--- title: The Chinese zodiac: the twelve real animals behind the signs — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «The Chinese zodiac: the twelve real animals behind the signs», a lesson of the biology course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: On a Chinese zodiac poster there are twelve animals: rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monk --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/) / The Chinese zodiac: the twelve real an… # The Chinese zodiac: the twelve real animals behind the signs Lesson 382 of the biology course of Mova's primary school: 18 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/0/) — On a Chinese zodiac poster there are twelve animals: rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog and pig. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/1/) — Each year belongs to one of them, so your animal comes back every twelve years. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/2/) — Eleven of the twelve are real animals, and only the dragon is made up, though it looks like a mix of several real ones. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/3/) — The old stories are legends: the rat did not really win a race by riding on the ox's back. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/4/) — But behind each sign is a real animal with its own true story. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/5/) — Water buffaloes pulled ploughs through flooded rice fields, wild horses were saved by zoos, and chickens and pigs were tamed in Asia thousands of years ago. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/6/) — So the zodiac is a good way to learn real biology: enjoy the legend, then ask what the real animal is like. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/7/) — The twelve zodiac animals are rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog and pig; eleven are real and one, the dragon, is not. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/8/) — Each year belongs to one animal, so the same animal comes back every twelve years. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/9/) — Real rats eat almost anything, have babies quickly and learn fast, and they spread round the world on people's ships and carts. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/10/) — Water buffaloes pulled ploughs through wet rice fields in southern China for thousands of years; their wide hooves stop them sinking deep in mud. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/12/) — People in China say the marks on a tiger's forehead look like the character for king; the stripes are really camouflage, and the South China tiger now survives only in zoos and reserves. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/13/) — The dark patches on the Moon are plains of old cooled lava, and people in China, Japan and Korea see a rabbit there, because our brains love finding faces and animal shapes in patterns; China named its Moon rovers Yutu, the jade rabbit. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/14/) — Przewalski's horses, the last truly wild horses, died out in the wild and were saved by zoos, then brought back to Mongolia and to Xinjiang in China. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/15/) — The Chinese character for the eighth animal can mean goat, sheep or ram, so both are right. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/16/) — The Monkey King is a story hero, but rhesus macaques really live wild in China and quickly learn to grab food and phones from tourists. - [17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/17/) — Chickens come from the red junglefowl of southern China and South-East Asia, and pigs were tamed in China about 9,000 years ago. - [18](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/382-the-chinese-zodiac-the-twelve-real-animals-behind-the-signs/18/) — Dogs were the first animals people tamed, from wolves that were less afraid of people, but where and when is still argued. - ← previous: [Silkworms and goldfish: two animals China changed](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/381-silkworms-and-goldfish-two-animals-china-changed/) - next →: [Giant reptiles of the past: Titanoboa, Sarcosuchus, Deinosuchus and giant tortoises](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/383-giant-reptiles-of-the-past-titanoboa-sarcosuchus-deinosuchus-and-giant-tortoises/) - ↑ back to [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/)