{"id":4204,"date":"2026-09-10T09:10:31","date_gmt":"2026-09-10T01:10:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/chinese-zodiac-year-of-the-cat\/"},"modified":"2026-09-23T12:25:31","modified_gmt":"2026-09-23T04:25:31","slug":"annee-du-chat-selon-le-zodiaque-chinois","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/fr\/chinese-zodiac-year-of-the-cat\/","title":{"rendered":"Le chat dans le zodiaque chinois : pourquoi le Vietnam a un chat et non un lapin"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<link rel=\"preconnect\" href=\"https:\/\/fonts.googleapis.com\">\n<link rel=\"preconnect\" href=\"https:\/\/fonts.gstatic.com\" crossorigin>\n<link rel=\"preload\" href=\"https:\/\/fonts.googleapis.com\/css2?family=Archivo:wght@400;500;600;700;800;900&#038;family=Noto+Sans+SC:wght@400;500;700&#038;family=Spline+Sans+Mono:wght@400;500&#038;display=swap\" as=\"style\" onload=\"this.onload=null;this.rel='stylesheet'\"><noscript><link rel=\"stylesheet\" href=\"https:\/\/fonts.googleapis.com\/css2?family=Archivo:wght@400;500;600;700;800;900&#038;family=Noto+Sans+SC:wght@400;500;700&#038;family=Spline+Sans+Mono:wght@400;500&#038;display=swap\"><\/noscript>\n<script src=\"https:\/\/unpkg.com\/@phosphor-icons\/web@2.1.1\" defer><\/script>\n<style>\n\/* The Zodiac Lore \u2014 Year\/Animal\/Compat page style \u2014 BRAND-UNIFIED to new homepage (Style B). 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if(!page)return; if(page.querySelector('.tzl-toc'))return;\n    var all=page.querySelectorAll('h2');var hs=[];\n    for(var q=0;q<all.length;q++){if(all[q].closest('.tzl-hero')){continue;}if(all[q].closest('.tzl-faq')){continue;}hs.push(all[q]);}\n    if(hs.length<3)return;\n    var ul='';\n    hs.forEach(function(h,i){\n      if(!h.id){var s=(h.textContent||'').trim().toLowerCase().replace(\/[^a-z0-9]+\/g,'-').replace(\/^-+|-+$\/g,'').slice(0,50)||('sec'+i);var id=s,k=2;while(document.getElementById(id)){id=s+'-'+(k++);}h.id=id;}\n      ul+='<li><a href=\"#'+h.id+'\">'+(h.textContent||'').trim()+'<\/a><\/li>';\n    });\n    var nav=document.createElement('nav');nav.className='tzl-toc';nav.setAttribute('aria-label','Contents');\n    nav.innerHTML='<div class=\"tzl-toc-h\">On this page<\/div><ul class=\"tzl-toc-list\">'+ul+'<\/ul>';\n    var hero=page.querySelector('.tzl-hero');\n    if(hero){if(hero.parentNode){hero.parentNode.insertBefore(nav,hero.nextSibling);return;}}\n    page.insertBefore(nav,page.firstChild);\n  }\n  if(document.readyState!=='loading')go();else document.addEventListener('DOMContentLoaded',go);\n})();\n<\/script>\n\n<div class=\"tzl-page\">\n<section class=\"tzl-hero rabbit\">\n  <div class=\"tzl-kicker\">Chinese Zodiac Across Asia \u00b7 Vietnam<\/div>\n  <h2>Cat Chinese Zodiac: <em>Why Vietnam Uses a Cat<\/em><\/h2>\n  <p><strong>Vietnam runs the same twelve-year cycle as the Chinese zodiac, but at the position China assigns to Rabbit (\u536f, m\u01ceo), the Vietnamese system puts Cat (m\u00e8o) instead.<\/strong> It&#8217;s a substitution of the animal name, not a different underlying system \u2014 Vietnam keeps the same twelve Earthly Branch positions in the same order. The two lunisolar calendars usually land on the same New Year date, though they can occasionally fall a month apart, because Vietnam and China calculate the calendar using different local time standards.<\/p>\n  <p>One of the most widely repeated explanations is about sound, not myth: a name mix-up between a branch reading and a Vietnamese word that sounds close to it. But the sound-alike theory is only one thread. Cats also turn up in a documented sorcery prosecution recorded in a Chinese dynastic history, and in a Song-dynasty story about a man who wouldn&#8217;t keep one \u2014 both because of the same underlying zodiac fact, not because either culture ever gave Cat a permanent seat in the twelve.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n\n<section class=\"tzl-section\">\n  <h2>Cat Chinese Zodiac: The Quick Answer<\/h2>\n  <p>The twelve zodiac animals are labels attached to an older twelve-symbol cycle called the Earthly Branches. <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u536f<\/span> (m\u01ceo) is the fourth branch: Chinese tradition associates that branch with Rabbit, while Vietnamese tradition associates the corresponding branch, <em>M\u00e3o<\/em>\/<em>M\u1eb9o<\/em>, with Cat.<\/p>\n  <div class=\"tzl-card-grid two\">\n    <div class=\"tzl-card\">\n      <span class=\"label\">In China<\/span>\n      <strong>Rabbit (\u5154, t\u00f9)<\/strong>\n      <p>Fourth animal in the cycle, paired with the Earthly Branch <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u536f<\/span> (m\u01ceo). Same branch position; usually the same cycle year \u2014 see the <a href=\"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/year-of-the-rabbit\/\">Rabbit animal guide<\/a>.<\/p>\n    <\/div>\n    <div class=\"tzl-card\">\n      <span class=\"label\">In Vietnam<\/span>\n      <strong>Cat (m\u00e8o)<\/strong>\n      <p>Same fourth branch position, usually the same cycle year \u2014 just a different animal name mapped onto it.<\/p>\n    <\/div>\n  <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n<section class=\"tzl-section\">\n  <h2>Two animals, not twelve: what actually differs<\/h2>\n  <p>The twelve-branch framework itself \u2014 <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5b50\u4e11\u5bc5\u536f\u8fb0\u5df3\u5348\u672a\u7533\u9149\u620c\u4ea5<\/span> \u2014 is identical in both systems: each branch keeps the same position in the sequence, and the same sixty-year sexagenary cycle (the traditional system formed by combining ten Heavenly Stems with the twelve Earthly Branches) runs underneath both. <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Vietnamese_zodiac\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">What Vietnam changes is only the animal name at two of the twelve positions<\/a> \u2014 a substitution the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.vam.ac.uk\/articles\/the-lunar-zodiac\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Victoria and Albert Museum&#8217;s overview of the lunar zodiac<\/a> also documents:<\/p>\n  <div class=\"tzl-table-wrap\">\n    <table class=\"tzl-table\">\n      <thead><tr><th>Branch<\/th><th>Chinese animal<\/th><th>Vietnamese animal<\/th><th>Same or different?<\/th><\/tr><\/thead>\n      <tbody>\n        <tr><td><span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5b50<\/span><\/td><td>Rat<\/td><td>Rat<\/td><td>Same<\/td><\/tr>\n        <tr><td><span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u4e11<\/span><\/td><td>Ox<\/td><td><strong>Water Buffalo<\/strong><\/td><td>Different species emphasis<\/td><\/tr>\n        <tr><td><span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5bc5<\/span><\/td><td>Tiger<\/td><td>Tiger<\/td><td>Same<\/td><\/tr>\n        <tr><td><span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u536f<\/span><\/td><td>Rabbit<\/td><td><strong>Cat<\/strong><\/td><td>Different animal<\/td><\/tr>\n        <tr><td><span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u8fb0<\/span><\/td><td>Dragon<\/td><td>Dragon<\/td><td>Same<\/td><\/tr>\n        <tr><td><span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5df3<\/span><\/td><td>Snake<\/td><td>Snake<\/td><td>Same<\/td><\/tr>\n        <tr><td><span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5348<\/span><\/td><td>Horse<\/td><td>Horse<\/td><td>Same<\/td><\/tr>\n        <tr><td><span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u672a<\/span><\/td><td>Goat<\/td><td>Goat<\/td><td>Same<\/td><\/tr>\n        <tr><td><span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u7533<\/span><\/td><td>Monkey<\/td><td>Monkey<\/td><td>Same<\/td><\/tr>\n        <tr><td><span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u9149<\/span><\/td><td>Rooster<\/td><td>Rooster<\/td><td>Same<\/td><\/tr>\n        <tr><td><span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u620c<\/span><\/td><td>Dog<\/td><td>Dog<\/td><td>Same<\/td><\/tr>\n        <tr><td><span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u4ea5<\/span><\/td><td>Pig<\/td><td>Pig<\/td><td>Same<\/td><\/tr>\n      <\/tbody>\n    <\/table>\n  <\/div>\n  <div class=\"tzl-note\">\n    <div class=\"mark\"><i class=\"ph-bold ph-warning-circle\"><\/i><\/div>\n    <div>\n      <h3>The two calendars don&#8217;t always agree on New Year&#8217;s date<\/h3>\n      <p>Vietnam and China both use lunisolar calendars \u2014 lunar months adjusted with solar seasonal markers so the calendar stays aligned with the seasons \u2014 anchored to the same astronomical rules. But <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Vietnamese_calendar\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">modern Vietnamese calendar calculations use UTC+7, while China uses UTC+8<\/a>: North Vietnam adopted UTC+7 in 1967, with South Vietnam following in 1975. Because the astronomical events used to construct the calendar can fall on different local dates under different time standards, the two calendars occasionally diverge. In 1985, the winter solstice fell on different local dates in Hanoi and Beijing, which changed which lunar month was designated the eleventh month; Vietnamese New Year consequently fell on January 21, while Chinese New Year fell on February 20, before the calendars realigned after Vietnam inserted a leap month later that year. In most years the New Year dates match; in some years they can differ, usually by much less than the 1985 case, and a birth close to the boundary in a divergent year may not land in the same cycle year under both systems.<\/p>\n    <\/div>\n  <\/div>\n  <div class=\"tzl-note\">\n    <div class=\"mark\"><i class=\"ph-bold ph-info\"><\/i><\/div>\n    <div>\n      <h3>This isn&#8217;t unique to Vietnam<\/h3>\n      <p>Local animal substitutions inside the same twelve-branch framework show up elsewhere in Asia too \u2014 Japan reads the twelfth branch, <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u4ea5<\/span>, as Wild Boar rather than the domestic Pig it names in Chinese, for instance. Vietnam swapping in Cat and Water Buffalo is the same kind of regional localization, not a break from the underlying system.<\/p>\n    <\/div>\n  <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n<section class=\"tzl-section\" id=\"why-no-cat-at-all\">\n    <h2>So why isn&#8217;t the cat in the standard zodiac at all?<\/h2>\n    <p>Vietnam&#8217;s cat aside, the standard Chinese zodiac has no cat. The short version: a well-known legend says the Rat tricked the Cat out of the Great Race, but the plainer historical reason is timing \u2014 the twelve animals were already fixed by about the 3rd century BC, centuries before house cats reached China along the Silk Road, so there was simply no cat to include. The full story, legend and history together, is laid out in <a href=\"\/why-is-there-no-cat-in-the-chinese-zodiac\/\">why there&#8217;s no cat in the Chinese zodiac<\/a>. What makes Vietnam the interesting exception is that there, the cat <em>did<\/em> get in \u2014 which is what the rest of this page is about.<\/p>\n  <\/section>\n  <section class=\"tzl-section\">\n  <h2>The language explanation \u2014 and what gets lost when it&#8217;s retold<\/h2>\n  <p>One of the most widely repeated explanations comes from Philippe Papin, a historian of Vietnam at the \u00c9cole Pratique des Hautes \u00c9tudes in Paris. <a href=\"https:\/\/nwasianweekly.com\/2011\/02\/year-of-the-cat-or-year-of-the-rabbit\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Writing about the question in 2011<\/a>, Papin pointed to <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u536f<\/span> itself: <em>&#8220;there is a little-used word for Rabbit in old Chinese (\u536f) that&#8217;s also pronounced mao,&#8221;<\/em> and proposed that this near-homophone with the Vietnamese word for cat, <em>m\u00e8o<\/em>, is what carried the animal into Vietnamese as a cat rather than a rabbit. The exact historical route is debated among specialists, so this remains an explanation rather than a settled origin story.<\/p>\n  <p>Papin was careful about how far this claim goes \u2014 <em>&#8220;I believe they did it in this precise case,&#8221;<\/em> he wrote, not stating it as settled fact. That hedge tends to disappear once the idea is repeated. Retellings, including <a href=\"https:\/\/www.scmp.com\/news\/asia\/southeast-asia\/article\/3207357\/why-vietnam-celebrating-year-cat-not-rabbit\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">major outlets like the South China Morning Post<\/a>, have compressed it into a flatter claim \u2014 that &#8220;the Chinese word for rabbit, &#8216;mao'&#8221; sounds like the Vietnamese word for cat. That&#8217;s not quite right: the modern Mandarin word for rabbit, <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5154<\/span>, is read <em>t\u00f9<\/em>. The <em>m\u01ceo<\/em> reading belongs to <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u536f<\/span>, the Earthly Branch character itself \u2014 a calendar and timekeeping symbol, not the everyday word for the animal. Papin&#8217;s own explanation already pointed at <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u536f<\/span>, not <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5154<\/span>; it&#8217;s the popular retelling that blurs the two together.<\/p>\n  <p>Linguist <a href=\"https:\/\/sites.google.com\/uw.edu\/vietnamstudiesgroup\/discussion-networking\/vsg-discussion-list-archives\/vsg-discussion-2023\/year-of-the-rabbit\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">John Phan<\/a> of Columbia University, a specialist in Sino-Vietnamese historical phonology, has offered a more technical version of this argument: <em>m\u1eb9o<\/em> reflects an Early Sino-Vietnamese reading of <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u536f<\/span>, while <em>M\u00e3o<\/em> reflects a later Sino-Vietnamese layer. On that analysis, the especially close historical comparison is <em>m\u1eb9o<\/em> with <em>m\u00e8o<\/em>, not simply modern Mandarin <em>m\u01ceo<\/em> with <em>m\u00e8o<\/em>.<\/p>\n  <p>A folk explanation sometimes offered instead is that cats disliked water and missed a river crossing during the animals&#8217; race to be chosen.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n\n<section class=\"tzl-section\">\n  <h2>A cat-demon sorcery prosecution recorded in dynastic history<\/h2>\n  <p>Centuries before the Vietnamese naming question, Chinese court records already linked cats to <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5b50<\/span> \u2014 the same branch Rat occupies \u2014 in a very different context: criminal sorcery. The <a href=\"https:\/\/ctext.org\/wiki.pl?if=gb&#038;chapter=439439\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><em>Book of Sui<\/em><\/a> (<span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u968b\u4e66<\/span>), the official dynastic history covering the Sui court (late sixth century), records a case against a nobleman named Dugu Tuo. A servant&#8217;s testimony describes a &#8220;cat demon&#8221; (<span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u732b\u9b3c<\/span>) cult practiced in the household:<\/p>\n  <div class=\"tzl-note\">\n    <div class=\"mark\"><i class=\"ph-bold ph-quotes\"><\/i><\/div>\n    <div>\n      <p><span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u9640\u5a62\u5f90\u963f\u5c3c\u8a00\uff0c\u672c\u4ece\u9640\u6bcd\u5bb6\u6765\uff0c\u5e38\u4e8b\u732b\u9b3c\u3002\u6bcf\u4ee5\u5b50\u65e5\u591c\u7940\u4e4b\u3002\u8a00\u5b50\u8005\u9f20\u4e5f\u3002<\/span><\/p>\n      <p style=\"margin-bottom:0\">&#8220;Tuo&#8217;s servant Xu Ani said she came originally from Tuo&#8217;s mother&#8217;s household, where they regularly served a cat demon \u2014 always sacrificing to it at night on the day of <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5b50<\/span>. They said <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5b50<\/span> means rat.&#8221;<\/p>\n    <\/div>\n  <\/div>\n  <p>The testimony explicitly links the ritual timing to <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5b50<\/span> days and immediately explains <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5b50<\/span> through its Rat association \u2014 it doesn&#8217;t go on to spell out why that link mattered to the ritual. A cat&#8217;s traditional role as a rat&#8217;s predator offers an obvious cultural context for why a cult built around a cat demon would fix on Rat&#8217;s day, but that reasoning isn&#8217;t the witness&#8217;s own stated explanation, only a plausible inference this page is drawing, not the source text.<\/p>\n  <p>The court treated the case as sorcery, and the consequences were severe: the empress and another official&#8217;s wife had fallen ill, physicians diagnosed &#8220;cat demon illness,&#8221; and <a href=\"https:\/\/zh.wikisource.org\/zh-hans\/%E9%9A%8B%E6%9B%B8\/%E5%8D%B779\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">the emperor initially ordered Dugu Tuo and his wife put to death<\/a>. He was spared only after his brother appealed for mercy \u2014 stripped of official rank and reduced to commoner status, while his wife was made a Buddhist nun. This is a documented criminal case built around superstition, not a claim that cats ever held a seat in the zodiac. The connection it draws on is the same one this whole page is about: <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5b50<\/span> was already associated with Rat, centuries before Vietnam&#8217;s separate naming question involving <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u536f<\/span> and Rabbit or Cat.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n\n<section class=\"tzl-section\">\n  <h2>Why some households kept cats away from the dead<\/h2>\n  <p>A separate, later strand of folk belief gave cats an unsettling reputation around death specifically \u2014 not sorcery this time, but the fear that a cat crossing a corpse could cause it to rise or change unnaturally. <a href=\"https:\/\/zh.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/%E6%B2%B9%E8%B9%84%E8%B2%93\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Taiwanese folk tradition<\/a>, documented in early-twentieth-century ethnographic surveys, records one specific version of this fear built around an ordinary-looking cat called <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u6cb9\u5e95\u8c93<\/span> in one early ethnographic record (also recorded as <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u6cb9\u8e22\u8c93<\/span>, and commonly written <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u6cb9\u8e44\u8c93<\/span> today) \u2014 loosely, the &#8220;oil-paw cat.&#8221; If it crossed a corpse, its vital energy was believed to pass into the body, causing the corpse to rise as a harmful corpse-spirit rather than returning as a living person.<\/p>\n  <p>This oil-paw-cat story belongs to a broader Taiwanese belief that a cat crossing a corpse could cause the body to rise or change unnaturally. Funeral customs known as <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5b88\u92ea<\/span> (&#8220;keeping watch&#8221;) and <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u9a5a\u8c93<\/span> or <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u8d95\u8c93<\/span> (&#8220;keeping cats away&#8221;) are documented in connection with that broader fear, with a family member watching beside or near the body before encoffining. They also had an obvious practical function \u2014 protecting the body from animals \u2014 separate from the supernatural reasoning. It&#8217;s regional folklore rather than a nationwide rule, but a genuine, separately documented reason cats and death became linked in popular imagination \u2014 distinct from the Sui-dynasty sorcery case above, and centuries removed from it.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n\n<section class=\"tzl-section\">\n  <h2>A Song-dynasty man who wouldn&#8217;t keep a cat<\/h2>\n  <p>A few centuries later, the zodiac&#8217;s rat connection shows up again \u2014 this time as personal superstition rather than court sorcery. <a href=\"https:\/\/zh.wikisource.org\/zh-hans\/%E5%A4%B7%E5%A0%85%E5%BF%97\/%E5%BF%97%E8%A3%9C21\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><em>Yijian Zhi<\/em><\/a> (<span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5937\u575a\u5fd7<\/span>), Hong Mai&#8217;s twelfth-century collection of Song-dynasty accounts, includes a story titled <em>Yu Shizi<\/em> (<span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u7389\u72ee\u5b50<\/span>, &#8220;The Jade Lions&#8221;) about an official named L\u00fc Yansheng:<\/p>\n  <div class=\"tzl-note\">\n    <div class=\"mark\"><i class=\"ph-bold ph-quotes\"><\/i><\/div>\n    <div>\n      <p><span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u5415\u5f66\u5347\u5c11\u537f\u64e2\u751f\u4e8e\u620a\u5b50\uff0c\u4ee5\u9f20\u4e3a\u76f8\u5c5e\uff0c\u6545\u4e0d\u755c\u732b\u3002<\/span><\/p>\n      <p style=\"margin-bottom:0\">&#8220;Vice Minister L\u00fc Yansheng was born in a <span class=\"tzl-cn\">\u620a\u5b50<\/span> year, with Rat as his zodiac animal, and so he did not keep cats.&#8221;<\/p>\n    <\/div>\n  <\/div>\n  <p>The story continues: after repeated signs of rat activity, his household urged him to deal with the problem, arguing that if he&#8217;d kept a cat as usual the rat trouble would never have gotten this bad. When the area was finally dug up, workers uncovered a pair of small white-jade lion carvings. The story ends by saying L\u00fc then understood the rats as repaying him by leading the household to the hidden treasure. Read past the folktale ending, the setup is the real point: a birth-year zodiac animal was treated as a real household reason to avoid an animal seen as its natural enemy. It&#8217;s a documented piece of Song-dynasty folk belief, not evidence that the practice was widespread.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n\n<section class=\"tzl-section\" id=\"go-deeper\">\n  <h2>Curious how your own chart carries this history forward?<\/h2>\n  <p>Everything above is the shared cultural and linguistic background behind the Cat sign. Your own element and full stem-branch chart are a separate, more personal layer:<\/p>\n  <div class=\"tzl-links two\">\n    <a href=\"\/product\/personalized-reading\/\"><strong>Personalized Reading<\/strong>Your full stem-branch write-up: exact element, and what that traditionally means for you specifically \u2014 as a printable report.<span>See the reading &rarr;<\/span><\/a>\n    <a href=\"\/product\/couple-chinese-zodiac-compatibility-report\/\"><strong>Couple Compatibility Report<\/strong>How your Cat-year sign and a partner&#8217;s sign read together, not just the shared naming history.<span>See the report &rarr;<\/span><\/a>\n  <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n<section class=\"tzl-section tzl-faq\">\n  <h2>Cat Chinese zodiac: common questions<\/h2>\n  <details><summary>Does Vietnam have a completely different zodiac from China?<\/summary><p>No. The same twelve-year cycle and the same Earthly Branch positions apply, and Vietnam changes the animal name at two of them \u2014 Cat instead of Rabbit, and Water Buffalo instead of Ox. The underlying branch order is the same, although the Vietnamese and Chinese lunar calendars can occasionally place New Year on different Gregorian dates, so a birth right at the boundary does not always fall in the same cycle year under both systems.<\/p><\/details>\n  <details><summary>Why does Vietnam use Cat instead of Rabbit?<\/summary><p>One widely repeated explanation, associated with historian Philippe Papin, links the branch \u536f with the Vietnamese word m\u00e8o through sound. Linguist John Phan has offered a more technical version: an Early Sino-Vietnamese reading, m\u1eb9o, is especially close to m\u00e8o, while m\u00e3o represents a later Sino-Vietnamese layer. The exact origin remains debated, and Papin himself presented his version as a reasoned conclusion, not a proven fact.<\/p><\/details>\n  <details><summary>Is it true that the Chinese word for rabbit sounds like the Vietnamese word for cat?<\/summary><p>Not quite as usually stated. The everyday Mandarin word for rabbit, \u5154, is read t\u00f9. The m\u01ceo reading belongs to \u536f, the calendar branch character itself, not the common word for the animal. Some retellings blur this distinction.<\/p><\/details>\n  <details><summary>Does a Cat birth year in Vietnam always match a Rabbit birth year in China?<\/summary><p>Usually, yes \u2014 but not with absolute certainty. The two lunisolar calendars can occasionally diverge because modern Vietnam uses UTC+7 (adopted in the north in 1967, the south in 1975) while China uses UTC+8, which can shift the local date of the winter solstice used to construct the calendar. In 1985, this changed which lunar month counted as the eleventh month, pushing Vietnamese New Year to January 21 and Chinese New Year a full month later, to February 20, before the calendars realigned. A birth close to either New Year boundary may not fall in the same cycle year under both systems.<\/p><\/details>\n  <details><summary>What is the &#8220;cat demon&#8221; case in the Book of Sui?<\/summary><p>A recorded sorcery prosecution from the late sixth century, against a nobleman named Dugu Tuo, whose household was accused of practicing a cat-demon cult timed to \u5b50 (rat) days. The emperor initially ordered him and his wife put to death; he was spared after his brother&#8217;s plea, reduced to commoner status, and his wife was made a Buddhist nun. It&#8217;s a documented criminal case, not evidence that cats were ever part of the zodiac.<\/p><\/details>\n  <details><summary>Why were cats kept away from the dead in some Taiwanese funeral traditions?<\/summary><p>Taiwanese folklore records a broader fear that a cat crossing a corpse could cause the body to rise or change unnaturally. One version involves the so-called oil-paw cat, whose vital energy was believed to pass into the corpse. Customs called \u5b88\u92ea (&#8220;keeping watch&#8221;) and \u9a5a\u8c93 or \u8d95\u8c93 (&#8220;keeping cats away&#8221;) are documented alongside this broader belief, while also serving the practical purpose of protecting the body from animals before encoffining.<\/p><\/details>\n  <details><summary>Why does the story about L\u00fc Yansheng connect cats and rats?<\/summary><p>L\u00fc Yansheng, recorded in the Song-dynasty collection Yijian Zhi, was born in a \u620a\u5b50 (Rat) year and avoided keeping cats because Rat was his zodiac animal and cats are traditionally seen as a rat&#8217;s predator. It&#8217;s a documented piece of period folk belief, not a claim that this practice was universal.<\/p><\/details>\n  <details><summary>Does Vietnam&#8217;s zodiac differ from China&#8217;s anywhere else?<\/summary><p>Yes, at one more position: Vietnam uses Water Buffalo where the Chinese zodiac uses Ox. Every other animal in the twelve-year cycle matches the Chinese list.<\/p><\/details>\n  <details><summary>Is Vietnam the only place that changes an animal in the Chinese zodiac?<\/summary><p>No. Japan, for instance, reads the twelfth branch, \u4ea5, as Wild Boar rather than the domestic Pig it names in Chinese. Local substitutions inside the same shared framework appear in more than one country that adopted the system.<\/p><\/details>\n<\/section>\n\n<section class=\"tzl-section\">\n  <h2>Where to go next<\/h2>\n  <div class=\"tzl-next\">\n    <a href=\"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/year-of-the-rabbit\/\"><span>The animal<\/span><b>Rabbit Guide<\/b><\/a>\n    <a href=\"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/why-is-there-no-cat-in-the-chinese-zodiac\/\"><span>The legend<\/span><b>The Missing Cat Story<\/b><\/a>\n    <a href=\"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/year-of-the-rat\/\"><span>Related<\/span><b>Rat Guide<\/b><\/a>\n    <a href=\"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/compatibility-rabbit\/\"><span>Compatibility<\/span><b>Rabbit Matches<\/b><\/a>\n    <a href=\"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/60-year-chinese-zodiac-cycle\/\"><span>The system<\/span><b>60-Year Cycle<\/b><\/a>\n    <a href=\"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/zodiac-years-chart\/\"><span>Full<\/span><b>Years Chart<\/b><\/a>\n  <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n<section id=\"editorial-note\" class=\"tzl-editorial\">\n  <h3>Editorial note<\/h3>\n  <p>The animal-substitution facts on this page \u2014 Cat for Rabbit and Water Buffalo for Ox in the Vietnamese zodiac \u2014 are documented by the Victoria and Albert Museum&#8217;s overview of the lunar zodiac and Wikipedia&#8217;s Vietnamese zodiac entry. The calendar-divergence facts, including the 1985 example, are documented on Wikipedia&#8217;s Vietnamese calendar entry. Philippe Papin&#8217;s linguistic explanation is quoted from his 2011 remarks reported by the Northwest Asian Weekly and is presented as his own proposed reasoning, not settled fact. The Early Sino-Vietnamese <em>m\u1eb9o<\/em> \/ later Sino-Vietnamese <em>m\u00e3o<\/em> distinction follows linguistic analysis discussed by John Phan, a Sino-Vietnamese historical phonology specialist at Columbia University, in a Vietnam Studies Group discussion. The Book of Sui passage and the Yijian Zhi story are quoted from the original classical Chinese texts, cross-checked against independent public transcriptions (Chinese Text Project and Chinese Wikisource). The oil-paw cat and its associated funeral custom are documented Taiwanese folklore, drawing on early-twentieth-century ethnographic surveys of Taiwanese customs (period works by Kataoka Iwao and Suzuki Seiichir\u014d) as cited in the topic&#8217;s reference literature \u2014 presented here as regional folk belief, not fact. Everything touching sorcery, superstition and folk belief is shared as documented cultural and historical record, not as fact about cats, rats, or the people born under any zodiac sign. It is not a prediction, and it is not medical, financial or relationship advice.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n\n<\/div>\n\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\">\n{\n  \"@context\": \"https:\/\/schema.org\",\n  \"@type\": \"BreadcrumbList\",\n  \"itemListElement\": [\n    {\"@type\": \"ListItem\", \"position\": 1, \"name\": \"Home\", \"item\": \"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/\"},\n    {\"@type\": \"ListItem\", \"position\": 2, \"name\": \"Cat Chinese Zodiac\", \"item\": \"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/chinese-zodiac-year-of-the-cat\/\"}\n  ]\n}\n<\/script>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\">\n{\n  \"@context\": \"https:\/\/schema.org\",\n  \"@type\": \"FAQPage\",\n  \"mainEntity\": [\n    {\"@type\":\"Question\",\"name\":\"Does Vietnam have a completely different zodiac from China?\",\"acceptedAnswer\":{\"@type\":\"Answer\",\"text\":\"No. The same twelve-year cycle and the same Earthly Branch positions apply, and Vietnam changes the animal name at two of them \u2014 Cat instead of Rabbit, and Water Buffalo instead of Ox. 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Il s'agit d'un remplacement du nom de l'animal, et non d'un syst\u00e8me sous-jacent diff\u00e9rent \u2014 le Vietnam\u2026 <a title=\"Le chat dans le zodiaque chinois : pourquoi le Vietnam a un chat et non un lapin\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/fr\/chinese-zodiac-year-of-the-cat\/\" aria-label=\"En savoir plus sur Cat Chinese Zodiac: Why Vietnam Has a Cat, Not a Rabbit\">En savoir plus<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"rank_math_title":"Cat Chinese Zodiac: Why Vietnam Has a Cat, Not a Rabbit","rank_math_description":"In the Vietnamese zodiac, Cat takes the place of Rabbit. The reasons cover language, a Sui-dynasty sorcery case, and a Song-dynasty cat-avoidance story.","rank_math_focus_keyword":"cat chinese zodiac, chinese zodiac year of the cat, vietnamese zodiac cat, vietnamese zodiac","footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-4204","page","type-page","status-publish"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4204"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4204\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4504,"href":"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4204\/revisions\/4504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thezodiaclore.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}