A dragon from the north-east
On Gen the position that matters most is the incoming dragon. Lai Buyi's Cuiguan pian ranks the directions a dragon can enter from, and the four noble entries, Hai, Gen, Xun and You, stand at the top. A Gen dragon comes in from the north-east. To judge it, walk the ridge from the last big hill down to the site: it should narrow, rise and fall in knots, turn at least once, and then spread into a level platform with the water in front. A ridge that runs straight, has no knots and ends on a slope is not a Gen dragon; it is a slope that happens to point north-east.
Tianshi, the market, and a Gen peak
Tianshi is the Heavenly Market, the market enclosure of the old star maps: trade, gathering, people coming and going. For shop owners this is the Gen that matters. Stand inside the shop door and look out: if a clean, well-formed building, a rounded hill or a busy crossing stands between 37.5 and 52.5 degrees, that is a Tianshi peak. Our school gives a noble star more weight than a common one, so a good peak on Gen is read as the market answering the ground. But the peak has to be good first: whole, upright, not leaning, not cut by a flyover. Gen is also one of the six elegant mountains.
What this means on the ground
Measure Gen as you measure any mountain: inside the door with the door at your back, or behind the stone along its face, luopan level, steel kept away, three readings. A facing of 225 means sitting on Gen. Inside the mountain the centre runs from 42 to 48 degrees. From 37.5 to 40 you lean on Chou, still earth but under Tianchu, a common star. From 50 to 52.5 you lean on Yin, where the element changes to wood and the star to Tianbang. A reading on either line is not Gen at all, only a stone with no clear mountain.
Common mistakes
The worst mistake with Gen is to plant a stone on 45 degrees because a book says Gen is noble. A noble mountain is a direction a good dragon may come from; it is not a sitting you choose off a page. If the ridge arrives from the west and the water leaves at the north-east, a Gen sitting puts the back on the water, and the noble name does nothing for it. The second is to give Gen an animal: it is a trigram mountain and has none; the Ox is Chou's and the Tiger is Yin's. The third is to borrow Gen's rank for Yin or Chou, its common neighbours. The fourth is a phone compass on true north, which shifts Gen onto Yin.
Questions people ask
What direction is Gen on a feng shui compass?
Gen is 45 degrees magnetic, the north-east, covering 37.5 to 52.5 degrees. It is a trigram mountain of the earth element, between Chou and Yin. A stone or door on Gen faces Kun.
Why is Gen called a noble mountain?
Because it carries Tianshi, the Heavenly Market, one of the four noble stars on our luopan, and it is also one of the six elegant mountains. The rank describes the star; the ground still has to earn it.
Is a north-east facing door good for a shop?
A door facing Gen sits on Kun. What our school looks at is what stands on Gen outside the door: a whole, well-formed building or hill there is read as a Tianshi peak; a cut or leaning one is not.
If a ridge or a building stands to the north-east of your site, ask Master Zhang for a site reading to see whether it is a true Gen dragon or peak.