Meaning
The 全書's dialogue begins:
貪狼北斗解厄之神，第一星也。
In our translation: Tan Lang is the Northern Dipper's spirit that resolves hardship, its first star.
The lines under 希夷先生 explain its epithet: 「其氣屬木，體屬水，故化氣為桃花」, its breath is wood and its body water, so its epithet is peach blossom, the Chinese image of desire and attraction. It is 「主禍福之神」, the spirit that governs blessing and harm alike. A person with it is deep in contrivance and far-seeing in plans, and 「隨波逐浪，愛憎難定」: drifts with the waves, with loves and hates hard to fix. It is a learner of unusual arts, a lover of song and company, and with Fire or Bell it can rise high.
The 形性賦 calls it 「善惡之星」, a star of good and bad: tall and upright in its strong palaces, stubborn and unruly out of them. That is a sketch of a type in the manner of its time.
The name means "greedy wolf". Our chart calls it the Wolf and keeps the literal "Greedy Wolf" only in quotation marks in its detail label; our gloss reads: desire, charm and versatility; appetite for experience.
The name
貪狼 is the first of the seven names the Sui-dynasty 五行大義 quotes for the stars of the Northern Dipper, the one it gives 天樞 (Dubhe), and the Daoist Northern Dipper scripture repeats it. The chart borrows the name and observes nothing. Chinese feng shui gives it to the number one of the nine stars, the star Nine Star Ki calls One White Water.
On the board
Tan Lang is two palaces ahead of Tian Fu. It shares a palace with Wu Qu in 丑 or 未, Zi Wei in 卯 or 酉 and Lian Zhen in 巳 or 亥, and stands alone in 子, 寅, 辰, 午, 申 and 戌. It is brilliant (廟) in 丑, 辰, 未 and 戌 and fallen (陷) in 巳 and 亥. In the common table it takes 化祿 in a 戊 year, 化權 in a 己 year and 化忌 in a 癸 year. It is the Life Master (命主) when the Life Palace is in 子.
What this page leaves out
Much of the 全書's dialogue on Tan Lang condemns drinking, gambling, theft and lust, and the text's sayings about it are among its harshest. We record that the text speaks so and repeat none of it; on our pages the star names a theme, desire and appetite, and judges no one.
Correspondences
Each item with how it stands: “sourced” is in the work cited, “our construction” is EsoTerrier’s own, and “disputed” means the sources disagree.
- 諸星問答論, the opening line
- 「貪狼北斗解厄之神，第一星也。」 Tan Lang is the Northern Dipper's spirit that resolves hardship, its first star sourced
- 形性賦, form and nature
- 「貪狼為善惡之星，入廟必應長聳，出垣必定頑囂」 Tan Lang is a star of good and bad: in its strong palaces tall and upright, out of them stubborn and unruly; a sketch of a type, never a reading of anyone's body sourced
- Namesake in the sky (symbolic)
- 天樞, the first star of the Northern Dipper (Dubhe, α Ursae Majoris), named 貪狼 in the Sui 五行大義's quotation; the chart does not read it sourced
- Dipper by series
- Listed as a Southern Dipper star on some practitioner pages because it belongs to the Tian Fu series; the 全書 seats it first in the Northern Dipper disputed
- Element, modern tables
- Yang wood with yang water in one practitioner table, yin water with yang wood in another disputed
- English names elsewhere
- "Greedy Wolf" (English Wikipedia and most sites), which our chart keeps only in quotation marks; wolf (iztro); Desire and Opportunity on other sites sourced
- Our short name and gloss
- Wolf: Desire, charm and versatility; appetite for experience. our construction
How the schools read it
- 紫微斗數全書, the lines under 希夷先生
- Its breath is wood and its body water, "so its epithet is peach blossom"; the spirit that governs blessing and harm. Deep in contrivance and far-seeing, it "drifts with the waves, its loves and hates hard to fix" (隨波逐浪，愛憎難定).
- 紫微斗數全書, 諸星問答論
- A learner of unusual arts and a lover of song and company; with Fire or Bell it can rise high. The rest of the dialogue is moral condemnation in the idiom of its age.
- 紫微斗數全書, 形性賦
- A star of good and bad: tall and upright in its strong palaces, stubborn and unruly out of them.
- Three-harmony practice (三合派)
- Reads it as the first of the peach-blossom stars, with Lian Zhen the second, and above all by its company.
- English teaching
- "Greedy Wolf" nearly everywhere; Desire or Opportunity on a few sites.
- EsoTerrier
- Short name Wolf, the literal "Greedy Wolf" kept in quotation marks in the detail label; our gloss names desire, charm and versatility. No reading of outcome.
Claims about it
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Tan Lang is the first star of the Dipper, and the chart reads where it stands.
disputedWhat the record shows: 貪狼 is the Sui 五行大義's name for the first Dipper star, and the 全書 seats Tan Lang there; but the chart places it by counting from Tian Fu.
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As a star of the Tian Fu series, Tan Lang belongs to the Southern Dipper.
falseWhat the record shows: The series is a placement grouping. The 全書 seats Tan Lang first in the Northern Dipper.
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The text's lines on Tan Lang condemn a person's conduct and foretell ruin.
unverifiedWhat the record shows: The 全書 is at its most moralising here. Those lines are its historical language; none of them is ours.
