The Legend of Tomb-Sweeping Day

Legends, Stories and Related Customs in Tomb-Sweeping Day

I. Legendary stories (illustrative stories)

About the origin of Tomb-Sweeping Day: According to legend, at the end of Qin Dynasty, Liu Bang, the emperor gaozu of Han Dynasty, and Xiang Yu, the overlord of Western Chu, finally won the world after several rounds of wars.

When he returned to his hometown, he wanted to worship his parents' graves, but due to years of war, the graves were covered with weeds, and the tombstones were uneven, some broken and some broken, and the words on the tombstones were unrecognizable.

Liu bang is very sad. Although his subordinates also helped him search all the tombstones, he didn't find his parents' graves until dusk.

Finally, Liu Bang took out a piece of paper from his sleeve, tore it into many small pieces by hand, held it tightly in his hand, and prayed to God: "My parents are in the spirit of heaven, and now the wind is blowing so hard, I want to throw these small pieces of paper into the air. If the paper falls in one place and the wind can't move, it is my parents' grave. " With that, Liu Bang threw the paper into the air. Sure enough, a piece of paper landed in front of a grave. No matter how the wind blew, Liu Bang ran over and looked at the vague tombstone carefully. Sure enough, he saw his parents' names engraved on it.

Liu Bang was so happy that he immediately had his parents' graves renovated. Since then, Tomb-Sweeping Day has visited his parents' graves every year.

Later folks, like Liu Bang, Tomb-Sweeping Day would go to the ancestral graves every year and press a few pieces of paper in front of the graves with small clods to show that someone was sweeping the graves.