Year of the Monkey in the Chinese Zodiac

The Monkey’s place in the cycle

A page on chinaculture.org says that although the Monkey is ninth in the Chinese zodiac, it is first in terms of wit and agility. The page also calls the Monkey the cleverest of the twelve animals.

An Ashmolean Museum blog post says people born in the Year of the Monkey are thought to be lively, intelligent, sociable and at times self-centered. The chinaculture.org page describes them as brave and resourceful, energetic and competitive, and adds that they can be quite capricious.

The Monkey in legend

A China.org.cn article by Zhou Jing says folktales tell of a lonely tiger, known as the “King of the Mountain.” In these folktales, the monkey, its neighbor, was the only animal brave enough to speak to it, and came to its rescue when it fell into a trap. In the same folktales, when the selection of the twelve zodiac animals began, the tiger voted for the monkey because of its wit and wisdom.

A page from the Timothy S. Y. Lam Museum of Anthropology gives another legend, in which the Jade Emperor needed to choose twelve animals as palace guards. The Snake, Horse, Goat, Monkey and Rooster fought amongst themselves, and the page adds that this is only a story.

Sun Wukong and the Monkey King

The Ashmolean post says the Monkey King, also called Sun Wukong, is the main character in the famous Chinese novel Journey to the West. After being cast out of heaven, it says, he redeems himself by helping the Tang dynasty monk Xuanzang on his pilgrimage to India. A V&A blog post by Ming Wilson says one of the monk’s disciples was a monkey, who protected him from the many perils during the journey.

The chinaculture.org page says Sun Wukong can leap 108,000 li in a single bound and transform himself into 72 different forms, and calls him a beloved folk hero of the Chinese people. The Ashmolean post adds that the Monkey King is a very popular character in Beijing opera.

Monkey art and objects in two museum blogs

The Ashmolean post describes an exhibition in 2016, drawn from the museum’s collections of Asian art, that celebrated the Year of the Monkey with images of monkeys from across Asia. The post also describes a color woodblock print from Japan by Tsukioka Yoshitoshi that frames the Monkey King against an enormous moon, with the Jade Rabbit in the background. The post says that, as there is no myth that involves the two characters together, it seems to be Yoshitoshi’s idea to bring them together.

Wilson’s V&A post lists an agate piece under its Monkey heading.