I Ching - what about the order?

Q: In the cryptogram you say is 5000 years old, why does it show Yin starting at the bottom on the circle and going around to the right, and yet Yin is at the top left on the square, going left to right, as in English? Doesn't Chinese writing start at the right side? J.H.

A: Since the cryptogram has come down to us unnumbered and without labeling of any kind, as far as I have been able to determine, we must consider the possibility that it should be turned the other way. I printed it in the position I found it in both Hellmut Wilhelm's Eight Lectures on the I Ching, and Jose Arguelles' The Mayan Factor. But if we turn it upside down, Yang will be at the upper left and Yin the lower right on the square, and in the circle Yin will appear at the top and Yang at the bottom. Either way the positions of the square and circle taken together are not consistent with our use of contemporary Chinese or English. There is a remote possibility that through the millennia, the square has been reversed inside the circle, but we have no basis to assume that was done.

Taking the cryptogram as it has come to us, then, and with the general understanding that the Chinese language is much older than the English, perhaps we need to go back further, before the current ordering of Chinese letters developed. We can stretch our minds to encompass the possibility of a system that conveyed written information which transcends anything that is in current usage, or that has been uncovered by research.

Or, consider this possibility:  Start at the bottom right on both the circle and the square.  Yang begins the square and Yin begins the circle.  The square traditionally represents Earth, and begins with Yang.  The circle traditionally represents Heaven, and begins with Yin.  See journal entry "I Ching - Yin = Sky and Yang = Earth" for greater detail.