Hai mountain

Meaning

Hai, 亥 hài, is the third mountain of the north-west (NW3): the fifteen degrees from 322.5° to 337.5°, centred on 330°. It takes its name from Hai, the twelfth of the twelve Earthly Branches, the Pig’s, and carries its phase, Water.

Hai is the Pig’s branch, Water, the late evening and the first month of winter, roots resting in the dark until the year begins again. On the compass it closes the north-west, up to the line at 337.5° where the north begins: a Water mountain in Qian’s palace of Metal, the Metal that feeds Water in the order of the phases. A home facing Hai looks between north-west and north-north-west and sits in Si, the Snake’s mountain: a Xun house.

For the Flying Stars Hai is the north-west’s Man dragon and counts as yang, like Qian, so a home facing Hai has Qian’s main chart: the prosperous one if it was built in Period 8, both of the period’s stars at the front with a Combination of Ten if it was built in Period 9. Even its replacement star, 6, is Qian’s; the two part only at the edges, Hai’s upper edge being the line between the north-west and the north.

In practice

• The facing: a home whose front faces between 322.5° and 337.5° faces Hai, and sits in Si, SE3: a Xun house of the East group. The Home lens tints Hai on its dial and draws Si dashed.
• Near its edges: within 3° of 322.5° or 337.5° many schools read a replacement chart, which Ulune shows beside the main one; within 1.5° the facing is on a void line: at 322.5° the line towards Qian, inside the north-west; at 337.5° the line between the north-west and the north, towards Ren.
• The Flying Stars: built in Period 9, a home facing Hai has the formations Double stars at the facing and Combination of Ten, water; built in Period 8, the formation Prosperous at sitting and facing.
• The year: Hai is the Grand Duke’s mountain in a Pig year, 2031 and 2043, which the classics suggest not facing for the year’s new beginnings, and the Year Breaker’s in 2025 and 2037, a side they suggest leaving undisturbed by works. The year’s 5 Yellow visits its palace, the north-west, in 2032 and 2041.

Across traditions

• The solar terms: on luopan plates that carry a ring of the solar terms, Hai goes with the Minor Snow, the Sun at 240°, entering Sagittarius in the Western zodiac.
• On the Western rose: Hai’s upper edge, 337.5°, is the north-north-west of the 16-point compass, where the luopan passes from Qian’s palace to Kan’s and the round of the mountains comes back to Ren.

Origin and history

Hai ends the twelve branches as the year enters winter, and the Water that fills the north begins here, inside the north-west: Hai is Water, and so are the next three mountains, Ren, Zi and Gui, four Water mountains in a row across the line at 337.5°. Each cardinal phase runs that way over four mountains, starting in the corner before it: Yin before the east’s Wood, Si before the south’s Fire, Shen before the west’s Metal.

How Ulune calculates it

Ulune finds the mountain a home faces from its magnetic facing, among 24 mountains of 15° counted from Ren at 337.5°: Hai takes every facing from 322.5° up to 337.5°, that edge belonging to the next, and the home sits in the mountain opposite, Si. For the Flying Stars, Hai is the third mountain of a corner palace, of the group the classics call the Man dragon, and so counts as yang: when the stars look to it for their flight, it sends a star forward. Its replacement star, from the classical verse, is 6, which takes the place of the number going to the centre when, near an edge, it is the mountain that decides.

Correspondences