The custom and origin of the Spring Festival

Among the traditional festivals of the Chinese nation, the Spring Festival is the "crown of festivals", with the longest duration, the strongest feelings and the most popular. Spring Festival is commonly known as "Chinese New Year". Do you know how the year came about?

In folklore, "Nian", also called "Xi", is a monster, which will harm people on the thirtieth day of the twelfth lunar month. Nian beast is afraid of red, fire and noise. Therefore, on the thirtieth day of the twelfth lunar month, every household posted Spring Festival couplets, set off firecrackers, hung lanterns and lit bonfires, and the Nian beast scared away at first sight. Call it "Chinese New Year" or "New Year's Eve" to let everyone spend the night safely.

In China, the Spring Festival has a history of over 4,000 years. In ancient Chinese, the word "nian" is pictographic, just like an adult holding a seedling, indicating that the crops are ripe. Later, the word "Niancheng" came into being. Because cereals are usually cooked at one year old, "year" and "year" are equated, in other words, a year is a year.

The ancients looked up at the astronomical phenomena and called the day of the birth of the moon new. The day when the moon is completely invisible is called the dark moon, and the day from the new moon to the dark moon is a month. In the ancient calendar Li Xia, there are twelve months in a year, and the first month is called the first month. The first day of the first month is the first year and the beginning of a year. The darkest day of the last month is the end of the year, that is, New Year's Eve.

The ancients usually hunted and shot pheasants and rabbits in the last month of the year to meet the people's demand for meat. "Hunting" and "wax" are similar in shape and sound, so you can take a vacation. The ancients also called this month "twelfth month". Wild animals can't be eaten, and extra prey should be taken out to sacrifice ancestors and gods, so it is called "La Worship".

It is natural to celebrate the harvest, so when should we celebrate it? Autumn harvest and winter storage, of course, should be chosen in the relatively leisure winter. The celebration and expectation of New Year's achievements combined with "La Worship" is the original prototype of "Chinese New Year". At that time, China was in the era of big tribal alliance, and Chinese civilization had just started.