The Year of the Rooster
The Rooster is one of the 12-year cycle of animals which appear in the Chinese zodiac related to the Chinese calendar. The name is also translated into English as Cockerel or Chicken. However, the Chinese term is more generic as it applies to barnyard fowl of either sex.
A weather vane, wind vane or weathercock is an instrument for showing the direction of the wind. They are typically used as an architectural ornament at the highest point of a building. Although partly functional, weather vanes are generally decorative, often featuring the traditional cockerel design. Pope Gregory 1 said that the cock (rooster) "was the most suitable emblem of Christianity", being "the emblem of St Peter”. Some say that it was because of this that the cockerel began to be used as a weather vane on church steeples. The oldest weather vane with the shape of a rooster existing in the world is the Gallo di Ramperto, made in 820 and now preserved in the Museo di Santa Giulia in Lombardy.