Start of Spring

Meaning

Lichun, the Start of Spring, is the first of the twenty-four solar terms: the instant the Sun reaches 315° of its path, about 4 February. Lì means to set up, to begin; chūn is spring. In the Chinese year spring does not wait for the equinox: it begins here, halfway between the winter solstice and the spring equinox, when the cold is still sharp but the days are already lengthening fast.

It is the hinge of the solar year. Lichun opens the Tiger month, the first of the twelve solar months, and in the arts that count by the Sun it opens the year itself: the year pillar of BaZi, the year animal as BaZi and Feng Shui count it, the year’s Flying Stars and its ruler, Tai Sui, all change at this instant, not at the Chinese New Year, which follows the Moon and falls between 21 January and 20 February.

The old texts give its first fifteen days three signs: the east wind melts the ice, the creatures that slept through winter begin to stir, and the fish rise up under the ice. Spring, in this reading, is not yet warmth but the first movement under the surface.

In practice

• In BaZi a birth from this instant belongs to the new year pillar and to the Tiger month; a birth within five minutes of it is marked uncertain, since a slightly different time would give the year and the month before.
• In Chinese astrology the year animal changes here; for a birth between Lichun and the New Year, or between the New Year and Lichun, Ulune gives both answers and says which it reads.
• In Feng Shui the year’s stars move to their new palaces, the year’s centre star one less than the year before, and Tai Sui and the Year Breaker move on by one branch.
• The Calendar marks it on its day, with the Sun at 15° Aquarius, as the opening of the Tiger month; the Cycles lens begins its year there.

Across traditions

• In the Celtic year Imbolc, on 1 February, also opens spring halfway between solstice and equinox, and Candlemas, on 2 February, keeps its weather lore in Europe.
• In Japan the day before Risshun is Setsubun, the dividing of the seasons, when families throw roasted beans to send the old season off and welcome good fortune; in Korea people still paste ipchun blessings on their doors, and in Vietnam it is lập xuân.
• In Western astrology the Sun is then at 15° Aquarius, the middle of a fixed winter sign: the Chinese calendar starts its spring where the Western one sees only the depth of winter.

Origin and history

Lichun is among the oldest of the terms. The “Twelve Months” of the Lüshi Chunqiu, around 239 BC, has the Son of Heaven lead his ministers to the eastern suburb on the day of Lichun to welcome the spring, dressed in the green of Wood; the Huainanzi, in 139 BC, sets it at the head of the twenty-four. The three pentads come down in the Yi Zhou Shu and the Book of Rites.

The day kept its rites for two thousand years. In Song dynasty Kaifeng, Meng Yuanlao describes the clay spring ox brought into the palace and whipped by officials to urge on the farming year; almanacs still print a picture of the spring ox and its herdsman at their front. Many families “bite the spring” that day, with spring pancakes or raw radish.

How Ulune calculates it

Ulune takes Lichun as the instant the Sun’s apparent longitude reaches 315°, from its table of the solar terms computed with the Swiss Ephemeris for 1800 to 2200. The year pillar, the Tiger month and the year’s stars change at that instant, whatever the clock or the time zone. In 2026 it fell on 3 February at 20:02 UT, already 4 February in Beijing; in 2027 it falls on 4 February at 01:46 UT.

Correspondences