Read a Palace with Its Opposite and Two Trines
Any palace in a Ziwei chart is read together with three others. The one you are looking at is the home palace. The one directly across the chart is its opposite palace.
The two trine palaces sit four cells away, one on each side. Each cell carries an Earthly Branch. With the home palace in Zi, the trines are in Shen and Chen, and the opposite is in Wu.
The home palace and its two trines form a triangle on the chart. Those are the three directions, and adding the opposite gives the four squares.
Build your chart with the free Ziwei Doushu calculator. The chart is labelled in Chinese, and the cells marked 命宮, 財帛, 官祿 and 遷移 are your Life Palace and its three partners. On a computer, hover over any cell and the chart marks its opposite and two trines.
See your Ziwei Doushu chart
Generate your natal chart to discover which stars shape your destiny and how they interact across your twelve palaces.
The Four Palaces for Each of the Twelve
The twelve palaces fall into four groups, and the three palaces in each group are trines of one another. Find the home palace's row and read across.
| Home palace | Opposite | Trines |
|---|---|---|
| Life | Travel | Wealth, Career |
| Siblings | Friends | Health, Property |
| Spouse | Career | Travel, Fortune |
| Children | Property | Friends, Parents |
| Wealth | Fortune | Career, Life |
| Health | Parents | Property, Siblings |
| Travel | Life | Fortune, Spouse |
| Friends | Siblings | Parents, Children |
| Career | Spouse | Life, Wealth |
| Property | Children | Siblings, Health |
| Fortune | Wealth | Spouse, Travel |
| Parents | Health | Children, Friends |
How to Read It in Four Steps
Go in order: the home palace, the opposite, the trines, then the transformations. Each step looks for one thing.
- Check the home palace's major stars and their brightness. The major stars are the fourteen main stars, and they set the tone of the palace. Brightness runs in seven grades, from Temple (Miao), the strongest, to Fallen (Xian), the weakest.
- Check the opposite palace. Its stars shine across into the home palace. If the home palace has no major star, borrow the opposite palace's stars.
- Check the two trines. Their stars are supporting evidence, showing what backs up or holds back the home palace.
- Check where the Four Transformations and the good and harsh stars fall among the four. The transformations are four tags: Hua Lu (wealth), Hua Quan (power), Hua Ke (fame) and Hua Ji (obstacle). The first three lean toward help, and Hua Ji toward obstacles. Benefic stars such as Zuofu and Youbi tend to bring help, while malefic stars such as Qingyang and Tuoluo tend to bring ups and downs.
Example: The Life Palace's Four
The Life Palace is about you. But who you are also shows in how you earn, how you work and how you get on with people out in the world. So the Life Palace is read with the Wealth, Career and Travel palaces.
Take a chart with the Life Palace in Zi, Ziwei as its only major star, and a birth in a Gui year.
| Palace | Branch | Stars (brightness) | Birth-year tags |
|---|---|---|---|
| Life | Zi | Ziwei (Ping) | — |
| Wealth | Shen | Wuqu (De), Tianxiang (Miao) | — |
| Career | Chen | Lianzhen (Li), Tianfu (Miao) | — |
| Travel | Wu | Tanlang (Wang) | Tanlang Hua Ji |
- The Life Palace holds only Ziwei, at Ping, a middle grade, so its own strength is modest.
- Wealth holds Wuqu and Tianxiang, and Career holds Lianzhen and Tianfu. Tianxiang and Tianfu are both at Miao, the top grade, so money and work are well supported and make up for the Life Palace.
- The opposite is the Travel Palace, where Tanlang is at Wang, the second grade. Chances out in the world are plentiful.
- A Gui year gives Tanlang Hua Ji, so social life and networking may take extra effort. The year's other three tags fall outside these four palaces.
Why Qisha, Pojun and Tanlang Always Travel Together
These three stars are trines of each other on every chart, so they always land in the same triangle. Together they are called Sha Po Lang, one of four star groups. The other groups are sorted by the stars' nature, and only some of their stars are always trines.
| Star group | Stars | Always trines |
|---|---|---|
| Sha Po Lang | Qisha, Pojun, Tanlang | Qisha, Pojun, Tanlang |
| Zi Fu Lian Wu Xiang | Ziwei, Tianfu, Lianzhen, Wuqu, Tianxiang | Ziwei, Lianzhen, Wuqu; Tianfu, Tianxiang |
| Ji Yue Tong Liang | Tianji, Taiyin, Tiantong, Tianliang | Tianji, Tiantong; Taiyin, Tianliang |
| Ju Ri | Jumen, Taiyang | None |
Some books call these star groups patterns. At Fortune Cloud a group is only a way of sorting stars. A pattern is a specific combination the chart can detect, such as Qisha Facing the Dipper (Qi Sha Chao Dou) or Ziwei–Tianfu Together (Zi Fu Tong Gong).
Decade and Annual Readings
Decade and annual readings use the same method, with that period's Life Palace as the home palace. A Decade Cycle (Da Xian) is a ten-year stretch, and each one moves the Life Palace to a new cell. An annual reading moves it every year.
The natal four palaces stay the base, and the period's four are read on top of them. For how to read a single year, see the annual fortune guide.
Common Mistakes
The most common mistake is judging from the home palace alone. The same star in the home palace reads differently once the opposite and trines change.
- Counting starsthe method covers four palaces, not a fixed set of stars.
- Trines on one sidethe two trines sit one on each side of the home palace.
- Borrowing from trinesan empty home palace borrows only from its opposite, and the trines stay supporting evidence.
