What is the custom of the southern Lantern Festival?

The annual custom of the Southern Lantern Festival is to eat glutinous rice balls, solve riddles on the lanterns and dance lions.

1. Eating dumplings: Eating dumplings is an important custom of the Lantern Festival. The custom of eating glutinous rice balls began in the Song Dynasty, when glutinous rice balls were called "floating dumplings", also known as "glutinous rice balls", "lactose dumplings", "soup balls" and "glutinous rice balls", and merchants called them "gold ingots". At the beginning of the Song and Yuan Dynasties, glutinous rice balls had become the festival food of the Lantern Festival, so people also called them "Yuanxiao". Today it's called Yuanxiao in the north and Tangyuan in the south.

2. solve riddles on the lanterns: Playing with lanterns is an important activity of the Lantern Festival. Lantern riddle is a word game originated from Lantern Festival, also called Lantern Tiger. Putting riddles on lanterns for people to guess and shoot, the answers are mainly word meanings, and there are 24 kinds of riddles such as roller blinds, swings and phoenix-seeking, which form a unique folk culture.

3. Lion Dance: Lion Dance is an excellent folk art in China. Every Lantern Festival or assembly celebration, people come to the lion dance for entertainment. This custom originated in the Three Kingdoms period and was popular in the Southern and Northern Dynasties. It has a history of 1000 years.

4. Walking on stilts: Walking on stilts is a popular mass performance. Stilts originally belonged to one of the hundred ancient operas in China, which appeared as early as the Spring and Autumn Period. In China, stilts first appeared in Liezi Fu Shuo: "Those who had orchids in the Song Dynasty used their skills to dry the Song and Yuan Dynasties. Summoned in the Song and Yuan Dynasties to see their skills.