The exact dates of the 1944 lunar year
The Wood Monkey year ran from January 25, 1944 to February 12, 1945. Those 385 days are longer than a Gregorian year because a leap fourth month was inserted: 1944 carried thirteen lunar months rather than twelve, the same month number falling twice.
The 1944 new year fell 11 days earlier in the Gregorian year than the 1943 one, January 25, 1944 against February 5, 1943. Why the 1944 boundary sits where it does, rather than on any fixed date, is worked through in how the Chinese calendar works.
What the Wood Monkey pairing is taken to mean
The stem for 1944 is Jia and the branch is the Monkey, which the tradition reads as one unit rather than two. In 1944 that branch is taken to mean someone inventive and quick, solving things sideways and getting bored fast. Wood, the element attached to 1944, adds growth, flexibility and the willingness to keep extending.
1944 is a yang year, the outward half of the Wood pair: 1945 carries the same element in its yin form, and the two are read as the same material handled differently. Taken together, 1944 is described as the monkey temperament working through growth.
Born in January or early February 1944
From 1 January 1944 to January 24, 1944 the animal in force was still the Goat, not the Monkey — 24 days of 1944 that most zodiac tables hand to the wrong animal. Someone born on 15 January 1944 is a Goat.
The first Monkey of 1944 is anyone born on January 25, 1944 or later, and the last one anyone born on February 12, 1945. Against the 21 January to 20 February window the new year can occupy, January 25, 1944 is at the early end.
Where 1944 sits in the sixty-year cycle
1944 is position 21 of sixty in the sexagenary cycle, the Jia stem against the Monkey branch. Ten stems and twelve branches only realign after sixty years, so the previous Wood Monkey year was 1884 and the next is 2004.
Someone born in 1884 therefore returned to their own pillar in 1944, at sixty, which the tradition marks as a full turn rather than a birthday. A child born in 1944 meets the pairing again in 2004.
Compatibility, and what it rests on
The Monkey of 1944 is grouped with the Rat and the Dragon, four years either side: in this stretch of the calendar that is 1940 and 1948. Its opposition is the Tiger, six years on from 1944 in 1950.
Those distances are arithmetic, not observation. Nothing about people born in 1944 was measured to produce them; 1944 stands four years from 1940 and six from 1950, and a twelve-part circle makes those the trine and the opposition just as it does in the western zodiac.
The western comparison for 1944
Because the 1944 lunar year opened on January 25, 1944, its first day falls under Aquarius in the western zodiac, and its last, February 12, 1945, under Aquarius — while the animal for the whole of 1944 stays the Monkey.
Handbooks equate the Monkey of 1944 with Leo, a pairing that lines up two twelve-part divisions rather than two claims about people. A western sign covers about thirty days, so 1944 holds twelve of them under one animal, and reading the 1944 Wood Monkey as a year-long version of Leo flattens both systems.
Questions people ask about this
When did the 1944 Chinese new year start?
January 25, 1944, and the year ran on to February 12, 1945 — 385 days.
What animal is 1944?
The Monkey, in its Wood form, from January 25, 1944 onward; a birth earlier in 1944 is a Goat.
Was 1944 a leap year in the Chinese calendar?
Yes — a leap fourth month made 1944 thirteen months and 385 days long.
I was born in January 1944 — which animal am I?
The Goat, unless you were born on January 25, 1944 or later, which is when the 1944 year began.