Year of the Tiger
寅 tora · Japanese 虎 · sign 3 of 12
The Tiger is the third sign and the first that is not native to Japan — there have never been wild tigers in the country. It arrives entirely through Chinese astrology and Buddhist art, which is why its imagery in Japan is copied from paintings rather than from life.
The sign is 寅, read tora. Traditional readings give it courage, impatience and a tendency to act before the room is ready. It holds east-northeast and the small hours before dawn. Painters working from imported scrolls gave Japanese tigers oddly cat-like faces for centuries, and you can still see it in temple screens.
Years of the Tiger
Each year page gives the exact date the zodiac year began, the element that goes with it, and what it means if you were born in the weeks before that date.
The character readings above are traditional characterisations with a long history, not predictions. The arithmetic on this page — which animal, which element, which date the year turns — is exact and checkable. What the tradition makes of it is culture, and we report it as culture.