Yin & Yang, Heavenly Stems & Earthly Branches: Polarity, Cycles, and the Core Language of Chinese Astrology (Chinese Astrology Foundations Book 4)

Chinese astrology becomes much clearer once its core language is visible.

Yin & Yang, Heavenly Stems & Earthly Branches explains the structures that sit beneath zodiac animals, element labels, and Four Pillars interpretation. Julian Verdan begins with Yin and Yang as relational polarity – not gender, morality, or a simple good-versus-bad opposition – and then builds toward the Ten Heavenly Stems and Twelve Earthly Branches.

Readers learn how the stems express the Five Phases through Yin and Yang, how the branches organize time, season, direction, and zodiac symbolism, and how combinations, trines, clashes, and other branch relationships should be read in context. The book then shows how stems and branches pair to form the sixty-step sexagenary cycle and how year, month, day, and hour layers create a more complex interpretive framework.

For readers ready to move beyond surface-level zodiac descriptions, this is a practical guide to the vocabulary and mechanics that make Chinese astrology work.