The Buddhist calendar is a set of
lunisolar calendar
A lunisolar calendar is a calendar in many cultures, combining lunar calendars and solar calendars. The date of Lunisolar calendars therefore indicates both the Moon phase and the time of the solar year, that is the position of the Sun in the Ea ...
s primarily used in
Cambodia
Cambodia (; also Kampuchea ; km, កម្ពុជា, UNGEGN: ), officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochinese Peninsula in Southeast Asia, spanning an area of , bordered by Thailand t ...
,
Laos
Laos (, ''Lāo'' )), officially the Lao People's Democratic Republic ( Lao: ສາທາລະນະລັດ ປະຊາທິປະໄຕ ປະຊາຊົນລາວ, French: République démocratique populaire lao), is a socialist ...
,
Myanmar
Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John C. Wells, Joh ...
,
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
,
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...
, and
Thailand
Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is bo ...
as well as in
Malaysia
Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...
,
Singapore
Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...
and
Vietnam
Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making i ...
by
Chinese populations for religious or official occasions. While the calendars share a common lineage, they also have minor but important variations such as
intercalation schedules, month names and numbering, use of cycles, etc. In Thailand, the name Buddhist Era is a
year numbering system shared by the traditional
Thai lunar calendar
The Thai lunar calendar ( th, ปฏิทินจันทรคติ, , , literally, ''Specific days according to lunar norms''), or Tai calendar, is a lunisolar Buddhist calendar. It is used for calculating lunar-regulated holy days. Based o ...
and by the
Thai solar calendar
The Thai solar calendar ( th, ปฏิทินสุริยคติ, , "solar calendar") was adopted by King Chulalongkorn (Rama V) in 1888 CE as the Siamese version of the Gregorian calendar, replacing the Thai lunar calendar as the lega ...
.
The Southeast Asian
lunisolar calendar
A lunisolar calendar is a calendar in many cultures, combining lunar calendars and solar calendars. The date of Lunisolar calendars therefore indicates both the Moon phase and the time of the solar year, that is the position of the Sun in the Ea ...
s are largely based on an older version of the
Hindu calendar
The Hindu calendar, Panchanga () or Panjika is one of various lunisolar calendars that are traditionally used in the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia, with further regional variations for social and Hindu religious purposes. They adopt a s ...
,
[ which uses the ]sidereal year
A sidereal year (, ; ), also called a sidereal orbital period, is the time that Earth or another planetary body takes to orbit the Sun once with respect to the fixed stars.
Hence, for Earth, it is also the time taken for the Sun to return to the ...
as the solar year. One major difference is that the Southeast Asian systems, unlike their Indian cousins, do not use apparent reckoning to stay in sync with the sidereal year. Instead, they employ their versions of the Metonic cycle
The Metonic cycle or enneadecaeteris (from grc, ἐννεακαιδεκαετηρίς, from ἐννεακαίδεκα, "nineteen") is a period of almost exactly 19 years after which the lunar phases recur at the same time of the year. The recu ...
. However, since the Metonic cycle is not very accurate for sidereal years, the Southeast Asian calendar is slowly drifting out of sync with the sidereal, approximately one day every 100 years. Yet no coordinated structural reforms of the lunisolar calendar have been undertaken.
Today, the traditional Buddhist lunisolar calendar is used mainly for Theravada Buddhist
''Theravāda'' () ( si, ථේරවාදය, my, ထေရဝါဒ, th, เถรวาท, km, ថេរវាទ, lo, ເຖຣະວາດ, pi, , ) is the most commonly accepted name of Buddhism's oldest existing school. The school' ...
festivals. The Thai Buddhist Era, a renumbered Gregorian calendar
The Gregorian calendar is the calendar used in most parts of the world. It was introduced in October 1582 by Pope Gregory XIII as a modification of, and replacement for, the Julian calendar. The principal change was to space leap years dif ...
, is the official calendar in Thailand.
Structure
The calculation methodology of the current versions of Southeast Asian Buddhist calendars is largely based on that of the Burmese calendar
The Burmese calendar ( my, မြန်မာသက္ကရာဇ်, , or , ; Burmese Era (BE) or Myanmar Era (ME)) is a lunisolar calendar in which the months are based on lunar months and years are based on sidereal years. The calendar is ...
, which was in use in various Southeast Asian kingdoms down to the 19th century under the names of Chula Sakarat
Chula Sakarat or Chulasakarat ( pi, Culāsakaraj; my, ကောဇာသက္ကရာဇ်, ; km, ចុល្លសករាជ "''Chulasakarach''"; th, จุลศักราช, , , abbrv. จ.ศ. ''Choso'') is a lunisolar calendar deri ...
and Jolak Sakaraj
Chula Sakarat or Chulasakarat ( pi, Culāsakaraj; my, ကောဇာသက္ကရာဇ်, ; km, ចុល្លសករាជ "''Chulasakarach''"; th, จุลศักราช, , , abbrv. จ.ศ. ''Choso'') is a lunisolar calendar deri ...
. The Burmese calendar in turn was based on the "original" ''Surya Siddhanta
The ''Surya Siddhanta'' (; ) is a Sanskrit treatise in Indian astronomy dated to 505 CE,Menso Folkerts, Craig G. Fraser, Jeremy John Gray, John L. Berggren, Wilbur R. Knorr (2017)Mathematics Encyclopaedia Britannica, Quote: "(...) its Hindu inven ...
'' system of ancient India (believed to be Ardharatrika school).[Ohashi 2007: 354–355] One key difference with Indian systems is that the Burmese system has followed a variation of the Metonic cycle
The Metonic cycle or enneadecaeteris (from grc, ἐννεακαιδεκαετηρίς, from ἐννεακαίδεκα, "nineteen") is a period of almost exactly 19 years after which the lunar phases recur at the same time of the year. The recu ...
. It is unclear from where, when or how the Metonic system was introduced; hypotheses range from China to Europe.[(Ohashi 2001: 398–399): Astronomers of ancient India certainly knew of the Metonic cycle, and may have introduced the concept to Southeast Asia. However, the Metonic cycle, which employs tropical years, is incompatible with sidereal based Hindu calendars, and thus was not (and still is not) used in Hindu calendars. Chatterjee (1998: 151) suggests that the Metonic system was introduced to Burma by Europeans. Ohashi (2001: 398–399) rejects Chatterjee's hypothesis saying that "no other trace of European influence is found in South-East Asian astronomy." Instead, Ohashi (2001: 401–403) suggests that China may have been the source of the Metonic cycle.] The Burmese system, and indeed the Southeast Asian systems, thus use a "strange" combination of sidereal year
A sidereal year (, ; ), also called a sidereal orbital period, is the time that Earth or another planetary body takes to orbit the Sun once with respect to the fixed stars.
Hence, for Earth, it is also the time taken for the Sun to return to the ...
s from Indian calendar in combination with the Metonic cycle better for tropical year
A tropical year or solar year (or tropical period) is the time that the Sun takes to return to the same position in the sky of a celestial body of the Solar System such as the Earth, completing a full cycle of seasons; for example, the time fro ...
s.[Ohashi 2001: 398–399]
Epochal date
In all Theravada traditions, the calendar's epochal year 0
A year zero does not exist in the Anno Domini (AD) calendar year system commonly used to number years in the Gregorian calendar (nor in its predecessor, the Julian calendar); in this system, the year is followed directly by year . However, the ...
date was the day in which the Buddha
Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha, was a śramaṇa, wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism.
According to Buddhist tradition, he was ...
attained '' parinibbāna''. However, not all traditions agree on when it actually took place. In Burmese Buddhist
Buddhism ( my, ဗုဒ္ဓဘာသာ), specifically Theravāda Buddhism ( my, ထေရဝါဒဗုဒ္ဓဘာသာ), is the State religion of Myanmar since 1961, and practiced by nearly 90% of the population. It is the most rel ...
tradition, it was 13 May 544 BCE
Common Era (CE) and Before the Common Era (BCE) are year notations for the Gregorian calendar (and its predecessor, the Julian calendar), the world's most widely used calendar era. Common Era and Before the Common Era are alternatives to the or ...
(Tuesday, Full moon of Kason 148 Anjanasakaraj).[Kala Vol. 1 2006: 38] But in Thailand, it was 11 March 545 BCE, the date which the current Thai lunisolar and solar calendars use as the epochal date. Yet, the Thai calendars for some reason have fixed the difference between their Buddhist Era (BE) numbering and the Christian/Common Era (CE) numbering at 543,[Eade 1995: 15-16] which points to an epochal year of 544 BCE, not 545 BCE. In Myanmar, the difference between BE and CE can be 543 or 544 for CE dates, and 544 or 543 for BCE dates, depending on the month of the Buddhist Era (as the Buddhist calendar straddles the Gregorian calendar—currently from April to April).
Month
Types
The calendar recognizes two types of months: synodic month
In lunar calendars, a lunar month is the time between two successive syzygies of the same type: new moons or full moons. The precise definition varies, especially for the beginning of the month.
Variations
In Shona, Middle Eastern, and Europ ...
and sidereal month
In lunar calendars, a lunar month is the time between two successive syzygies of the same type: new moons or full moons. The precise definition varies, especially for the beginning of the month.
Variations
In Shona, Middle Eastern, and Euro ...
.[ The Synodic months are used to compose the years while the 27 lunar sidereal days (Sanskrit: '']nakshatra
Nakshatra ( sa, नक्षत्रम्, translit=Nakṣatram) is the term for lunar mansion in Hindu astrology and Indian Astronomy. A nakshatra is one of 27 (sometimes also 28) sectors along the ecliptic. Their names are related to a ...
''), alongside the 12 signs of the zodiac, are used for astrological calculations.[Irwin 1909: 8–9] (The Burmese calendar also recognizes a solar month called ''Thuriya Matha'', which is defined as 1/12th of a year.[Irwin 1909: 5] But the solar month varies by the type of year such as tropical year, sidereal year, etc.)
Waxing and waning
The days of the month are counted in two halves, waxing and waning. The 15th of the waxing is the civil full moon day. The civil new moon day is the last day of the month (14th or 15th waning). Because of the inaccuracy of the calendrical calculation systems, the mean and real (true) New Moons rarely coincide. The mean New Moon often precedes the real New Moon.[Clancy 1906: 56–57][
]
Number of days per month
As the Synodic lunar month is approximately 29.5 days, the calendar uses alternating months of 29 and 30 days.[
]
Month numbering
Various regional versions of Chula Sakarat/Burmese calendar existed across various regions of mainland Southeast Asia. Unlike Burmese systems, Kengtung, Sipsongpanna, Lan Na, Lan Xang
existed as a unified kingdom from 1353 to 1707.
For three and a half centuries, Lan Xang was one of the largest kingdoms in Southeast Asia. The meaning of the kingdom's name alludes to the power of the kingship and formidable war machine of the ea ...
and Sukhothai systems refer to the months by numbers, not by names. This means reading ancient texts and inscriptions in Thailand requires constant vigilance, not just in making sure one is correctly operating for the correct region, but also for variations within regions itself when incursions cause a variation in practice.[Eade 1989: 9–10][Eade 1995: 28–29]
Year
The Buddhist calendar is a lunisolar calendar
A lunisolar calendar is a calendar in many cultures, combining lunar calendars and solar calendars. The date of Lunisolar calendars therefore indicates both the Moon phase and the time of the solar year, that is the position of the Sun in the Ea ...
in which the months are based on lunar month
In lunar calendars, a lunar month is the time between two successive syzygies of the same type: new moons or full moons. The precise definition varies, especially for the beginning of the month.
Variations
In Shona, Middle Eastern, and Europ ...
s and years are based on solar year
A tropical year or solar year (or tropical period) is the time that the Sun takes to return to the same position in the sky of a celestial body of the Solar System such as the Earth, completing a full cycle of seasons; for example, the time fro ...
s. One of its primary objectives is to synchronize the lunar part with the solar part. The lunar months, normally twelve of them, consist alternately of 29 days and 30 days, such that a normal lunar year will contain 354 days, as opposed to the solar year of ~365.25 days. Therefore, some form of addition to the lunar year (of intercalation) is necessary. The overall basis for it is provided by cycles of 57 years. Eleven extra days are inserted in every 57 years, and seven extra months of 30 days are inserted in every 19 years (21 months in 57 years). This provides 20819 complete days to both calendars.[Eade 1995: 15] This 57-year cycle would provide a mean year of about 365.2456 days and a mean month of about 29.530496 days, if not corrected.
As such, the calendar adds an intercalary month in leap year
A leap year (also known as an intercalary year or bissextile year) is a calendar year that contains an additional day (or, in the case of a lunisolar calendar, a month) added to keep the calendar year synchronized with the astronomical year or s ...
s and sometimes also an intercalary day in great leap years. The intercalary month not only corrects the length of the year but also corrects the accumulating error of the month to extent of half a day. The average length of the month is further corrected by adding a day to Nayon at irregular intervals—a little more than seven times in two cycles (39 years). The intercalary day is never inserted except in a year which has an intercalary month.[ The Hindu calendar inserts an intercalary month at any time of year as soon as the accumulated fractions amount to one month. The Burmese calendar however always inserts the intercalary month at the same time of the year, after the ]summer solstice
The summer solstice, also called the estival solstice or midsummer, occurs when one of Earth's poles has its maximum tilt toward the Sun. It happens twice yearly, once in each hemisphere ( Northern and Southern). For that hemisphere, the summer ...
while the Arakanese calendar inserts it after the vernal equinox.[Irwin 1909: 2–3]
Burmese
The Burmese calendar year consists of 354, 384 or 385 days.
Note: The Arakanese calendar adds the intercalary day in Tagu, not in Nayon.
Cambodian, Lao and Thai
The Cambodian, Lao and Thai lunisolar calendars use a slightly different method to place the intercalary day. Instead of it in a leap year as in the Burmese system, the Thai system places it in a separate year. Thus, the Thai small leap year has 355 days while the Thai great leap year has 384 days.
New Year's Day
Since the main purpose of Buddhist calendar is to keep pace with the solar year, the new year is always marked by the solar year
A tropical year or solar year (or tropical period) is the time that the Sun takes to return to the same position in the sky of a celestial body of the Solar System such as the Earth, completing a full cycle of seasons; for example, the time fro ...
, which falls at the time when the Sun enters Aries
Aries may refer to:
*Aries (astrology), an astrological sign
*Aries (constellation), a constellation of stars in the zodiac
Arts, entertainment and media
* ''Aries'' (album), by Luis Miguel, 1993
* ''Aries'' (EP), by Alice Chater, 2020
* "Aries" ...
.[ The date, which at the present falls on the 17th of April, has slowly drifted over the centuries. In the 20th century, the New Year's Day fell on April 15 or 16th but in the 17th century, it fell on April 9 or 10th.][Eade 1989: 135–145, 165–175] Thailand and Cambodia no longer use the traditional lunisolar calendar to mark the New Year's Day.
Cycle
The Cambodian, Lao and Thai systems give animal names to the years from a cycle of 12.[Eade 1995: 22] The practice also existed in Burma in the Pagan period but later died out.[Luce 1970: 330]
The Cambodian calendar also maintains a 10-year naming cycle (numbered one to ten). Cambodians use multiple systems to identify a given year. For instance, 2017 is identified as 2561 Buddhist Era, the year of Rooster, Nuppasak (Year 9). The Thai lunar calendar
The Thai lunar calendar ( th, ปฏิทินจันทรคติ, , , literally, ''Specific days according to lunar norms''), or Tai calendar, is a lunisolar Buddhist calendar. It is used for calculating lunar-regulated holy days. Based o ...
also uses a similar numbered 10-year cycle. Each number in the cycle corresponds to the last digit of the year in the ''Chula Sakarat
Chula Sakarat or Chulasakarat ( pi, Culāsakaraj; my, ကောဇာသက္ကရာဇ်, ; km, ចុល្លសករាជ "''Chulasakarach''"; th, จุลศักราช, , , abbrv. จ.ศ. ''Choso'') is a lunisolar calendar deri ...
'' calendar.
Accuracy
The Southeast Asian Buddhist calendars use lunar months but try to keep pace with the solar year, by inserting intercalary months and days on the Metonic cycle (in the case of the Burmese calendar, on a modified Metonic cycle). However, the solar year as defined by the Buddhist calendars is really a sidereal year
A sidereal year (, ; ), also called a sidereal orbital period, is the time that Earth or another planetary body takes to orbit the Sun once with respect to the fixed stars.
Hence, for Earth, it is also the time taken for the Sun to return to the ...
, which is nearly 24 minutes longer than the actual mean tropical year
A tropical year or solar year (or tropical period) is the time that the Sun takes to return to the same position in the sky of a celestial body of the Solar System such as the Earth, completing a full cycle of seasons; for example, the time fro ...
. Therefore, like all sidereal-based calendars, the lunisolar calendars are slowly drifting away from the seasons.[Irwin 1909: 26–27] The calendars are drifting one day approximately every 60 years and 4 months.
The accumulating drift against the seasons means the New Year's Day which used to fall on 22 March (near the vernal equinox) in 638 CE now falls on 17 April in 2013 CE. There is no known internationally concerted effort to stop this drift. Thailand has moved its "Buddhist Era" to the Gregorian calendar under the name of Thai solar calendar
The Thai solar calendar ( th, ปฏิทินสุริยคติ, , "solar calendar") was adopted by King Chulalongkorn (Rama V) in 1888 CE as the Siamese version of the Gregorian calendar, replacing the Thai lunar calendar as the lega ...
. In Myanmar, Burmese calendarists have tried to deal with the issue by periodically modifying the intercalation schedule in the Metonic cycle. One major downside of this approach is that it is not possible to publish future calendars more than a few years (often even a year) ahead.[(Irwin 1909: 26–27): In the mid-19th century, the Burmese ]Konbaung Dynasty
The Konbaung dynasty ( my, ကုန်းဘောင်ခေတ်, ), also known as Third Burmese Empire (တတိယမြန်မာနိုင်ငံတော်) and formerly known as the Alompra dynasty (အလောင်းဘ ...
tried to address the issue by introducing a new calculation methodology. However, the new solar year it chose was actually 0.56 second a year ''less'' accurate than the version still prevalent in the rest of Southeast Asia. The Konbaung court also modified the Metonic cycle, which did more to re-synchronize the calendar with the seasons than the less accurate solar year.
History
The Buddhist Era was first introduced to Southeast Asia along with Buddhism in the early centuries CE. It was not a separate calendar but simply a year numbering system that employed the organization and calculation methods of the prevailing lunisolar calendars in use throughout the region. In the early centuries CE, the reference civil calendar of the Buddhist calendar prevalent in Southeast Asia was the Saka Era (Mahāsakaraj Era), which is said to have been adopted by the Pyu state of Sri Ksetra
, conventional_long_name = Kingdom of Sri Ksetra
, common_name = Kingdom of Sri Ksetra
, era = Classical Antiquity
, status = City-state
, event_start = Founding of Kingdom
, year_start = c. 3rd to 9th century CE
, date_start =
, ...
in 80 CE. The Saka Era was gradually replaced by the Burmese Era or Culāsakaraj, first in Myanmar in 640 CE,[Hmannan Vol. 1 2003: 216] and in other Theravada kingdoms of Southeast Asia between the 13th and 16th centuries.[(Eade 1989: 11): The earliest use of the Burmese calendar in lands part of present-day Thailand dates to the mid-13th century. (Smith 1966: 11): Ayutthaya adopted the Burmese calendar in the 16th century.] Theravada Buddhist tradition also recognizes pre-Buddhist Anjana Sakaraj (Añjana's Era) since the events of the Buddha's life are recorded in that era.[
The tradition of using different reference calendars continued in Siam in 1912 when King ]Vajiravudh
Vajiravudh ( th, วชิราวุธ, , 1 January 188126 November 1925) was the sixth monarch of Siam under the Chakri dynasty as Rama VI. He ruled from 23 October 1910 until his death in 1925. King Vajiravudh is best known for his efforts ...
decreed that the Buddhist Era would now track the Thai solar calendar
The Thai solar calendar ( th, ปฏิทินสุริยคติ, , "solar calendar") was adopted by King Chulalongkorn (Rama V) in 1888 CE as the Siamese version of the Gregorian calendar, replacing the Thai lunar calendar as the lega ...
, the Siamese version of the Gregorian calendar
The Gregorian calendar is the calendar used in most parts of the world. It was introduced in October 1582 by Pope Gregory XIII as a modification of, and replacement for, the Julian calendar. The principal change was to space leap years dif ...
with the New Year's Day of 1 April. Therefore, the Thai Buddhist Era year of 2455 began on 1 April 1912 (as opposed to 15 April 1912 according to the lunisolar calendar[Eade 1989: 166]). The Thai Buddhist Era was further realigned to the Gregorian calendar on 6 September 1940 when Prime Minister Phibunsongkhram decreed 1 January 1941 as the start of the year 2484 BE. As a result, the Year 2483 was only 9 months long, and the Thai Buddhist Era equals that of the Common Era
Common Era (CE) and Before the Common Era (BCE) are year notations for the Gregorian calendar (and its predecessor, the Julian calendar), the world's most widely used calendar era. Common Era and Before the Common Era are alternatives to the or ...
plus 543 years.
Current usage
The lunisolar calendar is used to mark important Buddhist holidays. Many of the holidays are celebrated as public holidays.
Computer support
The Thai-style "Buddhist calendar", which is the Gregorian calendar with the Buddhist era, is supported in Java 8
The Java (programming language), Java language has undergone several changes since Java Development Kit, JDK 1.0 as well as numerous additions of class (computer science), classes and packages to the standard library (computer science), li ...
, iOS
iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also includes ...
, and macOS
macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and lapt ...
.
See also
* Burmese calendar
The Burmese calendar ( my, မြန်မာသက္ကရာဇ်, , or , ; Burmese Era (BE) or Myanmar Era (ME)) is a lunisolar calendar in which the months are based on lunar months and years are based on sidereal years. The calendar is ...
* Chinese calendar
The traditional Chinese calendar (also known as the Agricultural Calendar 曆; 农历; ''Nónglì''; 'farming calendar' Former Calendar 曆; 旧历; ''Jiùlì'' Traditional Calendar 曆; 老历; ''Lǎolì'', is a lunisolar calendar ...
* Hindu calendar
The Hindu calendar, Panchanga () or Panjika is one of various lunisolar calendars that are traditionally used in the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia, with further regional variations for social and Hindu religious purposes. They adopt a s ...
* Horology
Horology (; related to Latin '; ; , interfix ''-o-'', and suffix ''-logy''), . is the study of the measurement of time. Clocks, watches, clockwork, sundials, hourglasses, clepsydras, timers, time recorders, marine chronometers, and atomic cl ...
* Index of Buddhism-related articles
0–9
* 22 Vows of Ambedkar
A
* Abhayagiri Buddhist Monastery
* Abhayamudra
* Abhibhavayatana
* Abhidhajamahāraṭṭhaguru
* Abhidhamma
* Abhidhamma Pitaka
* Abhijatabhivamsa
* Abhijna
* Acala
* Acariya
* Access to Insight
* Achar (Budd ...
* Kalachakra
''Kālacakra'' () is a polysemic term in Vajrayana Buddhism that means "wheel of time" or "time cycles". "''Kālacakra''" is also the name of a series of Buddhist texts and a major practice lineage in Indian Buddhism and Tibetan Buddhism. The ta ...
* Thai lunar calendar
The Thai lunar calendar ( th, ปฏิทินจันทรคติ, , , literally, ''Specific days according to lunar norms''), or Tai calendar, is a lunisolar Buddhist calendar. It is used for calculating lunar-regulated holy days. Based o ...
* Thai solar calendar
The Thai solar calendar ( th, ปฏิทินสุริยคติ, , "solar calendar") was adopted by King Chulalongkorn (Rama V) in 1888 CE as the Siamese version of the Gregorian calendar, replacing the Thai lunar calendar as the lega ...
Notes
References
Bibliography
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{{Buddhism topics
*
Calendar eras
Specific calendars