Why is the ancient winter solstice important?

Ancient people thought that the winter solstice was a natural transformation of yin and yang and a godsend. As early as the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, officials and people paid special attention to the winter solstice. In Shang, Zhou and Qin dynasties, the solstice in winter was considered as the beginning of a year. After the Han Dynasty, the solstice of winter was established as the "Winter Festival", and the government held a grand celebration ceremony, namely "Happy Winter".

According to the Book of the Later Han Dynasty, around the winter of Sunday, "hundreds of officials offered sacrifices to heaven". There is a folk proverb called "fat in winter, thin in winter", so the activities of solar terms from winter solstice are also very rich. Winter solstice is also called short day, short day, southern solstice and winter festival, winter solstice festival and Asian New Year. It is both a solar term and a festival. The winter solstice is a solar term reflecting the direct sunlight movement. On the solstice of winter, the sun moves southward to the extreme, and the sun shines directly on the tropic of Capricorn, which is the place with the shortest day and the longest night in the northern hemisphere. From that day on, the direct sunlight point returned to the north, and the height of the sun in all parts of the northern hemisphere (China is located in the northern hemisphere) gradually increased, and the number of days also increased day by day.