What are the origins and customs of Qingming?

Tomb-Sweeping Day is one of the most important traditional festivals in China. It is not only a festival for people to pay homage to their ancestors and cherish the memory of martyrs, but also a link for the Chinese nation to recognize their ancestors and return to their ancestors. More importantly, we should know our ancestors, see our own shortcomings, correct ourselves and drive future generations. Realize the value of life, get rid of the dead leaves left by our ancestors, and keep new buds that can be used for reference. Promote positive energy. Passed down from generation to generation, the definite date of revision is April 4-5 every year.

2. It is said that the origin of Tomb-Sweeping Day began with the ceremony of ancient emperors offering sacrifices to graves. Later, people followed suit, and it became a fixed custom of the Chinese nation to worship ancestors and sweep graves on this day. Originally, the Cold Food Festival and Tomb-Sweeping Day were two different festivals. In the Tang Dynasty, the day of sweeping graves was designated as the Cold Food Festival. The correct date of the Cold Food Festival is from winter to the future 105, around Tomb-Sweeping Day. Because the two dates are similar, Tomb-Sweeping Day and Cold Food merged into one day.

3. According to Yan Yannian's Biography in Han Dynasty, Yan's family will return to the graveyard in the East China Sea in Tomb-Sweeping Day even though they are thousands of miles away in Beijing. Yan Yannian's behavior is reasonable in terms of the development and strengthening of ancestor worship and consanguinity consciousness of China people. Therefore, in ancient times, the tomb sacrifice was not included in the standard, but also included in the five rites: it is always a routine to let the scholarly family go to the tomb and include the five rites. With the official approval, the wind of tomb sacrifice is bound to flourish.

4. In the history of China, eating cold food and forbidding fire to worship ancestors has long been a custom. After the Tang Dynasty, the Cold Food Festival gradually declined, so it became a continuous festival tradition for Tomb-Sweeping Day to sweep graves to worship ancestors. Bai Juyi, a great poet in the Tang Dynasty, wrote in his poem "Cold Food and Wild Hope": The raven makes the tree faint, and whoever eats cold during the Qingming Festival will cry. The wind blows the paper money in the wilderness, and the ancient tomb is full of spring grass. The flowers in Li Tang reflect the poplars, which are full of places where life and death leave.

5. The mysterious desert spring cries but doesn't smell it, and the rustling rain makes people return. Song Dynasty poet Goguryeo once wrote in the poem Qingming: There are many graves in the north and south mountains, and Qingming is different. Paper ashes fly into white butterflies, and tears are dyed into red azaleas. When the sun goes down, the fox sleeps in front of the grave, and the children smile at the lights when the night returns. As long as you are alive, enjoy your wine and indulge yourself. In the grave after your death, you can't taste a drop. Even in today's society, before and after Tomb-Sweeping Day, people still have the custom of going to graves to pay homage to their ancestors: uprooting weeds, placing offerings, burning incense and praying in front of graves, burning paper money and gold ingots, or simply offering a bunch of flowers to express their memory of their ancestors.

6. Tomb-Sweeping Day is the time when willows sprout and smoke is green. There are folk customs of folding willow, piercing willow and inserting willow. When people go out for an outing, they break off some wicker branches, which can be played with in their hands, woven into hats and worn on their heads, or taken home and inserted on the lintels and eaves. Proverbs say that it is a very common custom in the old society to break the willow at Qingming Festival, so that a beauty becomes a bright head and a dog turns yellow after death.

7. It is said that willow branches have the function of ward off evil spirits, so inserting willow and wearing willow is not only a fashionable decoration, but also an effect of praying for ward off evil spirits. It may also be related to the custom of using willow branches to beg for new fire in the past cold food festival. Today, it seems that breaking willow branches at will is a kind of damage to trees and should not be advocated. The custom of planting trees by inserting willows in Tomb-Sweeping Day is said to commemorate Shennong, who invented various agricultural production tools and tasted herbs. On the other hand, it is said that the willow tree that meson held when he died came back to life. Jin Wengong named it Qingming Willow and folded it into a circle to wear on her head. This custom was later introduced to people. Although the sources of allusions are different, these customs are still inseparable from the joy of people returning to the earth in spring.

8. In addition to the above-mentioned custom of sweeping graves to worship ancestors, walking in the green and inserting willows, there are many entertainment habits in Tomb-Sweeping Day that have been loved by people for thousands of years, such as hooking, flying kites, swinging, shooting willows, cuju, etc., which were all the rage for a time, but are now rare.