Mid-Autumn Festival dates?

[crazy-meiguoren]

According to the calendar, it's still summer.

The Mid-Autumn Festival started yesterday.

What determines when the Mid-Autumn festival takes place?

How can it start on the cusp between summer and fall instead of the, well, middle of fall?

I'm a bit curious about the world around me...

[WangYuHong]

It's not exactly a random selection process... it just follows a different calendar system.

Look up "Lunar Calendar" in google to get more of the history... (I don't have any good links handy)

Historically, the Chinese followed the Lunar Calender which defines one month to be the period between two new moons, or about 29/30 days? (not sure on the exact number), and one year has 12 lunar months (sometimes 13).

The traditional Chinese holidays (Chinese New Year, Dragon Boat Festival, Mid-Autumn Festival) all use the Lunar calendar to determine the exact date. For the Mid-Autumn festival, it always falls on the 8th lunar month, and the 15th day. It's the same reason that the Chinese New Year seems to bounce around between January and February.

The only way I know of to convert between a western date (using the gregorian calendar) and a lunar date is to use an online calendar app, since there's a bunch of rules governing how things play out (just like trying to figure out when we're going to have a leap year, only about 10 times more complicated)

[crazy-meiguoren]

I suspected that the lunar calendar came in to play, and calculating the date may put even Easter to shame. This is new to me, so I would have expected something named Mid-Autumn to be more narrowly focused in its general date to be in the middle of the season. Perhaps the seasons on a lunar calendar are reckoned differently?

My curiosity was piqued when I saw a news article on Xinhua's web site where the government allowed a three day holiday for this event. It sounds like it's a big holiday for family get-togethers, much like Thanksgiving and Christmas are here in the States.

[Outofin]

Wikipedia is useful: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_calendar

Edited September 15, 2008 at 08:59 PM by Outofin
removing wrong info

[crazy-meiguoren]

Edited to remove reference and response to wrong info. I'll back you up. ;)

[WangYuHong]

Yeah, I'm not exactly clear on the seasons as far as the Chinese calendar is concerned...

Chinese New Year (mid January-mid February) is the start of spring to them, so that should give you a reference point... In the US, Spring doesn't start until March 21st, and if you go by "feeling" the weather, it doesn't "feel" like spring until mid-April even.

[johnd]

I had been thinking about exactly the same thing at the weekend, and decided it must be that the words for seasons in Chinese do not map directly to the words for seasons in English. Here's the confirmation from Outofin's wikipedia link:

In Chinese astronomy, seasons are centered on the solstices and equinoxes, whereas in the standard Western definition, they begin at the solstices and equinoxes. Thus the term Beginning of Spring and the related Spring Festival fall in February, when it is still very chilly in temperate latitudes in the Northern Hemisphere.

[HashiriKata]

Let's try some maths (the Chinese way):

Spring: 3months (beginning of Jan-end of March)

Summer: 3months (-------------April----------June)

Autumn: 3months (-------------July-----------September)

Then, the Mid-Autumn Festival falls on 15th of August, which is exactly in the middle of Autumn, and hence the name.

(The months referred to above are the lunar months, if you don't already realise that.)

[crazy-meiguoren]

In the US, Spring doesn't start until March 21st, and if you go by "feeling" the weather, it doesn't "feel" like spring until mid-April even.

That is so true, especially this year, when it snowed in April. Considering what feels like an early fall here, China may have it spot on this year.

the Mid-Autumn Festival falls on 15th of August, which is exactly in the middle of Autumn, and hence the name.

The Western solar calendar has seasons starting earlier than when the real seasonal climate begins. (at least for the warmer seasons.) This is even earlier still.

It would make an interesting study to see how the seasons have been defined either way. I've always been one to consider seasons by the thermometer instead of the calendar.