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Overview
Key data
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Period | Tang (non-official) |
| Compiler | Cao Shiwei |
| Innovation | No grand epoch; a near epoch used |
A calendar outside the bureau
The Futian calendar was made by Cao Shiwei and used among the people; the bureau judged it against the old methods and did not adopt it.
Its importance lies in dropping the grand epoch. Traditional calendars reckoned from an “grand epoch” so remote that its year-count ran to millions — cumbersome and error-prone. The Futian took 660 CE as a near epoch and reckoned directly from it, simple and workable.
Influence
The idea was valued by late Tang and Five Dynasties calendrists; Bian Gang’s Chongxuan and others were affected. After the Song the grand epoch was gradually abandoned, and the Futian began it.
That a popular calendar could move the official one shows the debate was not confined to the court.
Full text
No electronic full text of this work is available here. This calendar has no separate transmitted text; its methods survive scattered in the calendrical treatises of the standard histories. Among the histories held here, see New History of the Five Dynasties, Records of the Astronomical Bureau.
The title, date, summary and index structure compiled here are offered under CC BY 4.0 (attribution: Chujia Kuang · kuangchujia.com).
Compiled and arranged by Chujia Kuang.