What Chinese Zodiac Is 1944? Year of the Wood Monkey

When the 1944 Wood Monkey year starts and ends

The 1944 Wood Monkey year began at Lunar New Year on January 25, 1944 and lasted until February 12, 1945, the day before the next new year. Anyone born between January 1 and Jan 25 1944 therefore belongs to the Water Goat year that started in 1943, while someone born in early 1945, up to Feb 12, is still a Wood Monkey. The Chinese calendar is lunisolar, which is why the start date moves between January 21 and February 20 instead of staying on January 1. The same Wood Monkey combination also falls in 2004, sixty years apart, because five elements and twelve animals realign only once in each sixty-year cycle. Lunar New Year 1944 fell on a Tuesday, while the Western Sun was in Aquarius.

Wood Monkey personality

Wood Monkey years are associated with inventive, sociable and constructive people. The Monkey's Metal prunes Wood in the controlling cycle, so traditional readings describe cleverness shaped by warmth and an interest in fairness. Those born then are often lively communicators and quick learners. The usual caution is starting new schemes before finishing old ones. Teaching and tinkering are often lifelong pleasures for them, and they enjoy sharing what they make.

Wood is the element of spring and of things that grow, so a Wood year is traditionally said to lend any animal a generous, expansive streak. Classical descriptions link it with kindness, idealism and a talent for cooperation: Wood people are often pictured as the ones who start community projects, mentor younger colleagues and believe that most situations can improve with patience and goodwill. The element also carries a strong sense of fairness and a dislike of waste. Its shadow side, according to most readings, is overextension. Like a plant reaching in every direction, a Wood-year person may take on too much, trust too readily or struggle to say no when a cause seems worthwhile.

1944 in numerology and the twelve-year cycle

In numerology the year reduces to 9, the number of completion, generosity and letting go, and a 9 year is traditionally read as one of endings that clear space. The digits of 1944 add up to 18, which reduces to 9. In the twelve-year cycle the Monkey is the ninth animal, earthly branch Shen, with Metal as its fixed element and Yang polarity. The year element is Wood, and in the five-element cycles metal controls Wood. The year before was the Water Goat and the year after is the Wood Rooster.

In the traditional sexagenary count the year is called Jia-Shen: Jia is the Wood heavenly stem and Shen is the Monkey's earthly branch. Stems and branches alternate between yang and yin together, which is why yang stems only ever meet yang animals.