The twelve borj
In the Persian calendar the sign is the month. Each one starts where its month starts, and that is not the same Gregorian day every year.
- AriesAries stands first in the order of the zodiac, and in the Persian solar calendar the sign is also the opening month of the year. This page follows the sign by following that month, which is why its Gregorian starting date does not stay still.
- TaurusTaurus, known in Persian as ثور, is the second sign of the zodiac and the second month of the Persian solar year. In this calendar the sign is not laid over the month from outside; the month itself carries the sign's name.
- GeminiGemini is the third sign of the zodiac, and in the Persian solar calendar it is also the third month of the year — the borj called Jawzā. In this product the sign is the month, so the two are treated as one thing seen from two directions.
- CancerCancer — Saratan in Persian usage — is the fourth borj: the fourth sign of the zodiac and the fourth month of the Persian solar year. Because that year opens at the vernal equinox rather than on a fixed Gregorian date, the Gregorian days the month covers are not the same from one year to the next.
- LeoLeo is the Lion, known in Persian usage as the borj Asad. In this calendar it is not only a sign but a month: the fifth month of the Persian solar year, cut along the zodiac and beginning wherever the equinox and the count of the signs place it.
- VirgoVirgo is the sixth sign of the zodiac, and in the Persian solar calendar it is also the sixth month — known in Persian as Sonbola, the ear of grain. Here the sign is not laid over the calendar; it is the calendar's own month.
- LibraLibra is the seventh sign of the zodiac, and in the Persian solar calendar it is also the seventh month. Its traditional name is Mizān, the scales — an air sign, and a cardinal one, which is to say it opens its season rather than sitting inside it.
- ScorpioScorpio is the eighth sign of the zodiac, and in the Persian solar calendar it is also the eighth month. The sign and the month are the same span of days, which is why the Gregorian dates that mark it do not stay still.
- SagittariusSagittarius is the ninth sign of the zodiac and, in the Persian solar calendar, the ninth month of the year. Its traditional name in Persian is Qaws, the bow. This page follows the sign as the calendar itself keeps it: as a month, counted from the vernal equinox that opens the year.
- CapricornCapricorn, called Jadi (جدی) in Persian, is the tenth of the twelve borj — the zodiac signs that the Persian solar calendar took up as the names of its own months. Here the sign is the month, and the month is measured from the equinox rather than from a fixed Gregorian date.
- AquariusAquarius, the water carrier, is the eleventh sign of the zodiac and so the eleventh month of the Persian solar year — a sign that in this calendar is also a stretch of late winter you can point to.
- PiscesPisces is the last of the twelve signs, and in the Persian solar calendar it is also the last of the twelve months. The sign and the month are the same span of the year here, which is why the Gregorian dates it covers are not the same from one year to the next.