Why did Tomb-Sweeping Day go to the grave? What should Tomb-Sweeping Day pay attention to when sweeping graves? What other customs are there in Tomb-Sweeping Day besides sweeping graves?

Qingming is in early spring and March, with beautiful spring, everything recovering, pleasant climate and full of vitality everywhere. This is a good time for spring outing and suburban entertainment, so it is natural for people to enjoy outdoor sports and rural entertainment around Qingming Festival. However, the custom of sweeping graves in Tomb-Sweeping Day is inherited from the disappearing festival: Cold Food Festival.

At present, there is no clear record of the exact time for the Cold Food Festival to increase grave-sweeping entertainment activities. However, from the "Tang Yao Hui Ji" written by Wang Bi in the Northern Song Dynasty, it can be seen that the custom of sweeping graves and hiking in the cold food festival in the early Tang Dynasty has become a common practice and attracted the attention of the court. In the second year of Li Zhilong's reign in Tang Gaozong (622), the imperial court issued an imperial edict forbidding people to "marry at funeral" and "enjoy wine at funeral", and forbidding people to go to the grave on the Cold Food Festival, even forbidding people to have a happy outing after visiting the grave sadly: "Or go to the grave with cold food, and be happy again. I've never been embarrassed sitting in front of a pine tree. Since the wind is strong, it should be banned. " ("Don Yao Hui" Volume 23) Obviously, the court considered these folk practices to be contradictory and inconceivable, disrespectful to the dead and ghosts, and not serious and immoral. However, folk customs did not decline because of the imperial ban, but became more and more prosperous. So, after 100 years, in 732, the imperial court issued an imperial edict, allowing cold food to sweep graves and making it a routine.

But it also stipulates that you can't eat, drink and be merry on the spot after sweeping the grave. In the 29th year of Kaiyuan (74 1), Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty issued an imperial edict: "Those who eat cold food and go to the grave are Yan musicians. When they see the official code, they will not be eligible to take the exam. After three years in the temple, white people will definitely have a meal to eat. " ("Don Yao Hui", Volume 23) It has been a folk custom since ancient times to enjoy sacrifices in front of graves. Although the court has strict orders, it is difficult to ban them.

Since then, the custom of cold food sweeping graves has become more popular. Later, because officials returned to their hometowns to visit graves, they sometimes delayed their official duties, and the court issued several decrees to solve the holiday problem. At first, it was stipulated that the Cold Food Festival would be closed for four days. According to the imperial edict of the 12th year of Dali (777), the yamen in the Tang Dynasty had a five-day holiday, and the holiday in the 6th year of Zhenyuan (790) was increased to seven days. In this way, officials can calmly pay homage to the grave. It can be seen that the Cold Food Festival has become a very grand national festival in the Tang Dynasty. Wang Lengran's Cold Food in the Tang Dynasty said: "Autumn is as expensive as wax, so it is better to eat cold food before spring." That is, the importance of the Cold Food Festival exceeds that of the Double Ninth Festival and the twelfth lunar month at the end of the year. The Cold Food Festival in Song Dynasty also had seven days' holiday.

So, what does the Cold Food Festival have to do with Tomb-Sweeping Day? As mentioned above, there are three main customs in the Cold Food Festival at this time: no fire, grave sweeping and outing. The "Cold Food Festival" that people talked about in the Tang and Song Dynasties is actually a mixture of Tomb-Sweeping Day and the Cold Food Festival now. Cold food is only one day away from Qingming, and the fire ban is over on the third day. It is necessary to make a fire during Qingming Festival, and use wicker or elm to beg for a fire. In this way, Qingming and cold food are linked together, and Qingming's fire-changing activities become a part of cold food activities. In fact, a series of activities before and after Tomb-Sweeping Day in the Tang and Song Dynasties were related. At that time, people thought that Tomb-Sweeping Day was a part of the Cold Food Festival, and regarded it as an important day, as a day to get a new fire. Because Tomb-Sweeping Day banned fire a few days ago, so it should also be in Tomb-Sweeping Day to burn paper in the cemetery to confess. Some poems, actually in Tomb-Sweeping Day, record cold food, sweeping graves and burning paper. From the name, most people call it "cold food". For example, Mei's poem "Huzhou Cold Food with Taishou South Garden" describes the grand occasion of a spring outing in the suburbs; Some people call it "Qingming Festival", such as Du Fu's poem "Qingming Festival", which describes the lively scene of a spring outing in Changsha, Tomb-Sweeping Day in the fifth year of the Tang Dynasty: "It is a prosperous day, and thousands of people leave Changsha. The ferry is beautiful and arrogant. " Some people also call it "cold food is clear", such as Bai Juyi's "Cold Food Wild Forget Songs": "The five emperors are noisy and chaotic, and who cries when it is clear." Some poems confuse the two names, some poems are titled "Qingming", and the following poems are described as "cold food"; Or titled "Cold Food", the poem says "Qingming". According to the records of the Tang Dynasty, on February 15th of the 12th year of Dali, the imperial court issued a decree: "From now on, cold food will be the same as Qingming". After the late Tang and Song Dynasties, the custom of forbidding fire and cold food declined. By the end of the Yuan Dynasty, the name of "cold food" was naturally mentioned less and less, while Qingming, originally the name of solar terms, was highlighted, and more and more people summarized this period. By the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the name of "Qingming" was not only "cold food", but also tended to replace the latter. In modern times, people in most places only know "Tomb-Sweeping Day" and don't know the name "Cold Food Festival". But there are still a few places where fire or cold food is forbidden, such as some places in Shanxi and Shandong.

The similarities in customs and contents between Tomb-Sweeping Day and the original Cold Food Festival are not significant. There are two main links between them: one is the connection of time, and the other is the emotional appeal of remembering and sacrificing predecessors. These two links eventually made Tomb-Sweeping Day replace or annex the Cold Food Festival. The transition from the prohibition of fire in the Cold Food Festival to the memorial ceremony in Tomb-Sweeping Day is naturally completed by people in their lives when time is close.

Originally, the Cold Food Festival and Tomb-Sweeping Day were two different festivals. In the Tang Dynasty, the day of sweeping graves was designated as the Cold Food Festival. The day of the Cold Food Festival is the first day from winter to the future 105, around Qingming, so Qingming and the Cold Food Festival are combined! Grave-sweeping activities are usually held 10 days before or 10 days after Tomb-Sweeping Day. Some people in their hometown have been sweeping graves for a month.

There was no Gregorian calendar in ancient China, but there was a solar calendar. Tomb-Sweeping Day was originally calculated according to the solar calendar in the lunar calendar (the 24 solar terms in the lunar calendar belong to the solar calendar). First of all, the lunar calendar is not a simple lunar calendar, but a combination of yin and yang. So there was a solar calendar in ancient China, which was the twenty-four solar terms. In BC 104, taichu calendar written by Deng officially listed the 24 solar terms in the calendar, and defined their positions. The twenty-four solar terms are formulated according to the laws of the sun's movement (in fact, the laws of the earth's revolution). So it belongs to the solar calendar. You know, this solar calendar is the most accurate calendar known in the world that reflects the laws of the sun. The Gregorian calendar (Gregorian calendar) is also a solar calendar. So it seems to be "calculated by the Gregorian calendar". In fact, the 24 solar terms respond to the seasons more accurately. Each solar term has a fixed position in the earth's orbit. Every minute is not bad. The Gregorian calendar will have an error of one or two days before and after leap years. The first thing that can be determined is the "two solstices", namely the winter solstices and the summer solstices. The sun reaches the tropic of Capricorn from the winter solstice, and the daytime is the shortest; The sun shines directly on the Tropic of Cancer from summer solstice, and the night is the shortest. Winter solstice and summer solstice are easier to measure. The longest day in a year is the winter solstice, and the shortest is the summer solstice. It is stipulated that the time from the winter solstice to the next winter solstice is one year (the year of the tropic of cancer). A year is divided into twenty-four "qi", which is called twenty-four solar terms. At that time, due to the lack of astronomical knowledge, the flat gas was divided equally by time. From the solstice of winter, there is air every once in a while, such as cold, rain, vernal equinox and so on. , called gas; The other 12 species, such as: slight cold, beginning of spring, fright, etc. , are called solar terms. After the constitutional calendar of the Qing Dynasty, the sun moved on the ecliptic as a solar term or neutral gas 15 degrees.

"Chronicle of Jingchu's Age" said: "Last winter festival, there was a flurry of rain, which was called three days of cold food without fire." In other words, there is a gap of 105 days from winter solstice to cold food. The Cold Food Festival, also known as "No Smoking Festival", "Cold Food Festival" and "Hundred Fifth Festival", is the 105th day from summer to the future, one or two days before Tomb-Sweeping Day. In other words, Qingming is between 106 and 107 from the winter solstice. One return is 365.438+079 days. Divide the tropical year by 24 and multiply it by 7, and the Qingming time before the constitutional calendar of the Qing Dynasty is about 106.5 days, which is consistent with the Qingming record between the winter solstice 106- 107 days. However, according to the actual data in recent two years, the distance from the winter solstice in modern Tomb-Sweeping Day is 104. 1, but it is before the cold food.