The origin of kites

According to legend, the prototype of the kite was a "wooden magpie" made of wood by Mozi, and then Mozi passed this technology on to his apprentice Lu Ban, who made a "kite" by experimental transformation with extremely thin wood chips and bamboo pieces.

Cai Lun invented papermaking in the Eastern Han Dynasty, and people gradually replaced wood with paper and became "kites". In BC 190, Chu and Han contended, and Xiang Yu's army was besieged by Liu Bang's army. Han Xin sent people to make kites out of cowhide, put bamboo flutes on them, and the wind blew. The Han army cooperated with the flute to sing Chu songs, which dispersed the morale of the Chu army. This is also the origin of the idiom "besieged on all sides".

Kites were originally used for military purposes, but later they were widely used as a form of entertainment. Flying a kite generally requires two people to cooperate, one is to pull the string connecting the kite, the other is to lift the kite over the head, and two people cooperate with the run-up. When the wind is right, the kite holder will let go, and the guy who pulls the string will slowly carry the string according to his feel.

Extended data

With the development of kites, kite culture has gradually formed. Similar to Kongming Lantern, kites were mainly used for military purposes before the Tang Dynasty, and gradually became entertainment activities after the Tang Dynasty, spreading from the court to the people.

At the same time, kite culture was introduced into neighboring countries such as North Korea and Japan with cultural exchanges. After the Song Dynasty, kites developed from a single self-entertainment of flying high and far to a competition between two or three or even more kites, and some official or folk kite competitions of different levels appeared.

Accordingly, kite artists and kite industry came into being. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, kite culture was more developed, and Cao Xueqin also compiled and published a monograph on kite culture, which provided rich historical materials for studying kite making theory, technology and atlas.

Since 1980s, with the reform and opening up, the economic value of kite culture has become increasingly apparent. Kite associations have been set up in various places and various kite festivals have been held, which has revived the ancient kite culture and played a unique role in promoting the local economy.

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