When is the Lunar Cold Food Festival?

The date of the Cold Food Festival has not yet been determined. Generally, it is from summer to the future 105, and one or two days before Tomb-Sweeping Day. The Cold Food Festival is three days before and after the Tomb-Sweeping Day in China. From this day on, the ancients did not make a fire to cook for three days, so it was called cold food.

The customs of the Cold Food Festival include going to the grave, outing, cockfighting, swinging, playing with carpets and pulling hooks. The custom of going to the grave is very old.

Today, the folk custom of banning fire and cold food in Shanxi is mostly one day, and only a few places are used to banning fire for three days. People in southern Shanxi are used to eating bean jelly, cold noodles and cold cakes. In northern Shanxi, people are used to cooking, that is, cutting steamed cake noodles or white noodles into dice-sized squares, drying them in the sun, and frying them with soil to brown them as food for the Cold Food Festival. Some mountainous areas eat fried noodles for the whole family on this day.

Legend of the origin of the Cold Food Festival:

According to legend, Zhong Er, the son of the Jin Dynasty, traveled around the world and experienced hardships. Once, when he was hungry and helpless, Jie Zhitui cut the meat off his thigh for him to eat. Later, when Zhong Er became king, he went to Jiexiu, who was hiding in the mountains with his mother.

I couldn't find it anywhere, so I ordered Yamakaji to be released, trying to force Jiexiu out, only to find that Jiexiu and his mother were burned to death. Zhong Er regretted it very much, so he made it a rule not to light a fire and eat all the cold food at this time of the year. This is the so-called Cold Food Festival.

In fact, the real origin of the Cold Food Festival originated from the ancient system of drilling wood for new fire. Because of different seasons, the ancients used different trees to drill fires, which is the custom of making fires in different seasons. And every time you change the fire, you have to change it with a new one. People were forbidden to make a fire before a new fire came, which was a great event at that time.