Hong Luan: a minor star counted from the Rabbit

Counting back through twelve years, one palace per year

Hong Luan's position comes from the branch of the birth year alone. The placement verse is brief; it sits in the second volume of the classic known as Zi Wei Dou Shu Quan Shu (紫微斗数全书). Start at the Rabbit palace, call it the Rat, count backward to the Tai Sui of the birth year, and the star sits wherever you stop. The BaZi side has an article on the same verse, with the twelve-year table and the six year pairs that point at each other, in Hong Luan: the Rat starts on the Rabbit; this one looks at how the star falls into palace names on a Zi Wei chart.

Open the full-size diagram

Sketch: the numbers on the arcs count the years after a Rat year and each arrow points at that year's spot; all twelve spots are taken from the site engine.

The twelve arrows run from the Ox year to the Rat year, the number on each arc counts the years after a Rat year, and the arrow points at that year's spot. Twelve years turn counterclockwise once around the ring and return to the Rabbit. In numbers: write the branches as 0 to 11 from the Rat to the Pig, and the spot is 3 minus the year branch number, adding 12 first when it would go negative.

1. 1

   Fix the birth-year branch

   Use the branch of the birth year; which day the year turns on is set by the site's year-boundary setting.

2. 2

   Count back from the Rabbit

   A Rat year stops on the Rabbit, and each later year branch moves one palace backward.

3. 3

   Where you stop is Hong Luan

   The result is a branch position with no palace name yet; the name comes once Life is known.

When Life moves, the Rabbit spot changes its name

The year fixes the branch, but the palace name comes from Life, and Life's position is worked out from the birth month and hour together. Take a Rat year: the star lands on the Rabbit every time, and that Rabbit spot takes its name from wherever Life sits:

The order of the twelve palace names and the topic of each are laid out in what the twelve palaces discuss.

In the yearly layer the star is called Liu Luan

The time layers carry a copy of the star as well: the yearly layer runs the verse again on the yearly branch and renames the star Liu Luan. In a sample chart for a 1995 birth the natal Hong Luan stays on the Dragon, while Liu Luan runs like this:

Liu Luan is worked out by the yearly layer itself and is a separate mark from the natal Hong Luan. When a reading says "Hong Luan in such a palace", first check whether it belongs to the natal chart or to a year.

The Water line, and the half of the verse left out

In the section sorting stars by the five phases, the Quan Shu lists Hong Luan and Tian Xi on one line. Our translation:

Hong Luan and Tian Xi belong to Water.

The placement verse gives four lines of method (three for Hong Luan, the fourth for Tian Xi) and then four further lines of remarks that speak of life stages. Those lines are commentary rather than a rule; the site's engine uses only the placement and so does this article, which does not restate the remarks.

The partner star placed opposite it is covered in Tian Xi: the palace opposite Hong Luan; how Hong Luan sits relative to Nian Jie is shown in Nian Jie: a mirror table for twelve year branches.