Rabbit in the Chinese Zodiac
A sourced guide to the Rabbit’s fourth place in the Chinese zodiac, its 卯 branch, and the distinct histories of zodiac, moon-rabbit, and artistic imagery.
Reviewed
- Cycle position
- 4 of 12
- Earthly branch
- 卯 Mǎo
- Sequence
- Fourth of twelve · after Tiger, before Dragon
Rabbit is fourth in the zodiac, but the animal also moves through much older artistic material and a separate network of lunar stories. Reading those contexts side by side is more revealing than treating every rabbit as a single symbol of personality or luck.
Historical context
Rabbit or hare, object or calendar sign
The Chinese character 兔 (tù) can be rendered as “rabbit” or “hare” in English descriptions. Museum catalogues use both words, so the difference on a label does not automatically indicate a different zodiac animal. The calendrical reference remains the fourth animal paired with the earthly branch 卯 (Mǎo).
Rabbit and hare imagery also predates many later zodiac objects. The Metropolitan Museum of Art points to depictions on Shang jade pendants and sacred ritual bronzes from the Shang and Western Zhou periods. Later works include chariot fittings, carved jade, mirrors, textiles, porcelain, and human-bodied zodiac figures, each shaped by its own medium and purpose.
Traditional interpretation
Two journeys: across the river and to the moon
In one telling of the zodiac race, Rabbit crosses by hopping over stones and floating on a log before arriving fourth. The story makes the order memorable, but it is a folk explanation rather than historical evidence for the calendar’s origin.
A different tradition places a rabbit on the moon, where it prepares an elixir of immortality and appears with the moon goddess Chang’e in Chinese art and folklore. Buddhist narratives about a self-sacrificing hare provide another strand of lunar imagery. These stories have intersected over time, but the moon rabbit, the race character, and the calendrical branch are not interchangeable facts.
Modern practice
The moon rabbit remains visible
Historical objects keep the lunar connection tangible: the Met identifies a moon goddess and rabbit on an eighth- to ninth-century bronze mirror and the scene again on a nineteenth-century embroidered mirror case. A British Museum stone hare, possibly from the Tang dynasty, likewise records the animal’s association with the moon and the elixir of immortality.
Rabbit-year exhibitions, festival programs, illustrations, and decorations now bring zodiac and lunar imagery into the same public season. That overlap can be creative without erasing context. A museum object, a family decoration, a contemporary sculpture, and a person’s birth-year sign can all feature a rabbit while doing very different cultural work.
Sources & further reading
- Celebrating the Year of the RabbitThe Metropolitan Museum of Art
- Zodiac figure: rabbitThe Metropolitan Museum of Art
- Stone hare associated with the moonThe British Museum
- Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads — RabbitHirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution
- Legend of the twelve Zodiac AnimalsInternational Dunhuang Programme, British Library