The origin and customs of the Dragon Boat Festival 200 words

The new three-meter-high statue of Qu Yuan (taken in 1981) in the Qu Zi Ancestral Hall. A grand dragon boat race is held on the Miluo River in northeastern Hunan Province on the fifth day of the fifth month of the lunar calendar every year to commemorate Qu Yuan, a great patriotic poet who sank himself in the sand here 2,000 years ago. Xinhua News Agency reporter Wang Ping photo

It is said that the Dragon Boat Festival to eat rice dumplings and the custom of dragon boat races, is to commemorate the history of China's great poet Qu Yuan, it is precisely because of this liberation after the Dragon Boat Festival had been named "Poet's Day".

Qu Ping (about 339 BC ~ about 278 BC) word Yuan, usually called Qu Yuan, and since the cloud name Zhengze, the word Lingjun, Han nationality, the end of the Warring States period of the State of Chu Danyang (today's Zigui, Hubei Province) people, Chu King Xiongtong's son of the Qu Yuan's descendants. Although Qu Yuan was loyal to King Huai of Chu, he was repeatedly ostracized, and after the death of King Huai, he was exiled for listening to the slander of King Hai Xiang, and finally threw himself into the Miluo River and died.

Qu Yuan is one of China's greatest romantic poets, the earliest known famous poet in China, and a world cultural celebrity. He created the genre of "Chu Rhetoric" and the tradition of "Vanilla Beauty". His representative works include "Li Sao" and "Nine Songs".

In China's history, the Dragon Boat Festival has a history of more than 1500 years to honor Qu Yuan. According to legend, Qu Yuan cast Miluo River, the local people heard immediately rowing boats to rescue, has been traveling to the Dongting Lake, never see Qu Yuan's body. At that time, it was a rainy day, and the boats on the lake gathered together by the pavilion on the shore. When people learned that it was to salvage the wise minister Qu Daifu, once again braved the rain, scrambling to row into the vast Dongting Lake. In order to send their condolences, people swing boat on the river, and then gradually developed into a dragon boat race. The people are afraid of the fish in the river to eat his body, they have to go home to bring the rice ball into the river, so as not to spoil the fish and shrimp Qu Yuan's body, and later became the custom of eating rice dumplings.