What does a dragon boat look like

Dragon boat

Dragon boat racing is a folk activity that originated in China and is prevalent in East and Southeast Asia. A dragon boat is a boat with the shape of a dragon painted on it or made in the shape of a dragon.

Dragon boat racing is a traditional Chinese folk water sports and entertainment programs, mostly held on festive occasions. It is a multi-person collective paddling competition. Dragon boat racing first emerged in the Han Dynasty.

Dragon boat racing is not only a kind of sports and recreational activities, but also reflects the long history and cultural inheritance of China's traditional and people's collectivist spirit.

Origin:

The Dragon Boat Race at the Dragon Boat Festival, the Dragon Dance at the Lantern Festival (also known as the Dragon Lantern Dance and Dragon Lantern Juggling) and the Dragon Head Festival on February 2 are important folk activities in the Dragon Culture Zone of the Greater East Asia because of the spread of the Chinese culture, and because of the large number of Chinese in Southeast Asia, such as Singapore, Malaysia, and other Chinese areas popular.

Mentioning the origin of the dragon boat, people naturally think of honoring Qu Yuan, in fact, the dragon boat as a culture, which appeared much earlier than the era in which Qu Yuan lived. According to expert testimony, the prerequisite for dragon boat racing must be in the area of rice production and many river ports, which is exactly the characteristics of the southern region of China. In the ancient canonical records about the origin of the dragon boat, the earliest appeared in the Eastern Han Dynasty. Accordingly, it can be speculated that the custom of the Dragon Boat Festival may initially be popular only in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River among the Wu-Yue ethnic group, and then the Wu-Yue culture gradually exchanged and fused with the culture of the Central Plains, and only then did this custom spread to the upper reaches of the Yangtze River and the northern region.

And rumor has it that the dragon boat originated in Yuanling, northwestern Hunan Province. In the book "Yuanling Thousand Years of Dragon Boat", which reflects the profoundness of Chinese dragon boat culture and the historical origin of Yuanling dragon boat, 104 articles by writers and scholars on Yuanling dragon boat are compiled. These articles scientifically and systematically prove the origin of the traditional dragon boat in Yuanling, and record the scale of participation and boat construction of dragon boat activities in Yuanling. The Yuanling dragon boat originated 5,000 years ago, so it is more than 3,000 years older than the argument in honor of Qu Yuan.

The following are pictures of the dragon boat races: