Early Instruments and Techniques

Early Instruments and Techniques

A feng shui spiral at LA Chinatown’s Metro station.
The history of feng shui covers 3,500+ years before the invention of the magnetic compass. Its origins are in astronomy. Some current techniques can be traced to Neolithic China, while others were added later (most notably the Han dynasty, the Tang, the Song, and the Ming).
The astronomical history of Feng Shui is evident in the development of instruments and techniques. According to the Zhouli the original Feng Shui instrument may have been a gnomon. Chinese used circumpolar stars to determine the north-south axis of settlements. This technique explains why Shang palaces at Xiaotun lie 10° east of due north. In some cases, as Paul Wheatley observed, they bisected the angle between the directions of the rising and setting sun to find north. This technique provided the more precise alignments of the Shang walls at Yanshi and Zhengzhou.
The oldest examples of instruments used for feng shui are liuren astrolabes. These consist of a lacquered, two-sided board with astronomical sightlines. Liuren astrolabes have been unearthed from tombs that date between 278 BCE and 209 BCE. They show the cord-hook diagram and some models include the magic square of three. They were commonly used to chart the motion of Taiyi through the nine palaces. The markings are virtually unchanged from the astrolabe to the first magnetic compasses.
The magnetic compass was invented for Feng Shui and has been in use since its invention. Traditional Feng Shui instrumentation consists of the Luopan or the earlier south-pointing spoon (zhinan zhen) — though a conventional compass could suffice if one understood the differences. A Feng Shui ruler (a later invention) may also be employed.