About Time

Digest from Of Time, Space and Other Things

The lunar month is roughly equal to 29.5days. More exactly,it is equal to 29 days, 12hours,44minutes,2.8seconds,or 29.5306days.
The lunar year built up out of twelve 29.5-day months is 354days long,,whereas twelve lunar months are actually 354.37days long.
Now it so happens that 30 true lunar years come out to be almost exactly an even number of days--10,631.016.Thirty year built up out of 29.5-day months come to 10,620dyas--just 11days short of keeping time with the Moon.For that reason,the Mohammedans scatter 11 days through the 30 years.
The Sun makes its complete cycle about the zodiac in roughly 365 days, so that the lunar year is about 11days shorter that the season-cycle,or "solar year".Three lunar years fall 33 days,or a little more than a full month behind the season-cycle.
19 solar years contain just about 235 lunar months...The Babylonians added that 7-month discrepancy through 19-year cycle...Each cycle had twelve 12-month years and seven 13-month years.
The solar year,however, is not exactly 365 days long...is about 365.25 days long.By 46 BC,the Roman calendar was 80 days behind the Sun...Julian Caesar let 46 BC continue for 445 days so that it was later known as "The Year of Confusion"...In order to take care of that extra 1/4 day, Caesar and Sosigenes established every fourth year with a length of 366 days. It is called Julian year.
The 365-day year is just 52 weeks and 1 day long. If a 366-day year is involved,and if February 6 is on Tues day that year,it is on Thursday the year after.It is for that reason that the 366-day year is called "leap year"and February 29 is "leap day".

Jin's Bureaucracy

Digest from The Manchus:

The imperial bureaucracy of the Jin empire bore little similarity to that of the Kitans, and part of the reason is to be found in the basic socio-economic differences between nomadic and sedentary societies. The Kitans and Mongols retained, at least in official policy, a strong attachment to the principles of nomadic life among their peoples and a toleration for traditional segmented political structures. They appear to have been disinclined to effect drastic changes in their economic and social lives by linking status or achievement to time-consuming attainments in civil or literary pursuits. For this reason, they largely eschewed the Chinese institurion of using written examinations to select and promote bureaucrats. ... In the case of the jurchens, however, the establishment of bilingual examinations by the peoples in question are evidence of a very different state posture.Unlike the Kitans or the Mongols,the Jurchens were not given land grants in China proper,nor were they committed to cultural precepts or political structures that were characteristic of nomadism. Attempts to use the examinations for the promotion of commoners or for restricting aristocratic access to high office were consistent, in the Jin empire,with aggressive programs to limit the privileges and the influence of the nobility,to centralize the state,and to prepare the dynastic constituency for a very broad role in maintenance of a civil system. These practices were all forerunners of the bureaucracy of the Qing empire.
...Manchu emperors were avid readers of the history of the Jin empire,and repeatedly referred to the dilemma of Shizong(1161-89),who could neither force the Jurchens to return to their old ways,nor sanction the new culture they were developing for themselves in China.

低谷

忙忙碌碌
只为爬出低谷
不忍心回望身后的荒芜
前方的墙碰了多少堵
什么时候它才结束？

问苍天无语
春秋几度
都辜负
也找不到归路
也寻不到去处