Cast & Chart

Snake and Rooster

These are traditional rules about the twelve signs. No chart decides a relationship.

The traditional relations

  • 三合 Three Harmonies

    Two members of a trio of branches that tradition groups together.

What tradition says

巳 and 酉 are members of the metal group of 三合, the Three Harmonies, with 丑, the Ox, as the third. Four places separate them. The Wuxing Dayi gives 巳 the birth of metal in the south and 酉 metal at full strength in the west. There is a twist in the branches' own elements: 巳 is fire, which melts metal, so the branch where metal is born is the one that would melt it.

An eye for detail is the shared compliment in popular zodiac books, which pair the discreet Snake with the meticulous Rooster. Popular compatibility charts often place them near the top. The triad rule tells us about stages of metal in the calendar, and the compliments about detail were added by modern writers.

Two people of signs popular books call careful can polish a thing forever. For something you are doing together, agree in advance what finished means, and who gets to call it.

Belonging to one triad is a feature of 巳 and 酉, so a high score on a chart reflects the signs and has no view of you.

Where this text comes from

The relation tables follow 五行大義 volume 2 and 三命通會 volumes 2 and 3 on Wikisource. The popular readings are modern and come from neither.

The English here is our own plain wording, not a translation of a single source.