Quick answer: 庚辰 is yang metal (庚) sitting on earth (辰, the Dragon). The branch produces the stem, so it sits on its resource star (偏印 Indirect Resource), at the Nurture life stage; its Na Yin is 白蜡金 (White Wax Metal).
庚辰 (Geng Chen) is pillar number 17 in the cycle of sixty stem–branch pairs. When it appears as the day pillar, the Day Master is 庚 yang metal, sitting on the Dragon branch 辰. This page explains how the two halves of the pillar relate, what is hidden inside the branch, and how traditional Bazi texts interpret the combination.
| Pillar | 庚辰 Geng Chen |
|---|---|
| Stem | 庚 Geng — yang Metal (金) |
| Branch | 辰 Chen — Dragon, Earth; hours 07:00–09:00 |
| Hidden stems | 戊 乙 癸 |
| Life stage of 庚 in 辰 | Nurture (養) |
| Na Yin (納音) | 白蜡金 — White Wax Metal (Metal), shared with 辛巳 |
| Void branches (空亡) | 申酉 |
| Branch clashes with · combines with | 戌 (Dog) · 酉 (Rooster) |
The stem: 庚 Geng
The classical description of 庚 comes from the Di Tian Sui (滴天髓):
庚金帶煞，剛強為最，得水而清，得火而銳，土潤則生，土乾則脆，能勝甲兄，輸於乙妹。“Geng metal carries a killing edge, the hardest of all. With water it becomes clear; with fire it becomes sharp. Moist earth gives it life; dry earth makes it brittle. It can defeat elder brother Jia, but loses to younger sister Yi.”— Di Tian Sui (Drops from Heaven’s Marrow) 《滴天髓》, 天干論. Original text: Wikisource · also on ctext.org (different edition). Translation: bazimethod.
Geng (庚) is yang metal: ore, axes, raw steel. The Di Tian Sui says it is the strongest of the stems, wanting fire to forge it and water to cool it — hard, decisive metal. On the day pillar, this stem is the Day Master — the “self” of the chart that every other character is measured against. The full verse and a ten-gods table are on the Geng Metal Day Master page.
The branch: 辰 Chen
Chen (辰), the Dragon, is damp spring earth and the storehouse of water. It holds 戊, 乙 and 癸, so it is earth with wood and water inside. The day branch is traditionally called the spouse palace (夫妻宮), the seat closest to the self, so readers look at it for themes of partnership and private life. As a month it corresponds to the 辰 month (early April to early May, the end of spring).
How the stem and branch work together
The branch’s element produces the stem’s element, so 庚 sits on its own resource (印) star. The seat is supportive: the branch feeds the stem the way a parent feeds a child. Traditional readings associate it with learning, protection and an inward, reflective temperament, and say the spouse palace here brings support.
In the life-stage cycle this is Nurture, the embryo being nourished in the womb. It is a quiet, slowly building seat with modest strength.
Hidden stems in 辰
Each branch contains one to three hidden stems. Measured against 庚, they take these ten-god roles:
| Hidden stem | Layer | Element | Ten god for 庚 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 戊 | Main qi (本氣) | Earth | 偏印 — Indirect Resource |
| 乙 | Middle qi (中氣) | Wood | 正财 — Direct Wealth |
| 癸 | Residual qi (餘氣) | Water | 伤官 — Hurting Officer |
The main qi, 戊, is an Indirect Resource (偏印) — the element that produces the Day Master, same polarity; unconventional learning and support. The middle qi, 乙, is Direct Wealth (正财) — the controlled element, opposite polarity; steady income and, in a man’s chart, the classical wife star. The residual qi, 癸, is a Hurting Officer (伤官) — the produced element, opposite polarity; a sharper, more rebellious outlet. The main qi carries most weight; the minor stems become important when another stem in the chart “draws them out”, for example when the same stem appears openly in the month or hour pillar.
Element balance
Counting the stem plus the hidden stems (weighting the main qi fully and the minor qi less, one common convention), the pillar leans earth > metal > wood > water, and fire is absent from the pillar itself. That does not mean the chart lacks it — the year, month and hour pillars usually change the picture entirely, and the month branch matters most of all.
Because the strength of 庚 depends above all on the month of birth, the same 庚辰 day reads very differently in different seasons: a metal Day Master is strongest in autumn and weakest in summer. The five elements and useful god guides explain how practitioners decide whether a chart wants more of an element or less.
Na Yin: 白蜡金
In the older Na Yin system the sixty pillars are grouped in pairs, each with a poetic “sound element”. 庚辰 and 辛巳 share 白蜡金, “White Wax Metal”, a metal image. Note that the Na Yin element (Metal) is separate from the elements of the stem (Metal) and branch (Earth); most modern Zi Ping readers use Na Yin as colour rather than as the basis of the reading.
Traditional personality themes
Popular Bazi writing associates 庚 Day Masters with decisiveness, courage and directness, and sometimes with toughness and a sense of justice. On a 辰 seat, the 偏印 (Indirect Resource) star in the spouse palace colours that picture, as described above. These are traditional images, offered for cultural interest. They are not evidence about any real person, and a single pillar never decides a reading — the classics always judge the whole chart, its season and its balance.
Clashes, combinations and void branches
辰 clashes with 戌 and forms a six-combination (六合) with 酉, said to produce metal. It also belongs to the 申子辰 three-harmony group of water. When those branches appear in the year, month or hour, or arrive in a luck pillar, tradition says the spouse palace is “moved”. See combinations and clashes.
The pillar belongs to the 甲戌 decade (旬) of the sixty-cycle, whose two “void” branches (旬空, 空亡) are 申 and 酉. Many practitioners note when those branches appear elsewhere in the chart or in luck pillars, reading them as weakened or “empty”.
Kui Gang (魁罡). 庚辰 is one of the four days most handbooks list as Kui Gang (庚辰, 庚戌, 壬辰, 戊戌). The tradition associates these days with forceful, uncompromising character and says they prefer a strong Day Master and dislike clashes and wealth or officer stars that break them; schools disagree on the details, and some add 壬戌.
Find your own day pillar
The day pillar cannot be worked out from the Western date alone — it follows an unbroken sixty-day cycle, and a birth after 23:00 may count as the next day in some schools. Enter your birth data in the free Bazi calculator to see yours, then read the chart-reading guide.
Previous in the cycle: 己卯 Ji Mao · Next: 辛巳 Xin Si · All 60 day pillars
Keep learning
More in Day pillars, plus core guides — or go back to the Bazi calculator home page.
Classical quotations are copied from the public-domain texts on Wikisource; links let you check every line. English translations are our own. Traditional Bazi statements are reported as tradition, not as fact.