Talk:Traditional Chinese timekeeping

Talk regarding Ke (unit)

Is this logical or jibberish?

The top version of this wiki has some information written in the notes section that sounds either true or jibberish (edited by 64.122.219.100 on 05:13, 1 April 2008). Can someone confirm this? --Albert yusuke (talk) 16:15, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

100 Ke in a day?

This is the first time for my 3x years living on the Earth to hear that there are 100 ke in a day! I wonder where did the original author wrote this passage? We have been knowing that each double hour is divided into 8 ke. Therefore, computerized fortune-telling program need to know only a person's birthday up to a quarter of an hour. If a day was divided into 100 ke, I wonder how can people tell the time? Before that, we can say "half past three p.m." as "申時二刻" (the second quarter of the 9th double hour". But you cannot divide the 100 ke equally under the twelve double hours, right? -- Tomchiukc 16:30, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

If you read my text again, you will find that the ardent Jesuit missionaries had an itching finger and changed the original Chinese invention to 8x12=96 "new" ke a day, which seems OK with your fortune-telling..........

I added my source so you can check it out! :) Kurtan 00:00, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, I missed your point. If you have the ke=centiday, you can skip both minutes and [double] hours. You just count the kes from midnight=0 one night on till noon=50 and the day on again till midnigt=100 ! :) Kurtan 00:12, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

NPOV + Speculation?

The article as it is written now speculates that the French Revolutionary time/calendar system would have been successfully adopted if they'd known about the ke/short-quarter-hour. There's no way anyone can make that call, it should be rewritten.

The article also uses the word "unfortunate" which to me suggests an agenda.

agreed, the tone of the whole article seems wrong to me, ill try to do something about it --gwc 17:25, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

How do we know for sure that the French revolutionaries were entirely unaware? The article says that the Jesuits were aware of it, and they were there about a century before the revolution, and they were also in France. The 10x100x100 model was obviously based upon existing European analog clocks, but that does not prove that they had not heard of the Chinese method.

As for the French not using 100/day units, the laws establishing decimal time stated, Le jour, de minuit à minuit, est divisé en dix parties ou heures, chaque partie en dix autres, ainsi de suite jusqu’à la plus petite portion commensurable de la durée. The fact that these "dix autres" were intermediate between decimal hours and decimal minutes gives them the same position that quarters have to standard hours and minutes, which are still used today.

As for the centiday, this is not accepted for use with SI. In fact, it is expressly prohibited. The day (d) is accepted for use with the SI, but not with prefixes. See the SI brochure, which states:

Prefix names and symbols are used with a number of non-SI units (see Chapter 4), but they are never used with the units of time: minute, min; hour, h; day, d.

--Nike 08:33, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

Reference

The article references

the Shuowen Jiezi" from Xu Shen, "

There are several problems with this citation. First, the quote marks don't seem to make any sense. Second, the Shuowen Jiezi apparently is a dictionary by Xu Shen, not from Xu Shen. Finally, the editor does not say what publisher published the version that was relied on for this article. I've never seen this dictionary, and I don't know if you can just look up ke as you would in a modern dictionary. If not, some directions about how to look up ke would be in order.

I am asking about this because I want to add the reference to the article [Metrication]. Since I don't speak Chinese, I can't do so unless I can find a reliable English translation. --Gerry Ashton 23:06, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

This is not decimal !!

You cannot class something as a decimal system simply because it has (or had) one ratio of a power of ten. In a decimal system, all the ratios need to be powers of ten. From this article and the Chinese calendar article, it appears that none of the other ratios are powers of ten. Using the logic in this article, we could say that Western time-keeping is septenary because there are 7 days in a week!! -- 203.20.101.203 (talk) 07:55, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Recent changes

Orienomesh-w made some major changes. I do not know enough on the subject to judge whether it is an improvement, but there seems to be a translation issue. The grammar is so odd that I find some parts confusing. I don't think that "there're" is a word, and contractions are not appropriate in any case. And the repeated use of "scales" seems to be a mistranslation, as I am unfamiliar with use of the word in this context. Something like "etched markings" seems to be what the editor may have meant, as the article previously stated. However, I am hesitant to fix the grammar, since I don't know enough about the subject.

Another thing that occurs to me, which was retained from the previous version, is that "centiday" is not really a thing, just something once suggested but never adopted as a unit. It might be worth mentioning here, but needs context. --Nike (talk) 06:23, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

Talk regarding "Chinese Traditional Time System"

Dual hours

I noticed that 12 shi within the article arr transliterated as zi-sh, chou-sh, yin-sh, etc. Please note that the syllable is pronounced shi in Standard Chinese. Hope someone correct the mistake. Super Wang 03:04, 23 September 2016 (UTC) Super Wang 03:04, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

The syllable is absolutely pronounced 'sh'. On the other hand, that sound is written 'shi' in pinyin, which is what Wikipedia should default to. — LlywelynII 21:24, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

Sources for future article expansion

• Petersen, Jens Østergård, "The Taiping Jing and the A.D. 102 Clepsydra Reform", Acta Orientalia, vol. Vol. 53, Copenhagen, pp. 122–158 {{citation}}: |volume= has extra text (help).

has a good treatment of the general system, its use, and some various reforms and their rationales.  — LlywelynII 21:19, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

Move and massive cleanup needed

With all due appreciation to the work that went into it, this article and its companion section at Chinese calendar currently read like the Google Translate version of Time Cube, which is a shame since they are talking about interesting and important topics. The entirety of this article that is not nonsense seems to come from here. That article needs to be used to rebuild this article from the ground up, starting—as Nike mentioned above—with the removal of the WP:OR "translations" of the Chinese terms with oddities like "centiday".

The article is also clearly in the wrong place. Even if we were using these words (which we shouldn't), the "traditional" should precede the "Chinese" as with TCM and this isn't a proper name that takes all caps. Really, "time system" isn't a thing. It should be Traditional Chinese timekeeping or whatever similar phrasing Cambridge, Oxford, et al. use for describing these systems. — LlywelynII 14:39, 12 March 2017 (UTC)

Cleanup notes

I've put in a lot of elbow grease (keyboard grease?) to clean up this page and phrase things in a way that makes sense. I also moved the content from the Chinese calendar article's section on timekeeping to here, to keep the information in one place. I don't speak or read Chinese, but I was able to find sources with a combination of ctrl+f and Google Translate.

The one section I haven't been able to find any backup for is this one from Chinese calendar:

16-parts system

At pre-Qin and Qin-Han, a day was divided into 16 parts from the cock time (3:00; 4:15 / sig 1 point 50 fen). The 16-parts system is established for calendar convenience, for:

A season is about 91 days and 5 parts, and a solar month is about 30 days and 7 parts.

A couple of months is about 59 days and a part.

I'm assuming this has something to do with the Han-era system, just with another division of time added. I found one Chinese-language article that compares time systems throughout Chinese history, and most have a division of time called "rooster crows" that falls around 03:00. It even indicates that the Huainanzi uses it as a time unit, though I can't find anything on my own. Someone who can actually read Chinese might be able to find a source and explain it. For now, I'm just leaving it here and not within the article.

--A garbage person (talk) 15:56, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

Mainly, the third paragraph of the article says that the twelve "时辰" system is a development from the divide-into-segments timekeeping system.

"显然它是在分段纪时之制发展为十二进制基础上建立起来的纪时制度。"

"..., it is obvious that it [the twelve "时辰" system"] is a timekeeping system developed from the divide-into-segments timekeeping system using twelve as a basis."

"而战国秦汉之际仍流行分段纪时之制。"

"..., while during the Warring States, Qin dynasty, and Han dynasty periods, the divide-into-segments timekeeping system was popular."

Fourth Paragraph:

"分段纪时之制，是最古老的沿用历史最悠久的中国古代纪时法，是本之于日月运行以及人类的生活习俗和生产活动规律的划分时段的纪时法。分段纪时之制起自何时不详。早在大汶口文化时期的陶文，已有旦、炅两字，[41]似乎与纪时相关。至殷代逐步形了一套不均匀的分段纪时制度，殷武丁时，一天分为十三时段，白天九段，夜间四段；至廪辛康丁武乙文武丁时，一天分为十六时段，白天九段，夜间七段。"

"Divide-into-segments timekeeping system is the most established old era Chinese timekeeping system that has the oldest basis in history. It is a time-keeping system that divides periods based on the motions of the sun and moon as well as the customs and patterns of human lives. The invention of divide-into-segments timekeeping system is not clear. As early as the Dawenkou cultural era's pottery inscriptions, there were the two words 旦 and 炅 as though they were related to timekeeping. Until the time of the Yin Dynasty, a timekeeping standard with a set of uneven periods gradually developed. During the reign of King Wu Ding, a day was divided into thirteen periods — 9 in the day; 4 in the night. Until the time of Lin Xin, Kang Ding, Wu Yi, Wen Wu Ding (Shang Dynasty figures), a day was divided into 16 segments — 9 in the day, 7 in the night." Fredrick Campbell (talk) 11:35, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

Fifth paragraph

"西周时代流行分段纪时之制，见于典籍的时称有昧爽（《牧誓》）、朝（《召诰》）、日中、 昃 （《无逸》）、鸡鸣（《逸周书·周祝》）等，见于金文的时称有昧丧、大采（《小盂鼎》）、明（《墙盘》）、旦（《休盘》）、朝（《令彝》）、夜（《师虎簋》）、夕（《麦尊》）、夙（《利簋》）等，不完全。"

"Regarding the popular Western Zhou divide-into-segments timekeeping standard, the names of the 时 names encountered in classical texts include 昧爽 hidden brightness（《牧誓》）, 朝 toward（《召诰》）, 日中 sun center, 昃 decline（《无逸》）, 鸡鸣 chickens chirp（《逸周书·周祝》）etc. The 时 names encountered in bronze texts include 昧丧 hidden funeral, 大采 large gathering（《小盂鼎》）, 明 clear（《墙盘》）, 旦 dawn（《休盘》）, 朝 towards（《令彝》）, 夜 evening（《师虎簋》）, 夕 dusk（《麦尊》）, 夙 morning（《利簋》）, etc. The list is incomplete."

If you are wondering, the sixth paragraph talks of the Spring and Autumn period, the seventh Yan Dynasty and the eighth Qin Dynasty. Fredrick Campbell (talk) 12:02, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

I have had a look at your source but the source has heavy usage of Literary Chinese, probably because the author reads a lot of it.

Anyway, here's my own manual translations of what it says.

"中国古代的纪时制度，大致有三种，曰漏刻之制，十二时辰之制，分段纪时之制。"

Phrase by phrase translation: Traditional/Ancient Chinese timekeeping method, roughly three types, called leak notch system, twelve 时辰 system, dividing into segments timekeeping system.

Meaning translation: Traditional/Ancient Chinese timekeeping methods are largely covered by three categories — leak-notch system, twelve "时辰" system, and dividing into segments timekeeping system.

Fredrick Campbell (talk) 04:47, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

"漏刻之制，是利用漏壶的水漏量来计算时间，昼夜分作百刻，即《说文解字》所谓“漏，以铜受水刻节，昼夜百节”，故也称百刻纪时制。"

Phrase by phrase translation: Leak notch system, [it] uses a dripping pot's water leakage amount to calculate time, day night divided into hundred segments, [what]《说文解字》refers to as "drips, by water-accepting copper carve segments, day night hundred segments", because of this also known as hundred segment timekeeping system.

Meaning translation: Leak-notch system uses a dripping pot's water leakage amount to calculate time by dividing day and night into hundred segments.《说文解字》refers to this as "drips divide day and night into hundred segments by using a copper water container with segments" and is why the system is also known as hundred-segment timekeeping system.

Linguistic note: Hundred is likely not necessarily exact and could mean as little as around a hundred to hundreds.

Editing note: The 04:47 UTC comment will be edited to remove this line and the first line retranslated to match this one. I also removed the postscript. Fredrick Campbell (talk) 10:24, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

Editing my replies to correct the 纪时 translation error. Fredrick Campbell (talk) 10:36, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

It wasn't exactly a translation error according to Google Translate. I decided to make the nomenclature consistent between the two lines. This took more time than I thought, so I'll just be reading through it myself and report back without actually translating it to English. Fredrick Campbell (talk) 10:48, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

Removed {refimprove} tag

This can be added back in, but I think that there are enough sources for the major concepts that it can be removed. I've also made sure to add {citation needed} wherever there's a statement I haven't been able to back up.

--A garbage person (talk) 22:29, 3 June 2018 (UTC)

"Centiday" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Centiday has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 March 13 § Centiday until a consensus is reached. 1234qwer1234qwer4 22:00, 13 March 2023 (UTC)