Why is October 1st of the lunar calendar Ghost Festival?

The first day of October in the lunar calendar is Ghost Festival. Which dynasty did this statement come from? The first day of October in the lunar calendar is the Cold Clothes Festival. On this day, special attention is paid to paying homage to those who died first, which is called sending cold clothes. Together with Tomb-Sweeping Day and Mid-Autumn Festival (the 15th day of the seventh lunar month), it is called the three "ghost festivals" in a year. It is said that this festival comes from the legend that Meng Jiangnu traveled thousands of miles to find her husband. According to folklore, Meng Jiangnu was newly married, and her husband was taken to the corvee to build the Great Wall of Wan Li. When autumn came and winter came, Meng Jiangnv went through all the hardships to send her husband warm clothes. Who knows that her husband died at the construction site and was buried under the city wall. Meng Jiangnv was heartbroken, wailing at the sky, touching the sky, crying down the Great Wall, finding her husband's body and reburied it with the cotton-padded clothes she brought. This produced the "Cold Clothes Festival".

When sending warm clothes in the south of Shanxi, pay attention to wrapping some cotton in five-color paper, saying that it is to make cotton-padded quilts for the dead. When sending warm clothes in the north of Shanxi, five-color paper should be made into various styles of clothes, hats, shoes and quilts. Even a set of paper houses, tile columns, doors and windows should be made. In addition to shrinking in size, these paper handicrafts look more exquisite and beautiful than real houses, and then they are burned. This action reflects the grief and reverence of the living for the dead, and belongs to a spiritual sustenance. Rituals, such as burying ancestors, are always used to being held on the first day of October in the lunar calendar.

On the first day of October, people not only send warm clothes to the dead for the winter, but also the living people carry out some traditional activities symbolizing winter. On this day, women will take out cotton-padded clothes and let their children and husbands change seasons. If the weather is still warm, it is not suitable to wear cotton at this time, and children and husbands should be urged to try it on for good luck. People are used to arranging stoves and chimneys on this day. After installation, try to make a fire to ensure smooth heating in cold weather. On the first day of October in the lunar calendar, women are forbidden to travel. People improve their lives, and buckwheat noodles are very popular in mountainous areas.

Nowadays, the custom of burning paper and cold clothes on the first day of October has faded. Many people, especially city people, just go to the grave to mourn or present a bunch of flowers in memory of their deceased relatives. In the past, 1 October1day was also the off-duty day for long-term workers, so it was also called "temporary workers' day". On this day, the employer will hold a banquet to entertain the employees, settle their wages, and announce whether to continue to employ them and keep them as "winter workers" or "winter workers". By the first day of October, all the crops on the hillside had been harvested. Jimo, Laoshan, Pingdu, Jiaozhou, Jiaonan and Laixi all have the saying "Clear the slope on October 1st" and "Clear the field on October 1st".