What are the three major ghost festivals in ancient times?

1. The three major ghost festivals in ancient times were Tomb-Sweeping Day, Hanyi Festival and Zhongyuan Festival.

2, Tomb-Sweeping Day, grave-sweeping, called "thinking time" to worship ancestors. Its customs have a long history. In the Ming Dynasty's "A Brief Introduction to the Scenery of the Imperial Capital", it was written: "On the Qingming Festival in March, men and women went to the grave to pay their respects, and the gold ingot was hung on the back of the sedan chair, and the road was full of embarrassment. Worshipers, mourners, weeping, weeding, adding soil to graves, burning ingots several times, and buying graves with paper money. If you can't see the paper money, it will be a lonely grave. After crying, don't go back, go to the fragrant tree, choose the garden, and sit down and get drunk. " In fact, grave-sweeping existed before the Qin Dynasty, but not necessarily during the Qingming period, but after the Qin Dynasty. It was not until the Tang Dynasty that it became popular. Qing thomas lee said, "On New Year's Eve, the Cold Food Festival and the First Frost Festival, you should offer sacrifices to sweep the graves. During the period, I will serve my bed with vegetarian food, use wine and tools for cutting vegetation, seal trees in the middle of the week, and break Cao Jing, so it is called sweeping the grave. " And spread to this day.

Mid-Autumn Festival, the festival in July is Mid-Autumn Festival. According to legend, from July 1st every year, the King of Yan ordered to open the gates of hell, so that the ghosts who suffered and were imprisoned in hell all the year round could get out of hell, get a short wander and enjoy human blood. Therefore, people call July a ghost month, and this month is considered an unlucky month. They neither get married nor move. The 15th day of the seventh lunar month is the annual Ghost Festival in China. Buddhism calls it "Magnolia Festival". It is said that on this day, Yan Luowang will open the "Gate of Hell" and let the imprisoned ghosts come out to move freely until the end of July. Therefore, during this period, it was popular among the people to worship their dead relatives, burn gold ingots, paper candles and set off river lanterns, so as to pray for ancestors' blessing, eliminate disasters and increase happiness, or turn over the dead and resolve grievances.

The first day of October is called "October Dynasty", also known as "ancestor worship festival" and "cold clothing festival". Since ancient times, China has had the custom of offering sacrifices to ancestors in the new harvest season to show filial piety and not forget one's roots. On the first day of October, ancestor worship, including family sacrifice and tomb sacrifice, is held in both north and south. Today, in many areas south of the Yangtze River, there is also the custom of offering sacrifices to new graves on the first day of October. The first day of October is also the first day of winter, and then the climate is getting colder. People are afraid that their ancestors' souls in the underworld are short of clothes and clothes. Therefore, in addition to food, incense sticks, paper money and other general offerings, there is also an indispensable offering-ghost clothing. When offering sacrifices, people incinerate ghost clothes to their ancestors, which is called "sending cold clothes". Therefore, the first day of October is also called "Clothing Burning Festival". Later, the custom of "burning cold clothes" changed in some places. Instead of burning cold clothes, people burned a lot of ghost paper in a paper bag with the names of the recipients and senders and their corresponding names written on it. This is called "baggage". There is a name of cold clothes, but there is no reality of cold clothes. People think that the underworld, like the dead, can buy many things with money.