Javanese calendar

TheJavanese calendar(Javanese:ꦥꦤꦁꦒꦭ꧀ꦭꦤ꧀ꦗꦮ,romanized:Pananggalan Jawa)  is thecalendarof theJavanese people. It is used concurrently with two other calendars, theGregorian calendarand theIslamic calendar. The Gregorian calendar is the official calendar of theRepublic of Indonesiaand civil society, while the Islamic calendar is used by Muslims and the Indonesian government for religious worship and deciding relevantIslamic holidays.
The Javanese calendar is used by the main ethnicities ofJava island—that is, theJavanese,Madurese, andSundanese people—primarily as acultural iconand identifier, and as a maintained tradition of antiquity. The Javanese calendar is used for cultural and spiritual purposes.
The current system of the Javanese calendar was inaugurated bySultan Agung of Mataramin the Gregorian year 1633 CE.Prior to this, the Javanese had used theŚaka calendar, which has its epoch in 78 CE and uses thelunisolar cyclefor calculating time.Sultan Agung's calendar retained the Saka calendar year system of counting, but differs by using the samelunar yearmeasurement system as theIslamic calendar, rather than thesolar year. Occasionally, the Javanese calendar is referred to by itsLatinnameAnno JavanicoorAJ(Javanese Year).
The Javanese calendar contains multiple, overlapping (but separate) measurements of times, called "cycles". These include:
The Javanese calendar year of 1944 occurred entirely within the civil calendar year of 2011.Such years occur once every 33 or 34 Javanese years (32 or 33 civil years). More are listed here:
A Javanese year will be entirely within a Gregorian year of the same number in the year 4195,after which year the number of the Javanese year will always be greater than the number of the concurrent civil year.
Days in the Javanese calendar, like the Islamic calendar, begin atsunset.Traditionally, Javanese people do not divide the day and night intohours, but rather into phases.The division of a day and night are:
The native Javanese system groups days into a five-dayweekcalledPasaran, unlike most calendars that uses a seven-day week. The name,pasaran, is derived from the root wordpasar("market"). Historically, but also still today, Javanese villagers gather communally at local markets to socially meet, engage in commerce, and buy and sell farm produce, cooked foods, home industry crafted items and so on.John Crawfurd(1820) suggested that the length of the weekly cycle is related to the number of fingers on the hand,and that itinerant merchants would rotate their visits to different villages according to a five-day "roster".
The days of the cycle each have two names, as theJavanese languagehas distinct vocabulary associated with two different registers ofpoliteness:ngoko(informal) andkrama(formal). Thekramanames for the days, second in the list, are much less common.
The origin of the names is unclear, and theiretymologyremains obscure. Possibly, the names may be derived from indigenous gods, like theEuropean and Asian namesfor days of the week.An ancient Javanese manuscript illustrates the week with five human figures (shown at right below the day names): a man seizing a suppliant by the hair, a woman holding a horn to receive an offering, a man pointing a drawn sword at another, a woman holding agricultural produce, and a man holding a spear leading a bull.
Additionally, Javanese consider these days' names to have a mystical relation tocolorsandcardinal direction:
MostMarketsno longer operate under this traditionalPasarancycle, instead pragmatically remaining open every day of theGregorianweek. However many markets in Java still retain traditional names that indicated that once the markets only operated on certainPasarandays, such as Pasar Legi, or Pasar Kliwon.Some markets in small or medium size locations will be much busier on thePasaranday than on the other days. On the market's name day itinerant sellers appear selling such things as livestock, plants and other products that are either less frequently purchased or are more expensive. This allows a smaller number of these merchants to service a much larger area much as in bygone days.
Javanese astrological belief dictates that an individual's characteristics and destiny are attributable to the combination of thePasaranday and the "common" weekday of the Islamic calendar on that person's birthday. Javanese people find great interest in the astrological interpretations of this combination, called theWetonancycle.
The seven-day-long week cycle (dina pitu, "seven days") is derived from theIslamic calendar, adopted following the spread of Islam throughout the Indonesian archipelago. The names of the days of the week inJavaneseare derived from theirArabiccounterparts, namely:
These two week systems occur concurrently; thus, a certain Friday may fall on a Kliwon day, and is consequently calledJumat Kliwon.This combination forms theWetonancycle.
TheWetonancycle superimposes the five-dayPasarancycle with the seven-day week cycle. EachWetonancycle lasts for 35 (7x5) days. An example ofWetonancycle:
From the example above, theWetonfor Tuesday May 6, 2008 would be read asSelasa Wage.
TheWetonancycle is especially important for divinatory systems, important celebrations, and rites of passage. Commemorations and events are held on days considered to be auspicious.
An especially prominent example, still widely taught in primary schools, is that theWetonfor theProclamation of Indonesian Independenceon 17 August 1945 took place onJumat Legi; this is also theWetonfor the birth and death ofSultan Agung, one of the greatest kings of Java and the inventor of the modern Javanese calendar.Therefore,Jumat Legiis considered an important night for pilgrimage.There are alsotaboosthat relate to the cycle; for example, the ritual dancebedhayacan only be performed onKemis Kliwon.
The coincidence of thePasaranday with the common day on the day of birth is considered by Javanese to indicate the personal characteristics of that person, similar to the WesternZodiacand planetary positioning inWestern astrology.
Pawukonis a 210-day cycle in Javanese calendar,related to Hindu tradition. Though most associated withBali, it is still used in Java  for special purposes. The calendar consists of concurrent weeks, and has a set of ten weeks, which have a duration of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10 days.
The first day of the year is considered the first day of all ten weeks. As 210 is not divisible by 4, 8, or 9, extra days must be added to the 4-, 8-, and 9-day weeks.
For timekeeping, days are numbered within the lunar month (wulan) as is common in other calendar systems. The date indicates the change in the moon, and symbolizes the life of a human in the world. This process of revolving life is known ascakra manggilinganorheru cakra.
On the first day of the month, when the moon is small, it is compared to a newborn baby. The 14th day, calledPurnama Sidhi(full moon), represents a married adult. The next day, calledPurnama, occurs as the moon begins to wane. The 20th day,Panglong, symbolizes the point at which people begin to lose their memory. The 25th day,Sumurup, represents the point at which the adult requires care like when they were young. The 26th day,Manjing, represents the return of the human to his or her origin.
Because a Javanese lunar year is between 11 and 12 days shorter than a civil year, it begins 11–12 days earlier in the civil year following the civil year in which the previous Javanese year began. Once every 33 or 34 Javanese years, or once every 32 or 33 civil years, the beginning of a Javanese year (1 Sura) coincides with one of the first ten days of January. Subsequent New Years move backwards through the civil year back to the beginning of January again, passing through each civil month from December to January.
Thesolar yearis divided into twelve periods (mangsa) of unequal length. Its origin lies inagriculturepractice in Java. The names of the first ten months are simply theordinal numbersfrom 1 to 10 in Javanese language, although the names of the 11th and 12th months are unclear.The cycle begins near theJune solstice, around the middle of the dry season in Java.
In the 19th century, the solar month system orpranata mangsawas much better known among Javanese than the civil or religious year.The cycle is clearly of Javanese origin, since the specific application to their climate does not match other territories in theIndonesian archipelago, as well as the usage of Javanese names for the months.Although the cycle matches the weather pattern well, it is still clearly somewhat arbitrary, as can be seen in the lengths of the months.
Inastrology, the pranata mangsa is used to predict personality traits in a similar manner tosun signsin Western astrology. It is not widely used anymore fordivination, but some practitioners use it as well as the other cycles in their divination.
The Solar months are :
Eachlunar year(taun) is divided into a series of twelvewulan/sasior lunar months. Each consists of 29 or 30 days. This is adapted from the use of months in the Islamic calendar. The names of the month are given below in Javanese and Arabic which can be used interchangeably:
Length of the last month may be 29 or 30 days, depending on whether the year is normal or a leap year (taun kabisat).
The cycle of months is sometimes considered metaphorically to represent the cycle of human life. The first nine months representgestationbefore birth, while the tenth month represents the human in the world, the eleventh the end of his or her existence, and the twelfth the return to where he or she came from. The cycle thus goes from one spark or conception (rijal) to another, traversing through the void (suwung).
TheShalivahana era, which started in 78 CE and continues to be used on Bali, was used in Hindu times on Java, and for well over a century after the appearance of Islam on Java.
When Sultan Agung adopted the Islamic lunar calendar in 1633 CE, he did not adopt theAnno Hegiraeto designate those years, but instead continued the count of the Shalivahana era, which was 1555 at the time.As a result, the Anno Javanico does not in effect count from any time.
Eighttahunmakes up awindu. A singlewindulasts for 81 repetitions of the wetonan cycle, or 2,835 days (about 7 years 9 months in the Gregorian calendar). Thetahunare lunar years, and of shorter length than Gregorian years. The names of the years in the cycle of windu are as follows (in krama/ngoko):
Thewinduare then grouped into a cycle of four:
The cycles ofwulan,tahun, andwinduare derived from theSaka calendar.
Windu'are no longer used much in horoscopy, but there is evidence that it was previously used bycourt officialsto predict trends. The passing of awinduis often seen as a milestone and deserving aslametanritual feast.
Thekurupis a period of 120tahun, or lunar years.  There are thus 1440 lunar months, or 15winduin akurup.  One day is dropped from the last month of Besar having 30 days, resulting in the lastwinduof thekuruphaving one less day than usual.  Thus, the total number of days in akurupis 42,524 (2,835 days in awindux 15windu- 1 day).  This is the same number of days as in 120 lunar years of the Tabular Islamic Calendar.
Eachkurupis named for date of the wetonan cycle on which thekurupcommences. As this always falls in the Alip (first) year of thewindu, it is prefixed with Alip.  The currentkurupstarted on Tuesday, March 24 of 1936 CE, which corresponds to Muharram 01 of 1355 AH in the Tabular Islamic Calendar, and will end on Sunday, August 25 of 2052 CE.  As the wetonan date of that day was Selasa Pon, thekurupis named Alip Selasa Pon.
The nextkurupwill commence on Monday, August 26 of 2052 CE, which corresponds to Muharram 01 of 1475 AH in the Tabular Islamic Calendar, and will end on Saturday, January 28 of 2169 CE, and will be named Alip Senin Pahing.
Dina Mulya(ꦢꦶꦤꦩꦸꦭꦾ, literally "noble days") are celebrated by worshippingGusti, the creator of life and the universe. Practitioners of traditional Javanese spiritual teachings have preserved several noble days: