Preliminary Approach to the Astronomy of the Achang Nationality

The people of the Achang nationality have their independent spoken language but without the written language, and it has not been found whether there is their traditional astronomy. It is known from our on-the-spot investigated results that the explanation of the universe spread far and wide among the Achang people is the understanding of the first stage of the development of astronomy. From about A. D. 1500 up to now the Achang nationality has become related to the Han nationality by marriage, been influenced gradually by the Han civilization and used the traditional Chinese calendar. The contents of the calendar before A. D. 1500 have been lost and only four traditional festivals and part of the primitive religions are preserved from which the hint of the historical remains of the original calendar can be got.Among the traditional festivals, the first is the "Woluo" festival, of which "woluo" was originally the voice of cheers made by the people when they had bumper harvests after hunting and then has become the festival of the mass song and dance activities, with the date being not fixed in January. The unmarried young people celebrate their "Watering Flowers" festival in some day of March, singing in antiphonal style and making friends. June 25is the "Torch" festival, of which the activities are varied and colourful. Oc-tober26 is the first day of the " Meeting in the Streets" festival, with a period of 5 or 6 days, and it means in original that the people celebrate their harvests of a year. From this it is inferred that the last two festivals arise from the twice celebrations of a new year in summer and in winter, respectively, and it is the very outstanding characteristics of the "Ten-Month Calendar." As for the new year in winter, after the people lived for 10 months, totally containing 360 days, they celebrate the new year by using the 5 or 6 days left in a year and then the festival has been "simply" transplanted into October of the lunar calendar. The fact that according to the primitive religions only the Sun but not the Moon is worshipped can be used as the evidence for the utilization of the solar calendar (i. e. the "Ten-Month Calendar").