Year pillar
In Chinese: 年柱
The first of the four pillars, the stem and branch of the solar year of birth, from Lichun to Lichun: in BaZi, the roots, the family line and the early years.
Meaning
The year pillar, 年柱 niánzhù, is the first of the four pillars: the stem and branch of the solar year of birth, which runs from Lichun, the start of spring, to the next. Its branch is the year animal everyone knows, and its stem gives that animal its phase: 1990 was Geng-Wu, the Yang Metal Horse, and 2026 is Bing-Wu, the Yang Fire Horse. Everyone born between the same two Lichun shares it.
The tradition reads it as the outermost of the pillars: the roots one starts from, the family line and the grandparents, the society and the generation one is born into, and the early years. Many books give each pillar a part of life and a circle of people, the year the grandparents and childhood, the month the parents and youth, the day the self and the partner, the hour the children and the later years. Ulune keeps the sense of ground and roots, and does not read ages from the pillars.
For the Zi Ping school the year is no longer the centre of the chart, as it was in the oldest method: its stem and branch are read like the others, by their gods for the Day Master and by what they meet. What the year keeps is its reach beyond the self. Its stem sets the stems of the months, its polarity the direction of the luck pillars, and its branch is the base of several stars.
In practice
- On the board, the year stands on the right, as the tradition writes the pillars, hour, day, month and year; Settings can turn the board to read from the year.
- Lichun, not New Year: the year pillar turns at the exact instant of Lichun, about 4 February, so a birth in January or early February belongs to the year before; a birth within five minutes of that instant is marked uncertain.
- What it sets: the stems of the twelve months, by the rule of the five tigers (see the month pillar); and, with the tradition’s yin or yang count, the direction of the luck pillars.
- Stars read from its branch: the Red Phoenix and Heavenly Joy, and, with the day’s branch, the Peach Blossom, the Travelling Horse, the Canopy and the General.
- In the count, the year pillar weighs like the hour and the day: one point for its stem, one for its branch’s hidden stems.
- In Chinese astrology, its branch is the year animal, and each new year’s ruler, Tai Sui, meets it.
Across traditions
- In Japan and Korea it is the nenchū of Shichū Suimei and the nyeonju of saju; everywhere its branch is the year animal.
- In Western astrology the nearest idea is the slow planets a whole generation shares, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto in their signs: like the year pillar, they say more about where a person stands among others than about the person alone.
Origin and history
Years have been counted in the sixty-cycle since the Han dynasty, without a break, and the oldest birth reading began with them. Li Xuzhong, under the Tang, read a life from the year, month and day, with the year at the centre, as Han Yu’s epitaph for him records. Xu Ziping, in the 10th century, moved the centre to the Day Master, and the year became one pillar among four. The Song dynasty Yuanhai Ziping and the San Ming Tong Hui of the Ming set the year’s change at Lichun rather than at New Year, the rule BaZi still follows, and the Ziping Zhenquan, in the 18th century, reads the year’s stem and branch by their gods like every other.
How Ulune calculates it
Ulune finds the solar year of a birth, the Gregorian year whose Lichun opened it, and its place in the sixty-cycle, counted from Jia-Zi in 1984: the stem from the year’s last digit, Jia in years ending in 4, Yi in 5, and so round to Gui in 3; the branch from the Rat, in 2020 and every twelve years. Lichun is the Sun at 315° along its path, an instant, so no clock or time zone can move the year; a birth within five minutes of it is marked uncertain.
Correspondences
| Correspondence | Year pillar |
|---|---|
| Characters, pinyin | 年柱 niánzhù, “the year pillar” |
| Runs | From Lichun to Lichun, about 4 February |
| Its branch | The year animal |
| It sets | The months’ stems; the luck pillars’ direction, with the count |
| Stars read from it | Red Phoenix, Heavenly Joy; with the day, the four trine stars |
| In the tradition | Roots, the family line, the early years |
| 2024 to 2027 | Jia-Chen, Yi-Si, Bing-Wu, Ding-Wei |
| Japanese, Korean | Nenchū, nyeonju |
Related
- Month pillarThe second of the four pillars, the solar month of birth, from one opening term to the next: the season the self was born into, the strongest pillar.
- Year animalThe animal of the year of birth, the one most people know: in the tradition, how others see a person, and the roots and generation they share.
- Start of SpringThe first solar term, the Sun at 315° about 4 February: spring begins in the Chinese year, and with it the Tiger month and the year of the Four Pillars.
- Sixty-cycleThe sixty pairs of a Heavenly Stem and an Earthly Branch, from Jia Zi to Gui Hai, that name China’s years, months, days and hours: the pillars of BaZi.
- Day pillarThe third of the four pillars, the day of birth in the sixty-day cycle: its stem is the Day Master, the self, and its branch the partner palace.
- Hour pillarThe fourth of the four pillars, the double hour of birth: in BaZi, the children, the later years and the fruits of one’s work; without a birth time, left out.
- Luck pillarA ten-year pillar drawn from the month pillar, forward or backward through the sixty-cycle: the chapters of a life, each with its stem and branch.
Sources
- Han Yu, epitaph for Li Xuzhong, early 9th century
- Xu Sheng (ed.), Yuanhai Ziping, Song dynasty
- Wan Minying, San Ming Tong Hui, 16th century
- Shen Xiaozhan, Ziping Zhenquan, 18th century
- Joseph Needham, Science and Civilisation in China, vol. 3, 1959