What is the information of Spring Couplets?

Spring Couplets belong to a kind of couplets. Couplets are divided into spring couplets, birthday couplets, elegiac couplets, door couplets, hall couplets, temple couplets, famous place couplets, commercial couplets, game couplets and other forms, while spring couplets are only one kind of couplets. The so-called couplets are the couplings that are hung or pasted on the porch columns or door frames in front of the hall, so they are also called couplets. This kind of couplet is an independent style of writing consisting of two strings of equal number of words, which are opposite to each other and have certain connotations. That is to say, the number of words in the couplet is not limited, but must be equal, the content should be meaningful, the level and oblique should be in line with the law, the battle should be neat. Where these conditions are met is a couplet, otherwise it is not a couplet.

Couplets are a unique literary form of the Chinese nation with a long history. It originally originated from the peach symbol. Peach talisman is China's ancient hanging on the door frame, painted or engraved with the figure of the evil spirits or handwriting of the two pieces of peach wood board. Peach symbols appeared as early as before the Qin and Han dynasties, when China's folk every New Year, there are in the door of the left and right hanging painted or engraved with ghosts immortal "Shentian", "Yu base" peach symbols of custom.

So why peach wood can avoid disasters and drive away evil spirits? According to China's ancient myths, "the Classic of Mountains and Seas" records, in ancient times, there is a mountain is a ghost of the world, called the ghost domain. At the entrance of this ghost domain, there is a big peach tree, the canopy can cover three thousand miles, in the tree lives a golden chicken, responsible for the daily dawn. Whenever the golden cock crows in the early morning, the ghosts that go out to roam at night must rush back to the Ghost Region. On either side of the gate of the Ghost Domain stood two godmen named Shentan and Yubi. If the ghosts did something harmful at night, the gods would catch them, tie them up with ropes and feed them to tigers, so all the ghosts were afraid of the gods. Thus, all the ghosts were afraid of Shentian and Yubi. Thus, the custom of using Shentian, Yubi and peach wood to drive away evil spirits and avoid disasters was spread in the folklore. They used peach wood to carve into the appearance of Shentian and Yubi, or carved the names of Shentian and Yubi on the peach wood boards and hung them at the entrance of their homes to protect themselves from evil spirits. This kind of peach wood board is called "Peach Amulet".

How did the Spring Festival couplets come about?

It is said that Meng Chang, the ruler of the state of Shu in the Five Dynasties, was a king who liked to innovate, and on New Year's Eve at the end of the year 964 AD, he had a whim to have a bachelor named Xin Yinxun, who was under his command, to write two phrases on the mahogany boards, which were hung as a peach talisman on the doorframe of his residence. The two sentences were "New Year's Day, Eternal Spring, and Jiacheng Festival". The meaning of the first sentence is that the New Year is a time to enjoy the legacy of our ancestors. The next phrase means that the festival heralds the perpetuation of spring. Starting from this, the form and content of the peach charm changed, which not only manifested in the beginning of the use of parallel couplings to replace the "Shentan" and "Yubi", but also expanded the connotation of the peach charm, not only to ward off evil spirits and drive away disasters, but also increased the content of prayers and wishes. This became one of the earliest spring scrolls in China.

By the Song Dynasty, it was quite common to write couplets on peach boards. Wang Anshi's poem "New Year's Day" wrote, "The sound of firecrackers in a year, the spring breeze sent ambiguous into the tassel. The poem "New Year's Day" written by Wang Anshi reflects that every New Year's Eve, every family hangs peach symbols. At the same time, with the emergence of the god of the door and the use of red paper to symbolize the auspiciousness of peach symbols to write peach symbols, the previous peach symbols of the mission of driving away evil spirits and avoiding disasters is gradually transferred to the god of the door, and the content of the peach symbols have evolved into the expression of the people to pray for good luck in the coming year and a bumper harvest of the good wishes.

The appearance of the word "spring couplets" is in the early Ming Dynasty. After Zhu Yuanzhang, the first emperor of the Ming Dynasty, became the emperor, he liked to promote the Peach Symbol, which was put up by the big families every New Year's Eve. He issued an imperial decree before New Year's Eve one year, requiring every household in Jinling to welcome the New Year with spring scrolls written on red paper and pasted on door frames. On the morning of the first day of the Lunar New Year, Zhu Yuanzhang made his rounds in micro-suits, going from house to house to inspect the spring scrolls. Whenever he saw a well-written spring scroll, he was very happy and praised it. When he saw a house without spring scrolls, Zhu Yuanzhang was very angry and asked what the reason was. The attendant replied that it was a family of masters engaged in killing and neutering pigs, and that they were particularly busy during the New Year and had not yet had time to hire someone to write them. Zhu Yuanzhang ordered people to bring pen, ink, paper and inkstone, for this family wrote a spring couplet: "hands split the road of life and death, a knife to cut off the roots of right and wrong." After writing it, he continued his rounds. After a period of time, Zhu Yuanzhang completed his inspection and returned to the court, and then passed by here, saw that the butcher's family had not yet put up the Spring Festival couplets he had written, so he asked what was wrong. The master of this house replied respectfully, "This pair of spring couplets is written by the Emperor himself, we hang it high in the center hall and burn incense for worship every day." Zhu Yuanzhang was very happy to hear this, and ordered his attendants to reward this family with thirty taels of silver. This shows that the name and promotion of the "Spring Festival Couplet" is Zhu Yuanzhang to take the method of administrative orders, issued by the imperial decree to be able to promote in every household.

With the passage of time, Chunlian became a broad concept, there are many subsidiary categories. Depending on where they are used, they can be categorized as frame pairs, horizontal pi, spring strips, doufang, and so on. The "frame pair" is pasted on the left and right door frames, which is our common spring couplets; the "horizontal phi" is pasted on the horizontal wood of the door winks, which is the horizontal phi of the spring couplets; the "spring strips" are single pieces that are pasted on the corresponding places according to the different contents. According to the different contents of the "spring strip" posted in the corresponding place of the single text, such as in the New Year in the courtyard pasted on the "head up to see the happy", "in and out of the peace", "congratulations on wealth" and so on the text; "Doo catty", also known as the "door leaf", for the square diamond-shaped, more posted in the furniture, single door or shadow wall, the Chinese New Year, we like to stick upside down the "Fu" character, belongs to this kind of "bucket catty".

China's people's Spring Festival complex

If calculated from the beginning of the Qin and Han Dynasties, the history of China's Spring Festival couplets have been two thousand years, then why our people have been sticking to the Spring Festival couplets have been obsessed with it? This involves the traditional concept of thinking of our people. As the saying goes, "A year's plan lies in spring." Since ancient times, our people have had an optimistic mindset, which is to hope for the future and pray that the future will bring them good luck. No matter what they were happy and pleased with in the past year, or what they were not happy with, they always hoped that the coming year would be better, so when the New Year was approaching, posting Spring Festival couplets was the best choice to achieve this purpose. With the help of spring scrolls, they express their joy and happiness for the year that is about to pass, or express their expectations and high hopes for the new year. In their traditional concept, a good start of the year is the most pleasant thing, the most auspicious thing, so, every Spring Festival by sticking the Spring Festival couplets to express their good feelings and a kind of good hope for the future. At the same time, our people in the Spring Festival is very concerned about the festive, auspicious, lively, eat well, drink well, wear new clothes, firecrackers, visit friends and relatives, etc. are the reflection of the festive mentality, and posting Spring Festival couplets is precisely to strengthen people's celebratory mentality and rendering the atmosphere of a means of external.

Requirements for writing Spring Festival couplets

The Spring Festival couplet is a new style of writing derived from the ancient parallelism of China, and a literary form that draws on the tradition of poetry in China. It is different from the ancient ekphrasis and poetry, and is a unique form of independent literary style. Though the couplets in the poems or parallel texts are often excellent couplets, they can only be called couplets when they exist independently from the poems or parallel texts. Its most notable feature is the form of pairs of pairs, two couplets each other "right", the content of each other, closely linked. A couplet of the first and second couplet, must be structurally complete and unified, the language is clear and concise. Specific requirements are as follows:

First, the number of words to be equal.

For example: "New Year's wealth and prosperity every year, a good year of peace step by step." This pair of Spring Festival couplets are seven words each, the number of words in the upper and lower couplets are equal, which is the most basic requirements of the Spring Festival couplets. But there is also an alternative phenomenon. In 1916, after Yuan Shikai, the great thief of the country, died, the people of the country ran around, rejoicing and dancing. There was a man of letters in Sichuan who claimed that he wanted to go to Beijing to deliver an elegy for Yuan Shikai. The townspeople were shocked to hear this, and opened the couplet he had written, which reads:

Long live Yuan Shikai

Long live the Chinese people

After reading it, the people could not help but be dumbfounded. The literati deliberately asked, "What are you laughing at?" A straight-talking young man said, "How can the three words 'Yuan Shikai' in the first line be corrected by the four words 'Chinese people' in the second line?" The scholar laughed and said, "That's right, Yuan Shikai just can't match the Chinese people!" This story is about the "elegiac couplet" thing, and "elegiac couplet" also belongs to a kind of couplet, which shows that whether the Spring Festival couplet or other couplets, must do the upper and lower couplets equal number of words, such as not equal, it can only be a very few alternative.

Second, the upper and lower couplet phrases to be the same, the word to be consistent.

That is to say, the composition of the upper part of the phrases are a few words, the lower part of the corresponding phrases must also be a few words. The lexical nature of the upper and lower couplets, that is to say, the nature of the category of words, such as nouns, verbs, adjectives, etc., should be reciprocal arrangement, both the same, but also relative. For example, as just listed, "The New Year is a good year for wealth and prosperity, and the good year is a safe year for peace and prosperity." Each of these is a three-word phrase, i.e., New Year - rich and noble - good year after year, good year - peaceful - high step by step. The phrases are the same in the upper and lower couplets. The words "new" and "good" in this couplet are adjectives. The words "spring" and "year", "wealth" and "peace" are nouns. "Yearly" and "step by step" are adverbs, and "good" and "high" are verbs. The main purpose of this requirement is to use symmetrical artistic language to better express the content of the idea.

Third, the upper and lower couples should be in tune with each other.

The method of expression of the couplet couplet, pay attention to the relative sound and rhythm, that is, the level and oblique tone. This is mainly in order to harmonize the sound, the wrong ups and downs, pleasing to the ear, resonant and powerful. According to legend, Ji Xiaolan came to Hangzhou on a southbound trip, and a friend hosted a banquet for him to wash the dust. During the banquet, the guests and the host answered each other in a joint sentence. Ji Xiaolan's talent was so sharp that his friend was so impressed that he praised him as the only talent in the northern part of the country. Xiaolan was not impressed, said: "the northern talent, all over the Great Wall and beyond; buddy's words from where to start?" My friend said, "A few years ago, I went to the north and brought a couplet with me, but no one could match it." Xiaolan, half-convinced and half-doubting, asked, "Buddy, what sentence did you come up with that the other party could not match?" His friend then read out the superscription smoothly:

The twin towers are hidden, seven layers in all directions

Ji Xiaolan laughed out loud at this and said, "Such a simple coming out of a sentence, it is because they feel that they don't care to answer it, and only then did they say that they wouldn't be able to get it right!" The friend asked in disbelief, "Then, how should the next line be correct?" Ji Xiaolan blurted out:

Lone palm shake, five fingers three long and two short

The friend heard, not only found the next couplet, but also very much admire Ji Xiaolan's superior talent. This pair of "Twin Towers hidden, seven layers in all directions; Lone palm shake, five fingers three long two short" couplet will do the level and oblique tone, to achieve the harmony of sound, staggering ups and downs, pleasing to the ear, resounding artistic effect.

Fourth, do not close your palm.

The so-called "palm", semantic repetition, waste of ink. For example, the old businessmen commonly used Spring Festival couplets, there is a pair of "prosperous business through the four seas, the source of prosperity up to three rivers". This pair of spring couplets, level and oblique rhythm, neat, and with the sound of firecrackers in the "congratulations on wealth" atmosphere of coordination, very popular with the business community. But a deeper study will find that "through the four seas" and "up to three rivers" is a meaning, semantic repetition, the terminology of the couplet is called "clap". A seven-word couplet has only fourteen words, six of which express the content of three words, which leads to semantic repetition. Couplets are the most concise form of writing and should never be allowed to waste ink. In order to provide more information in fewer words, it is important to avoid saying the same thing in both the upper and lower couplets. For example, in the Spring Festival couplet with "Zhen Qiankun" to "shock the world", "send auspicious light" to "Teng Ruiqi", but also are semantic repetitions, all belong to the "clap" problem.

Fifth, choose a good couplet.

The horizontal phi, also known as the horizontal batch, horizontal forehead, horizontal link. In addition to the horizontal phi in addition to the elegiac couplets, longevity couplets, most of them should be used. Horizontal phi and the content of the couplet has an inseparable relationship. A good poncho can be the icing on the cake. In other words, a sentence of the banner, is a couplet of the content of the sublimation, is the theme of the couplet, but also the pen. Horizontal Phi in the writing techniques, common can be divided into three forms:

First, the couplet writing, horizontal Phi title, such as "celebrate the Spring Festival", "New Year's Day," etc., the purpose of direct naming sticker Spring Festival;

Second, the couplet writing, the horizontal forehead Eyesight, such as "New Year's wealth and prosperity every year, a good year of peace step by step," the horizontal cape is "Auspicious Star", is to reveal the realization of the contents of the couplet is the key to the "Auspicious Star", belongs to the eye-catching stroke; third, the couplet writing, the horizontal cape is "Auspicious Star", is the key to the realization of the contents of the couplet, is the eye-catching stroke. belongs to the eye-catching stroke; third is the joint phi complementary, mutually reinforcing, such as, "reduce the burden of compassionate, HaoHao east wind often send warmth; poverty alleviation, the dashing spring rain is always concerned about the feelings of" the crossword is "the future is like gold," is with the couplet complement each other, mutually reinforcing, not only to reveal that the people of the CPC Central Committee "often send warmth", "the people of the CPC Central Committee", "the people of the CPC Central Committee", "the people of the CPC Central Committee". The Party Central Committee "often send warm" and "always concerned about the feelings" of immense gratitude, but also praised the Party's future is great, brilliant. Horizontal phi is mostly four characters, the past writing horizontal phi is from the right to the left horizontal writing, nowadays more from the left to the right, from the right to the left when written in the formal writing style. Paste the cross should be pasted in the center of the lintel, the font should be consistent with the style of the couplet, echoing the top and bottom.

How should I choose the Spring Festival couplets?

Spring Festival couplets have a wide range, almost every family in the Spring Festival when the paste spring couplets. Not only that, it is even some restaurants, hair salons, hotels, grocery stores and some other merchants and businesses are also posted Spring Festival couplets. This involves the question of how to choose the Spring Festival couplets.

First of all, the Spring Festival couplets should highlight the healthy aesthetic concept and aesthetic pursuit.

Whether it is a resident of households or units posted Spring Festival, should reflect a healthy aesthetic interest and pursuit. This aesthetic pursuit, some from the motherland's flourishing, prosperous and strong focus. Such as, "spring back to the land of flowers, the sun warms the state of all things bright", "good times and good scenery everywhere there are good people and good things, the new society and new atmosphere every day to compose a new song and new song" and so on. Such Spring Festival couplets summarize the prosperity of the motherland of a hundred flowers, all living things, eulogizing the new face of the new era, revealing the Spring Festival couplet creators of the motherland's ever-changing beautiful life of praise. Some Spring Festival couplets express the family's beautiful pursuit of the future and aspirations, such as, "one night even two years of the year year as desired, five nights divided into two years of the year to be satisfied". "The sky increases the years and the moon increases the life of people, the spring is full of Qiankun and the door is full of blessings". This kind of family spring couplets is to express the blessings and wishes for the coming year, hope that in the new year, everything will be satisfied, good luck.

Secondly, it is best to stick the Spring Festival couplets to reflect the personality.

Since the sticker is to send some kind of prayers and blessings, then, different people, different industries, different identities will have different prayers and blessings, so the sticker should be in line with their own characteristics. For example, "Spring is good and seedlings are strong; people are new and rice is plentiful." This is a Spring Festival couplet that reflects farmers' prayers and blessings for the new year. "The department store is full of goods, the cabinet is full of spring, summer, fall and winter goods; the building is prosperous, the customers are full of east, west, south, north and south buildings." This is a spring couplet publicizing commercial prosperity. "A branch of chalk, continuous rain nourishes peaches and plums; three-foot podium, swaying spring breeze caresses beams." This is the Spring Festival couplet posted by teachers' families. This kind of spring couplets reflecting their own characteristics, more prominent to the work of the incomparable love and loyalty to the spirit of professionalism. Of course, those from the country's macro point of view, praising the country's prosperity, expressing love for the motherland, love of socialism, the future of the country and society to be enthusiastic eulogy of the Spring Festival, whether it is the family, or the unit can be posted, there is no doubt. What we say reflects the personality is mainly to emphasize that the spring couplets should not be posted in series. That is to say, as a working family, if you post a pair of "hard to raise pigs, three people sweet day over; planting sweat, nine autumn fruit prosperous year," the spring couplets, it will make people laugh.

Third, the posting of spring couplets.

The posting of Spring Festival couplets, to comply with the traditional rules, Spring Festival couplets should be posted vertically. The upper couplet should be posted on the right hand side (i.e., the left side of the door), the lower couplet should be posted on the left hand side (i.e., the right side of the door). The upper and lower couplets must not be reversed. For example, "Spring returns to the earth, a hundred flowers compete for color, the sun warms the state of God, all things are bright", can not be pasted as "the sun warms the state of God, all things are bright, the spring returns to the earth, a hundred flowers compete for color", from the content point of view, the first line and the second line has a cause and effect relationship, because the " Spring back to the land of all flowers compete in color", only to make the "sun warms the state of all things bright", if you paste the opposite on the reversal of the cause and effect relationship, but also let a person read the awkward. And then from the flat and oblique look, from the spring couplet on the sentence and the next sentence on the flat and oblique can be judged to the upper and lower couplet. The last character of the first line of this couplet, "Yan", is a tetragrammaton, i.e., a level tone. The last character of the next couplet, "Hui", is one tone, i.e., oblique tone. Generally speaking, such as the last word is three, four (oblique tone) is the first couplet, such as the last word is one, two (flat) is the second couplet. However, there are also couplets where the last word of the first couplet is flat, and the last word of the second couplet is oblique, so don't think that the ones that are oblique are the first couplet. In this case, we have to judge the upper and lower couplets from the content of the spring couplets. This requires us to read carefully when posting, and really understand the content of the sentence.

In addition, the size of the Spring Festival couplets should be coordinated with their own portals. Residents of the gateway to paste 15 to 20 centimeters wide spring festival is best, and business store store store according to the width of the gateway, paste 20 to 30 centimeters or so of the spring festival is best, so it can appear to be coordinated, generous. As for some of the tall buildings of the organization's door, if you paste the spring scrolls, the width of the spring scrolls should not exceed 40 centimeters is appropriate.