The nine palaces are the one fixed stage of a Qimen chart: Luo Shu layout, element, direction, people, body, things, season, opposite palaces, and the special case of center 5.
The nine palaces follow the Luo Shu square, oriented the classical way: south at the top, north at the bottom, east on the left, west on the right. In the square below, the first row is the south edge and the last row the north edge:
| Xun 4 | Li 9 | Kun 2 |
|---|---|---|
| Zhen 3 | Center 5 | Dui 7 |
| Gen 8 | Kan 1 | Qian 6 |
Property: every row, column and diagonal sums to 15.
The body column follows the Traditional Chinese Medicine organ correspondences and can be used directly when asking about illness.
| Palace | Element | Direction | People | Body | Things | Season |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 Kan ☵ | Water | North | Second son, hidden person | Ears, kidneys, blood | Water, liquor, boats, thieves, danger | Winter |
| 2 Kun ☷ | Earth | Southwest | Mother, elderly woman, the crowd | Abdomen, spleen and stomach | Farmland, cloth, multitudes, old things | Late summer to autumn |
| 3 Zhen ☳ | Wood | East | Eldest son, person of action | Feet, liver, voice | Thunder, vehicles, trees, instruments, speed | Spring |
| 4 Xun ☴ | Wood | Southeast | Eldest daughter, go-between | Thighs, gallbladder, breathing | Wind, rope, documents, plants, comings and goings | Late spring to summer |
| 5 Center | Earth | Center | Middleman | Neck, central axis | Center, being trapped, confinement | — |
| 6 Qian ☰ | Northwest | Father, elder, leader | Head, lungs, bones | Heaven, roundness, metal and jade, government, bigness | Late autumn to winter | |
| 7 Dui ☱ | West | Youngest daughter, speaker | Mouth, tongue, lungs | Marsh, speech and quarrels, breakage, entertainment, metal | Autumn | |
| 8 Gen ☶ | Earth | Northeast | Youngest son, guardian | Hands, back, nose | Mountain, real estate, doorways and paths, stopping | Late winter to spring |
| 9 Li ☲ | Fire | South | Second daughter, scholar | Eyes, heart | Fire, light, documents, beauty, electricity | Summer |
| Palace | Basic meanings | Opposite palace |
|---|---|---|
| 1 Kan ☵ | Second son; peril and pitfalls; strategy; thieves | Li 9 |
| 2 Kun ☷ | Mother; the many; farmland; docility | Gen 8 |
| 3 Zhen ☳ | Eldest son; movement; thunder; decisiveness | Dui 7 |
| 4 Xun ☴ | Eldest daughter; entering; wind; documents | Qian 6 |
| 5 Center | Lodges in Kun 2, with no gate and no trigram; something landing here is trapped, powerless, unable to move, caught in the middle | — |
| 6 Qian ☰ | Father; ruler; chief; roundness | Xun 4 |
| 7 Dui ☱ | Youngest daughter; speech and quarrels; joy; deficiency | Zhen 3 |
| 8 Gen ☶ | Youngest son; stopping; mountain; real estate | Kun 2 |
| 9 Li ☲ | Second daughter; brightness; documents; beauty | Kan 1 |
The opposite palace usually stands for the counterpart, rival, or other party: you sit in one palace, the other side is often in the opposite one. Kan 1 ↔ Li 9 is Water against Fire, Zhen 3 ↔ Dui 7 and Xun 4 ↔ Qian 6 are Wood against Metal, Gen 8 ↔ Kun 2 is Earth with Earth (harmony).
| Aspect | How center 5 behaves |
|---|---|
| Trigram | None |
| Gate | None |
| Deity | Lodges in Kun 2 |
| Star | Home of the Qin star, which in the rotating plate lodges in Kun 2 and travels with the Rui star |
| Earth-plate stem | Occupies its place as usual |
| Element | Earth |
Whatever lands in the center is trapped, powerless, unable to move, caught in the middle; a person there may be a go-between or mediator, or someone who is stuck.
| Role | Used for | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Spatial coordinate | Choosing a direction | Qian 6 = northwest |
| Human and worldly imagery | Who and what is involved | Qian 6 = father, leader, government |
| Five-element node | Weighing generation and control | Qian 6 = Metal, controls Wood, generates Water |
Six steps to read one palace:
Four relationships are weighed inside a palace: gate vs palace, star vs palace, heaven-plate stem vs earth-plate stem, palace vs palace. The eight deities take no part in the element calculation; they are read by imagery.
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