Fire Horse
| Fire Horse | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chinese name | |||||||
| Chinese | 丙午 | ||||||
| |||||||
| Vietnamese name | |||||||
| Vietnamese alphabet | Bính Ngọ | ||||||
| Chữ Hán | 丙午 | ||||||
| South Korean name | |||||||
| Hangul | 병오 | ||||||
| Hanja | 丙午 | ||||||
| |||||||
| Japanese name | |||||||
| Kanji | 丙午 | ||||||
| Kana | ひのえうま へいご | ||||||
| |||||||
| 01 Wood Rat |
02 Wood Ox |
03 Fire Tiger |
04 Fire Rabbit |
05 Earth Dragon |
06 Earth Snake |
| 07 Metal Horse |
08 Metal Goat |
09 Water Monkey |
10 Water Rooster |
11 Wood Dog |
12 Wood Pig |
| 13 Fire Rat |
14 Fire Ox |
15 Earth Tiger |
16 Earth Rabbit |
17 Metal Dragon |
18 Metal Snake |
| 19 Water Horse |
20 Water Goat |
21 Wood Monkey |
22 Wood Rooster |
23 Fire Dog |
24 Fire Pig |
| 25 Earth Rat |
26 Earth Ox |
27 Metal Tiger |
28 Metal Rabbit |
29 Water Dragon |
30 Water Snake |
| 31 Wood Horse |
32 Wood Goat |
33 Fire Monkey |
34 Fire Rooster |
35 Earth Dog |
36 Earth Pig |
| 37 Metal Rat |
38 Metal Ox |
39 Water Tiger |
40 Water Rabbit |
41 Wood Dragon |
42 Wood Snake |
| 43 Fire Horse |
44 Fire Goat |
45 Earth Monkey |
46 Earth Rooster |
47 Metal Dog |
48 Metal Pig |
| 49 Water Rat |
50 Water Ox |
51 Wood Tiger |
52 Wood Rabbit |
53 Fire Dragon |
54 Fire Snake |
| 55 Earth Horse |
56 Earth Goat |
57 Metal Monkey |
58 Metal Rooster |
59 Water Dog |
60 Water Pig |
| Heavenly Stems ・ Earthly Branches | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
The fire horse (Japanese: 丙午 (ひのえうま); hinoe-uma, or へいご, heigo) or bing wu (Chinese: 丙午; pinyin: bǐngwǔ) or Bính Ngọ is the 43rd combination of the sexagenary cycle. It is preceded by Wood Snake and followed by Fire Goat. In the traditional correspondence of the Heavenly Stems with the Five Phases, bǐng (丙) represents yang and Fire, while the Earthly Branch wǔ (午) corresponds to the Horse zodiac.[2][3] It is said that birthrates in Japan tend to see a sharp decline in hinoe-uma years.[1][4]
Years
[edit]| 1st millennium | 2nd millennium | 3rd millennium | 4th millennium |
|---|---|---|---|
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Superstition
[edit]Origin
[edit]There is a superstition that "a woman born in the year of the fire horse has a strong temperament, shortens her husband's life and bring ruin to their families and maybe even kill their husbands." It is said that the superstition in the early Edo period that "there are many fires in the year of the fire horse", changed to a superstition about women's marriage because Yaoya Oshichi was believed to have been born during the fire horse.[5][6]
In the Edo period, all human ages were counted using East Asian age reckoning,[7] and if Yaoya Oshichi was born during the fire horse in 1666, then she would have been 18 years old in 1683 when she was burned at the stake. However in various biographies, such as that of Ihara Saikaku, she is 16 years old.[8][9] Ki no Kaion, in his jōruri Yaoya Oshichi, placed Oshichi's birth as during the fire horse, which influenced the jōruri Junshoku Edo Murasaki (Japanese: 潤色江戸紫) by Tamenaga Tarobei (Japanese: 為長太郎兵衛) et al. to say the same. Baba Bunkō in his work Kinsei Kōto Chobunshū (Japanese: 近世江都著聞集) states that Yaoya Oshichi being 11 years old when she hung a plaque at Tennō-ji in 1676 was the basis for assigning her birth year to 1666.
Ki no Kaion had a strong influence on the theatrical world, and the story in Bunkō's Kinsei Kōto Chobunshū has long been considered a true story, although it has been denied in modern times.[10]
Births in 1906
[edit]This superstition continued even into the Meiji era, and in 1906 the number of births decreased by about 4% from the previous year. In some cases, the births of boys were reported to have been shifted to the year before or after they were actually born.[11]
Around 1924, when women born in 1906 were of marriageable age, there was a series of stories denying the superstition and reports of suicides of women whose marriage proposals were broken off, suggesting that the superstition of fire horse births affected women's marriages.[a] In his novel Gubijinzō published in 1907, Natsume Soseki describes Fujio, an evil woman who deceives the main character, as being "a fire horse".[12]
The novelist Ango Sakaguchi, who was born in this year, was given the name Heigo (炳五), which means fire horse (丙午 (へいご), heigo), and left a story in his writings about how he was told by relatives that it was "lucky he was born a man". Sakaguchi predicted that this superstition would not go away, which would turn out to be the case in 1966.[13]
Births in 1966
[edit]This superstition remained strong in the Shōwa era, and the birth rate in 1966 dropped 25% from the previous year.[14] Many couples avoided having children or had abortions, especially in rural and regional areas[b] and the number of births was extremely low compared to other years, with only 1,360,974 births.[15] On the other hand, the number of births between the previous year and the following year increased.
Since there were fewer children born in 1966, it was often discussed at the time whether it was easier to take high school and college entrance examinations in this school year (the population including early-borns in 1967 was about 1.6 million[16]) than in other years, but there was no significant difference in the general college entrance rate. While no such increase was seen, the rate of entry into public universities increased in 1985.[14] Additionally, in 1985 the first child rate was 50.9%, the highest ever in statistical history. [citation needed]
On the other hand, Japanese local governments took the following actions against fire horse superstitions: In November 1965, the Yamagata District Legal Affairs Bureau of the Ministry of Justice sponsored the "Fire Horse Banishment Campaign" in Yamagata City, and on the 21st of the same month, a parade was held in the city to raise awareness of the issue. According to the Legal Affairs Bureau, this was due to a number of consultations regarding the issue of childbearing, which led to divorce settlements and harassment from neighbors.[17] A similar movement was also underway in Kasukawa-mura in Gunma Prefecture (now Kasukawa-cho, Maebashi), led by the village mayor, who declared it a "village of banishment of superstition". The village office conducted a survey of 1,400 women born in 1906 and the years before and after, and worked to publicize the fact that fire horse superstitions have no basis.[18] The city of Kurume in Fukuoka Prefecture strongly rejected fire horse beliefs in its public relations paper, calling it "a fairy tale from once upon a time", "a truly strange custom most unbecoming of a scientific Japan, which last year produced its second Nobel Prize winner", and "of the world of fairy tales".[19]
Births in 2026
[edit]Between 2024 and 2025, many scholars and experts speculated that the trend would not significantly affect 2026 birth rates.[20][21][22][23][24]
Traditional Japanese Medicine and the Fire Horse Year
[edit]In Traditional Japanese Medicine (TJM), acupuncture, herbology and massage, the element of Fire governs the Heart/Mind (Shin神) which is responsible for emotional stability and clarity, In Japanese medicine the Fire Horse year is double the Fire Element in the Gogyo (五行) philosophy creating the highest Yo (ヨウ) energy posable. As it is a year of immense creativity and personal drive in Traditional Japanese Medicine when left unchecked the heat from the Fire rises up and out, creating reckless momentum that is over reacting and over reaching or extending in one's life. When in excess this can lead to burnout and excessive mental activity leading to physiological palpitations, sweating and psychological mental conditions of restless, anxiety, manic behaviour and in server cases hallucinations and or mania, by extension on a societal level turmoil and upheaval.[25][26][27]
Footnotes
[edit]References
[edit]- 1 2 Haberman, Clyde (15 January 1987). "Japan's Zodiac: '66 was a very odd year". The New York Times. ProQuest 110840956. Retrieved 21 October 2015.
- ↑ Smith, Adam (2011). "The Chinese Sexagenary Cycle and the Ritual Foundations of the Calendar". In Steele, John M. (ed.). Calendars and Years II: Astronomy and Time in the Ancient and Medieval World. Oxford: Oxbow Books. pp. 1–38. ISBN 9781842179871.
- ↑ National Astronomical Observatory of Japan. "Glossary on 60 Kanshi or Sexagenary Cycle - ECO, NAOJ".
- ↑ Kaku, Kanae (April 1975). "Increased induced abortion rate in 1966, an aspect of a Japanese folk superstition". Annals of Human Biology. 2 (2): 111–115. doi:10.1080/03014467500000651. PMID 1052742.
- ↑ "［どらく］ – 朝日新聞がビートルズ世代に贈る、こだわりエンターテインメントサイト". Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
- ↑ "東京消防庁＜消防マメ知識＞＜消防雑学事典＞". www.tfd.metro.tokyo.lg.jp. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
- ↑ "2007年│過去の展示一覧│江戸東京たてもの園". 19 August 2012. Archived from the original on 19 August 2012. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
- ↑ 井原西鶴 原著、吉行淳之介 現代語訳『好色五人女』河出書房新社、1979年、pp.66–86
- ↑ サライ責任編集『十代目桂文治』昭和の名人完結編、小学館、2011年、pp.11–12および付属CD「八百屋お七」
- ↑ 竹野 静男「西鶴-海音の遺産 八百屋お七物の展開」『日本文学』vol.32、日本文学協会編集刊行、1983年、p.11
- ↑ 高橋, 眞一 (April 2003). "明治 : 大正期における地域人口の自然増加と移動の関連性" [The Relationship between Natural Growth of Population and Migration by Region in the Early Twentieth Century in Japan]. 国民経済雑誌 [National Economic Journal] (in Japanese). 187 (4): 31–44. doi:10.24546/00055847. hdl:20.500.14094/00055847.
- ↑ 虞美人草 (夏目 漱石) (in Japanese).
- ↑ 坂口安吾. "坂口安吾 ヒノエウマの話". www.aozora.gr.jp (in Japanese). Retrieved 11 March 2022.
- 1 2 赤林 英夫 (December 2007). "丙午世代のその後―統計から分かること" [What happened to the Hei-go generation after that? What the statistics tell us] (PDF). 日本労働研究雑誌 [Japan Labor Research Journal] (in Japanese) (569): 17–28.
- ↑ 内閣府『青少年白書』平成18年版
- ↑ "18歳人口と高等教育機関への進学率等の推移" [Trends in the 18-year-old population and the rate of enrollment in higher education institutions] (PDF) (in Japanese). Archived from the original (PDF) on 10 October 2015.
- ↑ Kahoku Shimpō November 1965
- ↑ "Vol.78 ひのえうま 「迷信の追放」に挑んだ村 昭和41年（1/2）- 昭和史再訪セレクション – 地球発 – [どらく]". 23 January 2012. Archived from the original on 23 January 2012. Retrieved 11 March 2022.
- ↑ 「暮らしのしおり」 久留米市役所『市政くるめ』第188号 1966年1月5日
- ↑ "60年前は出生激減…2026年「令和のひのえうま」はどうなる？". 読売新聞 (in Japanese). 16 September 2025. Retrieved 5 September 2026.
- ↑ 産経新聞 (8 January 2025). "来年は丙午（ひのえうま） 過去には迷信で〝産み控え〟 少子化加速回避へ「啓発が必要」". 産経新聞：産経ニュース (in Japanese). 産経新聞. Retrieved 5 September 2026.
- ↑ "来る26年は丙午（ひのえうま）。前回66年の出生率・数激減が再来しないと予測される理由など（坂東太郎） - エキスパート". Yahoo!ニュース (in Japanese). Retrieved 5 September 2026.
- ↑ Lewis, Leo. "Japanese births set to fall below lowest official forecasts in 2025". Financial Times. Retrieved 28 December 2025.
- ↑ "Japan's birth rate dropped sharply in 1966, influenced by cultural beliefs". Our World in Data. Retrieved 5 September 2026.
- ↑ "2026 Year of the Horse ~ | The Dao". thedaohealth.com.au. 22 December 2025. Retrieved 25 June 2026.
- ↑ "Japanese Acupuncture | COMO Shambhala Stories". COMO Shambhala. Retrieved 25 June 2026.
- ↑ "The Fire Element". www.thomsonmedical.com. Retrieved 25 June 2026.
Annotations
[edit]- ↑ An example from the press "Girls turning 19 this year, troubled by superstitions; caught up in the distantly related 'fire horse' superstition", Asahi Shimbun, 10 February 1924 Morning Edition (in Japanese).
- ↑ Statistics also reported a high number of abortions. "Abortion in Japan is Unusually High," Asahi Shimbun, 22 August 1966, Evening Edition (in Japanese).