-west, the 3 Jade in the west, the 4 Green in the north-east, the 5 Yellow in the south, the 6 White in the north, the 7 Red in the south-west, the 8 White in the east and the 9 Purple in the south-east.

Across traditions

• Nine Star Ki gives each person the star in the centre of their birth year, so that someone born in 2026 is a 1 White Water person, and moves their star through the same palaces year by year.
• The Kua: for the yang count, a year’s Kua is its centre star, but for a 5, which becomes 2: the Kua and the year’s star are one number seen from two schools.
• The almanac, the Tong Shu, prints the year’s nine-palace chart among its opening pages, with the year’s spirits and directions.

Origin and history

The year’s stars are among the oldest uses of the nine numbers: almanacs printed the year’s purple and white stars, 紫白, long before the Flying Stars of the home were set out in full, and the Zi Bai Jue, the Verse of Purple and White, reads them over a home’s own. Shen Zhureng’s school made the year’s chart a layer over the home’s, which is how practitioners read it today.

How Ulune calculates it

Ulune finds the solar year, which turns at Lichun, and its star: the 1 White in 2026, one less each year after and one more each year before, round the nine. The year’s star goes to the centre and flies forward through the nine palaces in the Lo Shu’s order, so each year every star moves one palace on along the same path. The year’s afflictions come from the same year: the 5 Yellow where the 5 lands, the Grand Duke on the year’s branch.

Correspondences