The Weaver and the Cowherd

A complaint to the stars

In the Book of Poetry, the stars are tools that do no work.

An early mention is in the Book of Poetry, the Shijing, compiled between the 11th and 8th centuries BCE (opens in a new tab). In the ode Tâ Tung, as James Legge translated it in 1879 (opens in a new tab), an officer of the eastern states complains of the government's demands and turns to the sky.

The Weaving Sisters pass through their seven stages but “complete no bright work” (opens in a new tab); the Draught Oxen shine but do not draw carts; the Sieve does not sift, and the Ladle lades out no liquor. The stars are tools that do no work.

Sources for this section Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, From stars to roses: the forgotten origins of Chinese Valentine's Day (Huailin Mu) (opens in a new tab) · ; The Shih King (Book of Poetry), Minor Odes, Fifth Decade, Ode 9 (Ta Tung), tr. James Legge (Sacred Books of the East vol. 3, 1879), Project Gutenberg #9394 (opens in a new tab)

Which stars

Legge's notes place the Weaving Sisters in Lyra and the Draught Oxen in Aquila.

Legge's notes (opens in a new tab) identify the Weaving Sisters as three stars in Lyra that form a triangle, Vega and its two neighbours, and the Draught Oxen as stars in the neck of Aquila, around Altair. The Sieve and the Ladle, he notes, are in Sagittarius.

In the later Chinese sky the Hong Kong Space Museum (opens in a new tab) gives Vega as the first star of Zhinu, the Weaving Girl, and Altair as the second star of Hegu, the Drum at the River: the Cowherd, with a dimmer star on each side for the sons he carries on a pole.

Sources for this section The Shih King (Book of Poetry), Minor Odes, Fifth Decade, Ode 9 (Ta Tung), tr. James Legge (Sacred Books of the East vol. 3, 1879), Project Gutenberg #9394 (opens in a new tab) · ; Hong Kong Space Museum, Chinese Starlore (opens in a new tab)

From stars to lovers

Over centuries, poets gave the two stars human lives, a river between them and a bridge of magpies.

As Huailin Mu of Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University (opens in a new tab) points out, the poem treats the cowherd and the weaver simply as stars; over the centuries poets and storytellers gave them human lives.

In the story the Hong Kong Space Museum (opens in a new tab) tells, the Weaving Girl, granddaughter of the celestial emperor, stops weaving when she marries the Cowherd; the emperor parts them with the celestial river, the Milky Way, and they may meet once a year, on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month, over a bridge of magpies' wings.

Versions differ even within one museum: a curator's blog (opens in a new tab) from the same museum has the Heavenly Mother part the lovers and the Jade Emperor, moved by their grief, allow the yearly meeting over the magpie bridge.

Sources for this section Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, From stars to roses: the forgotten origins of Chinese Valentine's Day (Huailin Mu) (opens in a new tab) · ; Hong Kong Space Museum, Chinese Starlore (opens in a new tab) · ; Hong Kong Space Museum, Chinese Valentine's Day, when Altair and Vega meet (Curator's Blog, 2020) (opens in a new tab)

Qixi

The night of the meeting is the Qixi festival.

That night is the Qixi festival. One old custom was threading needles (opens in a new tab), which girls practised to ask the Weaver for skill in craft.

In Japan the same stars are the heart of Tanabata, which has its own names and its own customs; the Hong Kong Space Museum's curators (opens in a new tab) also write about the two stars' yearly “meeting”.

Sources for this section Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, From stars to roses: the forgotten origins of Chinese Valentine's Day (Huailin Mu) (opens in a new tab) · ; Hong Kong Space Museum, Chinese Valentine's Day, when Altair and Vega meet (Curator's Blog, 2020) (opens in a new tab)

In the sky today

The two stars never meet: they are 25 and 17 light-years away and stay put on either side of the Milky Way.

Vega is 25.3 light-years (opens in a new tab) from us and Altair 16.8, and by this site's calculation (opens in a new tab) they are about 34° apart on the sky, with the Milky Way between them. With Deneb they make the Summer Triangle.

The seventh day of the seventh lunar month falls on a different date each year in the Western calendar, which is why Japan's National Astronomical Observatory (opens in a new tab) holds a separate “traditional” star festival by the old calendar.

Sources for this section ESA, Hipparcos: The 50 Brightest Stars (opens in a new tab) · ; Bright Star Catalogue, 5th Revised Ed. (Hoffleit & Warren 1991), as computed by this site's star engine (opens in a new tab) · ; Seiichiro Naito, Looking up at the Tanabata stars from Hawai’i, National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (2014) (opens in a new tab)