Tibetan Calendar - Days

Days

There are three different types of days (zhag), the khyim-zhag, the tshes-zhag and the nyin-zhag.

The first two of these days are astronomical days. The time needed for the mean sun to pass through one of the twelve traditional signs of the zodiac (the twelve khyim) is called khyim-zla (solar month). One-thirtieth of one solar month (khyim-zla) is one khyim-zhag, which might be called a zodiacal day, because there is no equivalent name in Western terminology.

The time needed by the moon to elongate 12 degrees from the sun and every 12 degrees thereafter is one tithi (tshes-zhag, lunar day). The lengths of such lunar days vary considerably due to variations in the movements of the moon and sun.

Thirty lunar days form one lunar or synodic month (tshes-zla), the period from new moon to new moon. This is equal to the time needed for the moon to elongate 360 degrees from the sun (sun to sun). The natural day (nyin-zhag) is defined by Tibetans as the period from dawn to dawn. Strictly speaking, the months appearing in a Tibetan almanac, called by us Tibetan calendar months, are not the same as lunar or synodic months (tshes-zla), which can begin and end at any time of day. In Tibetan, there is no special term for a calendar month containing whole days. These calendar months are just called zla-ba (month).

A Tibetan calendar month normally starts with the week day or natural day (gza' or nyin-zhag) in which the first tithi (tshes-zhag) ends. A Tibetan calendar month normally ends with the week day or natural day (gza' or nyin-zhag) in which the 30th tithi (tshes-zhag) ends. In consequence, a Tibetan calendar month (zla-ba) comprises 29 or 30 natural days. In the sequence of natural days or week days, there are no omitted days or days that occur twice. But since these days are also named by the term tshes together with a cardinal number, it happens that certain numbers or dates (the corresponding tithi) do not occur at all (chad) or appear twice (lhag). The tithi are counted from 1 to 30 and it can happen that a Monday with the lunar day number 1 (tshes gcig) is followed by a Tuesday with the moon day number 3 (tshes gsum). On the other hand, a Monday with the lunar day number 1 (tshes gcig) may be followed by a Tuesday with the lunar day number 1 (tshes gcig). In other words, it happens quite often that certain dates do not appear in the Tibetan almanac and certain dates occur twice. But there are no natural days or week days that occur twice or which are omitted.

The days of the week (gza', གཟའ) are named for celestial bodies.

Day	Tibetan (Wylie)	Phonetic transcription	Object
Sunday	གཟའ་ཉི་མ་ (gza' nyi ma)	Sa nyi-ma	Sun
Monday	གཟའ་ཟླ་བ་ (gza' zla ba)	Sa da-wa	Moon
Tuesday	གཟའ་མིག་དམར་ (gza' mig dmar)	Sa Mik-mar	Mars
Wednesday	གཟའ་ལྷག་པ་ (gza' lhag pa)	Sa Lhak-ba	Mercury
Thursday	གཟའ་ཕུར་བུ། (gza' phur bu)	Sa Phur-bu	Jupiter
Friday	གཟའ་པ་སངས་ (gza' pa sangs)	Sa Ba-sang	Venus
Saturday	གཟའ་སྤེན་པ་ (gza' spen pa)	Sa ben-ba	Saturn

Nyima "Sun", Dawa "Moon" and Lhagpa "Mercury" are common personal names for people born on Sunday, Monday or Wednesday respectively.