What Chinese Zodiac Is 1970? Year of the Metal Dog

When the 1970 Metal Dog year starts and ends

The 1970 Metal Dog year began at Lunar New Year on February 6, 1970 and lasted until January 26, 1971, the day before the next new year. Anyone born between January 1 and Feb 6 1970 therefore belongs to the Earth Rooster year that started in 1969, while someone born in early 1971, up to Jan 26, is still a Metal Dog. 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 Metal Dog combination also falls in 2030, sixty years apart, because five elements and twelve animals realign only once in each sixty-year cycle. Lunar New Year 1970 fell on a Friday, while the Western Sun was in Aquarius.

Metal Dog personality

Fiercely loyal, principled and determined, the Metal Dog stands firm under pressure. The Dog's Earth generates Metal, which tradition reads as steadiness forged into moral resolve. People born in this year often earn deep respect for their integrity. Black-and-white thinking and grudges are the usual cautions, and forgiveness frees considerable energy. Their courage is often quiet, steady and entirely unselfish, and friends rarely doubt where they stand.

Metal is the element of autumn and harvest, and a Metal year is traditionally said to sharpen whatever animal it meets. Descriptions associate it with determination, discipline, clear judgement and a strong code of principle. Metal-year people are often portrayed as decisive, self-reliant and willing to do difficult things because they are right. The element is linked with refinement and with cutting away what is unnecessary, so it tends to bring focus and high standards. Its traditional shadow is rigidity: Metal can become inflexible, proud or emotionally guarded, preferring to be correct over being close, and finding it hard to bend once a position is taken.

1970 in numerology and the twelve-year cycle

In numerology the digits reduce to 8, associated with ambition, authority and material results, so an 8 year is described in terms of effort and reward. The digits of 1970 add up to 17, which reduces to 8. In the twelve-year cycle the Dog is the eleventh animal, earthly branch Xu, with Earth as its fixed element and Yang polarity. The year element is Metal, and in the five-element cycles earth generates Metal. The year before was the Earth Rooster and the year after is the Metal Pig.

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