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Confucius: His Life And Teaching

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 February 2009

Extract

The third of October, 1949, was the 2,500th anniversary of Confucius’ birth. This date has been under dispute for more than 2,000 years. Early and reliable accounts state that the birth was on a certain day of the Chinese sixty-day cycle and that it was fifty days after an eclipse of the sun. But those same accounts list eclipses of the sun in two successive months, something that is impossible in China. Only recently has any one bothered to calculate which eclipse actually occurred and discover that, in a period of twenty years before and after the birth, only one eclipse of the sun occurred on that day of the cycle and was visible at Confucius’ birthplace. So this date can be fixed accurately by modern scientific methods.1

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 1951

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References

1 H. H. Dubs, “The Date of Confucius’ Birth,” Asia Major, N.S., vol. I, 1949, part 2, pp. 139–146.

page 33 note 1 The Political Career of Confucius,” Journal of the American Oriental Society, vol. 66, 4, Oct., 1946, pp. 273282.CrossRefGoogle Scholar