Page 328 - A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols BIG Book

A-Z 321
The Chinese divide the year, as we do, into four seasons; though there was a period in the
Middle Ages when a division into five seasons was decreed, in order to bring the number
of seasons into line with the five colours, the five states of being ( elements) and all
the other things and events that come in fives. This fifth season was a short one,
interposed between the end of summer and the beginning of autumn.
In the old Chinese calendar, the year began at the second new moon after the
winter solstice. In very ancient times, the first or third new moon was sometimes
identified as the beginning of the new year. In our Western scheme of things the seasons
begin immediately after the relevant solstice or equinox, but in China there is a gap of up
to two months. This has to be borne in mind when we read, for example, that the
plum-tree ‘blossoms in winter’ – winter, for the Chinese, ended in April or even in May.

The rose as the symbol of the four seasons

The Yue-ling treatise (‘Ordinances for the Months’) lists the months with their
correspondences: the animals that reappear, the plants that must be sowed or planted or
which are then in bloom, the stars that the farmer must observe before he chooses a day
for this or that job, and also the rituals to be held in the imperial court. Requirements
were meticulously set out: ritual music must be in one of the five tones; if the season
was spring, green garments must be worn as green is the colour corresponding to
spring, etc. Even executions were to be carried out in autumn only, as the colour
corresponding to autumn was white, the colour of dying and death.
Flowers portrayed in a picture identify the season: thus, the plum-blossom
symbolises winter, the peony indicates spring, the lotus summer and the
chrysanthemum winter. In China, the rose plays nothing like the part it does in the West,