How did people in ancient times celebrate New Year's Eve, and how is it different from modern times?

The Spring Festival is the most traditional and grand festival of the Chinese nation. There are many different ways to describe its origin, but most of them are unproven, and it was after the Xinhai Revolution that the first day of the Lunar New Year was called the Spring Festival. In ancient times, the Spring Festival has a variety of names, mostly related to the "yuan" (the initial meaning), such as "the first day", "the first day", "the first day", "the first day" and so on, meaning that the first day of the Chinese New Year.

So, how did our ancient people celebrate the Spring Festival? And what is the difference between modern times?

First of all, many of our modern Spring Festival customs have been passed down from ancient times, such as dusting, New Year's Eve, eating New Year's Eve dinner, sticking Spring Festival couplets, sticking window clings, setting off firecrackers, giving out New Year's Eve money, etc., so what are the differences?

I. Ancestor worship

Sacrifice to ancestors, although nowadays the Spring Festival according to the different customs of different places, but also in different ways to remember the ancestors, graves and ancestors, but the ancient people than we more revered and valued this tradition. Good people will put their wishes on the ghosts and ancestors, the end of the year sacrifices to the gods, ancestor worship is the main activity of the Spring Festival, in the New Year's Eve before the arrival of the "invitation to the family hall", every family should be the genealogy, ancestor statues, such as tablets for the home in the upper hall, placed on the table, set up the incense burner, offerings. Ancestor worship at the same time, some places will also be sacrificed to the gods of heaven, land gods, and even bow to worship the Jade Emperor, Queen Mother. This is a fine tradition of the Chinese nation and should come before everything else.

II. New Year's greetings

Today's society pays New Year's greetings in a variety of ways, but in ancient times, they would send "greeting cards" to visit friends and relatives, without having to enter the house. As early as in the Song Dynasty, the royal aristocrats and scholars of the family and relatives have been used between the special New Year's greeting piece, called the "name of the prick" or "name post", the door of each family to stick a red paper bag, known as "door book

Three New Year's greeting cards were written in the red paper bag glued to the door of each house, called "door book", on which was written the name of the master to receive the name of the prick (name post), the visitor cast the name of the prick (name post) in the door book, that is to say that the New Year's Day, the significance of which is the same as that of the modern New Year's card.

Three. Street sellers

Nowadays, we can purchase New Year's Eve in the supermarket or online one-stop shopping, while in ancient times, near the New Year, there will be a seller picking the goods on the streets and alleys of the yelling and trading, stretcher of everything, daily necessities, vegetables, clothing, small toys and so on.