Double hour 1 of 12 · 時支
Rat Hour 子时 23:00–00:59: Secret Animal & Meaning
The Rat hour 子时 runs 23:00–00:59. Born then, your secret animal is the Rat; the hour branch is 子 (Yang Water), and the hour stem follows the day stem.
Traditional secret-animal reading
The Rat hour’s inner image
The Rat hour places Yang Water at the turn between one civil day and the next. As a secret-animal image, it suggests an inward beginning already carrying movement: possibilities are forming before they have a public shape, like a current continuing beneath a quiet surface.
In hour folklore, this is the hour rats are boldest, when a still household is theirs.
One branch · four linked coordinates
What stays fixed in the Rat period
五鼠遁 · day stem sets hour stem
Five complete Rat hour pillars are possible
- 01 · on 甲 Jia / 己 Ji days甲子Yang Wood Rat
- 02 · on 乙 Yi / 庚 Geng days丙子Yang Fire Rat
- 03 · on 丙 Bing / 辛 Xin days戊子Yang Earth Rat
- 04 · on 丁 Ding / 壬 Ren days庚子Yang Metal Rat
- 05 · on 戊 Wu / 癸 Gui days壬子Yang Water Rat
A period across two civil dates
Rat hour exposes the disputed day boundary
The period begins at 23:00 and ends at 00:59. A late-Rat-hour school starts the next sexagenary day at 23:00, while a civil-midnight school changes it at 00:00. The hour branch remains Rat; the day stem and therefore the hour stem can differ during 23:xx.
The same branch geometry at every scale
Its clash, harmony and trine do not change with the clock
The Rat branch clashes with Horse, forms Six Harmony with Ox, and belongs to the Water trine with Monkey and Rat and Dragon. These relationships come from fixed positions.