About the origin and customs of the Qingming Festival

About the origin and customs of the Qingming Festival are as follows:

One, the origin of the Qingming Festival

The traditional Qingming Festival of the Chinese people began around the Zhou Dynasty. According to legend, the astronomers of the Zhou Dynasty used the "Tu Gui" method of measuring the sun and shadow to determine the twenty-four seasons, Qingming is one of them. Later, Duke Wen of Jin, Chong Er, designated the third day before Qingming as the Cold Food Festival in honor of his loyal servant, Jie Zi Tui. Because of the close proximity between Qingming and the Cold Food Festival, Qingming was gradually integrated into the custom of paying homage to ancestors during the Cold Food Festival.

During the Tang Dynasty, Emperor Xuanzong of Tang Xuanzong directly designated Qingming and the Cold Food Festival as national holidays. Later, the Qingming Festival gradually absorbed the custom of trekking on the Shangsi Festival, and gradually rose from a mere agricultural festival to an important one.

Second, the Qingming Festival customs

1, trekking

Chinese people since ancient times, there is a Qingming trekking custom. In ancient times, it was called to explore the spring, searching for spring, that is, spring excursions, also known as "spring". Generally refers to the early spring to the countryside to walk and play. Treading this seasonal folk activities, in China has a long history, its source is the ancient farming rituals to welcome the spring custom, this farming rituals to welcome the spring custom has a profound influence on later generations.

The Qingming Festival has two major connotations, the Qingming Festival in time and meteorological and physical characteristics for the formation of the Qingming Treading Customs provides important conditions. Qingming season, spring, nature everywhere presents a vibrant scene, it is a great time for excursions. People are because of the benefit of the convenience, but also a family of young and old in the mountains and countryside between the wild play some.

3, kite flying

Also known as "paper kite" or "kite", kite flying is a favorite activity during the Qingming Festival. Kites are made of paper or silk on a skeleton made of bamboo gabions and pulled by a long line tied to it, which can be flown into the sky while the wind is blowing, and belong to a kind of flying machine that utilizes aerodynamic power alone.

Every Qingming Festival, people not only fly kites during the day, but also at night. At night, a string of small colorful lanterns are hung under the kite or on the wind steady pulling line, like twinkling stars, which are called "divine lanterns". In the past, some people put the kite on the blue sky, then cut the line, let the wind send them to the end of the world, it is said that this can eliminate diseases and bring good luck to themselves.

Cultural Connotation

The Qingming Festival is the grandest and most important ancestral festival of the Chinese nation, which belongs to a kind of cultural and traditional festival of honoring ancestors and tracing the distant past. Qingming Festival cohesion of the national spirit, inherited the sacrificial culture of the Chinese civilization, express people respect their ancestors and ancestors, following the moral sentiment of the story. The Qingming Festival has a long history, originating from early human ancestor beliefs and spring festival rituals. According to the results of modern anthropological and archaeological research, the two most primitive beliefs of mankind are the belief in heaven and earth and the belief in ancestors.

According to archaeological excavations, the Qingtang site in Yingde, Guangdong Province, has discovered a 10,000-year-old tomb, which is the earliest confirmed burial in China, indicating that the ancient ancestors had a clear and conscious concept of burial behavior and rituals 10,000 years ago. The "tomb sacrifice" ritual has a long history of origin, Qingming "tomb sacrifice" is the traditional spring season custom synthesis and sublimation.