Season and Practice

The solar terms schedule planting, harvest and seasonal food and health practices across the Chinese cultural world, and several, the solstices and equinoxes among them, anchor festivals and observances. In Chinese medicine and in feng shui the terms mark the turning of seasonal energies. They were inscribed on UNESCO's list of intangible cultural heritage in 2016.

The atlas gives each term its point in the solar year, its seasonal meaning, and its associated customs. The solar terms belong with the Chinese calendrical and cosmological material under Eastern Systems.