The exact dates of the 1973 lunar year
The Water Ox year ran from February 3, 1973 to January 22, 1974. Twelve lunar months came to 354 days in 1973, eleven or twelve short of the solar year, and that shortfall is what pulls the following new year back towards January.
The 1973 new year fell 12 days earlier in the Gregorian year than the 1972 one, February 3, 1973 against February 15, 1972. Why the 1973 boundary sits where it does, rather than on any fixed date, is worked through in how the Chinese calendar works.
What the Water Ox pairing is taken to mean
The stem for 1973 is Gui and the branch is the Ox, which the tradition reads as one unit rather than two. In 1973 that branch is taken to mean someone patient and immovable, doing the work whether or not anyone is counting it. Water, the element attached to 1973, adds adaptability, depth and a way of getting around obstacles rather than through.
1973 is a yin year, the inward half of the Water pair: 1972 carries the same element in its yang form, and the two are read as the same material handled differently. Taken together, 1973 is described as the ox temperament working through adaptability.
Born in January or early February 1973
From 1 January 1973 to February 2, 1973 the animal in force was still the Rat, not the Ox — 33 days of 1973 that most zodiac tables hand to the wrong animal. Someone born on 15 January 1973 is a Rat.
The first Ox of 1973 is anyone born on February 3, 1973 or later, and the last one anyone born on January 22, 1974. Against the 21 January to 20 February window the new year can occupy, February 3, 1973 is at the later end.
Where 1973 sits in the sixty-year cycle
1973 is position 50 of sixty in the sexagenary cycle, the Gui stem against the Ox branch. Ten stems and twelve branches only realign after sixty years, so the previous Water Ox year was 1913 and the next is 2033.
Someone born in 1913 therefore returned to their own pillar in 1973, at sixty, which the tradition marks as a full turn rather than a birthday. A child born in 1973 meets the pairing again in 2033.
Compatibility, and what it rests on
The Ox of 1973 is grouped with the Snake and the Rooster, four years either side: in this stretch of the calendar that is 1969 and 1977. Its opposition is the Goat, six years on from 1973 in 1979.
Those distances are arithmetic, not observation. Nothing about people born in 1973 was measured to produce them; 1973 stands four years from 1969 and six from 1979, and a twelve-part circle makes those the trine and the opposition just as it does in the western zodiac.
The western comparison for 1973
Because the 1973 lunar year opened on February 3, 1973, its first day falls under Aquarius in the western zodiac, and its last, January 22, 1974, under Aquarius — while the animal for the whole of 1973 stays the Ox.
Handbooks equate the Ox of 1973 with Capricorn, a pairing that lines up two twelve-part divisions rather than two claims about people. A western sign covers about thirty days, so 1973 holds twelve of them under one animal, and reading the 1973 Water Ox as a year-long version of Capricorn flattens both systems.
Questions people ask about this
When did the 1973 Chinese new year start?
February 3, 1973, and the year ran on to January 22, 1974 — 354 days.
What animal is 1973?
The Ox, in its Water form, from February 3, 1973 onward; a birth earlier in 1973 is a Rat.
Was 1973 a leap year in the Chinese calendar?
No. 1973 ran twelve months and 354 days, so no month was doubled.
I was born in January 1973 — which animal am I?
The Rat, unless you were born on February 3, 1973 or later, which is when the 1973 year began.