Folk customs of the Spring Festival

The year 2008 is the concentrated culture of China. China has endless stories and customs. For everyone in China, the Spring Festival is definitely the biggest and most lively festival of the year. What are the traditional Spring Festival customs in China?

Customs of the Spring Festival:

First, sweep the floor and remove dust

According to Lu Chunqiu, China had the custom of sweeping dust during the Spring Festival in the Yao and Shun era. According to Chinese folk sayings, because of the homonym of "dust" and "Chen", sweeping dust in the Spring Festival means "welcome in addition to Chen". Its original intention is to sweep all "unlucky" and "bad luck" out of the door and make it clean inside and outside.

Second, hang New Year pictures.

Hanging New Year pictures is a unique custom during the Spring Festival in China. Popular all over the country. In the new year, draw pictures on the door or hang them on the wall. It evolved from the ancient doorkeeper, originally used to exorcise evil spirits, and later evolved into a lively atmosphere to set off the New Year and express people's happy emotions.

Third, write Spring Festival couplets.

Spring Festival couplets have a history of thousands of years. According to the records in Jade Candle Collection and Yanjing Year, the original form of Spring Festival couplets is what people call "Fu Tao". In the Song Dynasty, people began to write couplets on mahogany boards, one for killing evil spirits, the other for expressing good wishes, and the third for decorating the portal for beauty. Later, people wrote couplets on red paper symbolizing happiness and auspiciousness and posted them on both sides of doors and windows during the Spring Festival to express people's good wishes for good luck in the coming year.

Fourth, New Year's Eve.

On New Year's Eve, the whole family get together, have a good drink and enjoy family happiness. There is a custom of eating jiaozi on New Year's Eve in northern areas. Jiaozi's practice is to mix noodles first, and the word harmony is the combination; Jiaozi's jiaozi homonym means to get together and to make friends at a young age. Generally speaking, jiaozi in 1930s should be wrapped before 12 in the evening and eaten at midnight, because this is the beginning of the first day of the first lunar month. South China has the habit of eating rice cakes, which are sweet and sticky, symbolizing the sweetness of life in the new year and rising step by step.

Five, * * * drink Tu Su wine.

What is Tu Su wine? Tu Su is the name of a kind of grass. It is said that Tu Su wine was invented by Hua Tuo, a famous doctor in the late Han Dynasty, and the custom of drinking Tu Su wine was spread by Sun Simiao, a famous doctor in the Tang Dynasty. Every year in the twelfth lunar month, Sun Simiao always sends a pack of medicine to his neighbors, telling them to take medicine to soak wine and drink it on New Year's Eve, which can prevent the plague. Since then, after several generations, drinking Tu Su wine has become the custom of China New Year. Ancient people drank Tu Su wine in a unique way. Usually old people drink first, but young children drink first. The old man was in the back, and everyone only drank a little. The ancients explained: "Young people have achieved success, so congratulations; The old man lost his age and was punished. "

Six, shou sui

Guarding the old age is also called wasting time, lighting a fire, staying up late, and so on. The folk custom of celebrating New Year's Eve is mainly manifested in the fact that lights are always on on New Year's Eve. Observing that New Year's Eve is called "Lighting the New Year with Lights", that is, it is full of lights and candles on New Year's Eve. It is said that this will enrich the wealth of the family in the coming year. Keeping old also refers to family reunion on New Year's Eve and staying up late to welcome the Lunar New Year.

Seven, lucky money

For children, the happiest thing during the Spring Festival is the lucky money given by their elders. The earliest lucky money appeared in the Han Dynasty. The earliest lucky money, also called "money aversion", is a coin-shaped exorcism for wearing and enjoying. The Chronicle of Yanjing written by Dunchong, Fu Cha in the Qing Dynasty recorded the lucky money in this way: "It is called lucky money to wear money with colored ropes, weave it into a dragon shape and put it at the foot of the bed. The elders give their children lucky money. " The meaning of lucky money is to suppress evil spirits and wish children health, luck and peace in the new year.

Eight, welcome the kitchen god

According to the folk saying, on the fourth day of the first month, Kitchen God should check the household registration, so every household should stay at home, prepare rich fruits, burn incense, light candles and set off firecrackers as a welcome. Although many folk sayings have no basis, they carry people's good wishes to pray and avoid disasters, so they have been handed down.

We have to put together a hodgepodge of leftovers from a few days and clean up the new year's goods. Dust indoors, sweep the floor indoors, dump garbage in the yard, and prepare to "throw the poor".

Eight, Lantern Festival

Eating Yuanxiao on the fifteenth day of the first month, as a kind of food, has a long history in China. In the Song Dynasty, a novel Lantern Festival food was popular among the people. This kind of food was originally called "Floating Zi Yuan", later called "Yuanxiao", and merchants also called it "Yuanbao".

Yuanxiao, or "Tangyuan", is filled with white sugar, rose, sesame, red bean paste, yellow cinnamon, walnut kernel, nuts and jujube paste, and wrapped in glutinous rice flour into a circle, which can be meat or vegetarian, with different flavors. It can be boiled, fried and steamed, which means happy reunion.

Spring Festival is an ancient festival in China, and it is also the most important festival in a year. How to celebrate this festival has formed some relatively fixed customs and habits in thousands of years of historical development, and many of them have been passed down to this day. There are differences between the North and the South in Chinese New Year culture, but one thing is basically the same, that is, family reunion, visiting relatives and friends, visiting elders and so on. I hope we can remember these customs full of affection and good wishes and pass them on from generation to generation.