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Lunar New Year marks the beginning of a new year according to lunar calendars or, informally but commonly, to lunisolar calendars. Because a year of twelve lunar months is about 11 days shorter than a solar year (which determines the seasons), lunar cycle-based calendars may have strategies to take this fact into account. Pure lunar calendars have twelve lunar months invariantly and consequently their New Year is not fixed relative to the solar year; no adjustments are made. In contrast, most lunisolar calendars also have twelve lunar months, but every few years, a thirteenth “leap month” is added to resynchronise with the solar year. Consequently, neither type of calendar begins on a fixed date in the international Gregorian calendar.
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Martial arts can be divided into the armed and unarmed arts. The former include archery, spearmanship, and swordsmanship; the latter, which originated in China, emphasize striking with the feet and hands or grappling. In Japan, traditionally a warrior’s training emphasized archery, swordsmanship, unarmed combat, and swimming in armour. Members of other classes interested in combat concentrated on arts using the staff, everyday work implements (such as thrashing flails, sickles, and knives), and unarmed combat. Perhaps the most versatile practice was ninjutsu, which was developed for military spies in feudal Japan and also included training in disguise, escape, concealment, geography, meteorology, medicine, and explosives. In modern times, derivatives of some of the armed martial arts, such as kendō (fencing) and kyūdō (archery), are practiced as sports. Derivatives of the unarmed forms of combat, such as judo, sumo, karate, and tae kwon do, are practiced, as are self-defense forms, such as aikido, hapkido, and kung fu. Simplified forms of tai chi chuan (taijiquan), a Chinese form of unarmed combat, are popular as healthful exercise, quite divorced from martial origins. Derivatives of many of the armed and unarmed forms are practiced as a means of spiritual development.
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