Language handbook

Chinese New Year and the concept of the year, the original meaning from agriculture, people in ancient times the growth cycle of the grain called "year in the Xia and Shang Dynasties produced the Xia calendar, to the cycle of the moon for the month, the year is divided into twelve months, each month to not see the moon for the day for the solstice, the first month of the solstice of the first day of the Zi Shi known as the first day of the year, that is, the beginning of the year, also called the year, the year of the name is from the Zhou Dynasty began to the Western Han Dynasty was officially fixed and has continued today. Western Han Dynasty to formalize the fixed, has continued to the present day. But the first day of the first month in ancient times was called "New Year's Day", until China's modern Xinhai Revolution victory, the Nanjing Provisional Government in order to comply with the farming season and facilitate the statistics, the provisions of the civil use of the summer calendar, in the government agencies, mines, schools and organizations in the implementation of the Gregorian calendar.

On September 27, 1949, at the first plenary session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, the use of the world's common calendar was adopted, and the first day of the first month of the Gregorian calendar was designated as New Year's Day, commonly referred to as the solar year; the first day of the first month of the Lunar Calendar is usually around the time of the first day of spring, and therefore the first day of the first month of the Lunar Calendar is designated as the "Spring Festival", commonly referred to as the lunar year. The first day of the first month of the lunar calendar is usually around the beginning of spring. Traditionally, the Spring Festival is celebrated from the Lunar New Year's Eve or Lunar New Year's 23rd day of the Lunar New Year to the 15th day of the first month of the Lunar New Year, with New Year's Eve and the first day of the Lunar New Year as the climax of the Spring Festival. During the Spring Festival, the Han Chinese and most ethnic minorities in China hold a variety of celebrations, most of which are mainly devoted to the worship of gods and Buddhas, paying tribute to ancestors, getting rid of the old and bringing in the new, welcoming good fortune, and praying for a good year. The form of activities is colorful, with a strong ethnic characteristics.

The year ------ explore the origins of this custom, in folklore has been circulating an interesting story: the ancient times, there is a ferocious beast, scattered in the mountains and dense forests, people call them "year". It is hideous, vicious, specializing in eating birds and beasts, scales and insects, a day to change a flavor, from knocking insects have been eaten to the living, so that people talk about the "year" color change. Later, people slowly mastered the "year" of the law of activities, it is every three hundred and sixty-five days scurrying to the crowd gathered to taste a mouthful of food, and the time of the infestation are in the dark, until the cock crows at dawn, it will return to the mountains and forests to go. Calculated the date of the "year" rampage, the people will be this terrible night as a gate to brake, called "New Year's Eve", and came up with a set of New Year's Eve approach: every night, every family is done in advance of the dinner, the fire net stove, and then put the chicken coop Cattle fences all tied up, the front and back doors of the house are sealed, hiding in the house to eat "New Year's Eve dinner", because this dinner has the meaning of bad luck and uncertainty, so it is very rich, in addition to the whole family to dine together to express the harmony and reunion, but also have to be in the meal before the sacrifice to the ancestors, praying for the blessing of the gods of the ancestors, and peacefully through the night, and after eating dinner, no one will have a good time, and then the fire will be turned off. After dinner, no one dares to sleep, sitting together in a crowded chat. Gradually formed on New Year's Eve to stay up to keep the New Year's custom. The custom of keeping the New Year's Eve rose in the North and South Dynasties, and many literati in the Liang Dynasty had poems about keeping the New Year's Eve. "One night is even a double year, and the fifth night is divided into two years." People light candles or oil lamps and keep vigil all night, symbolizing that all evil plagues and diseases will be driven away, and looking forward to an auspicious new year. This custom has been passed down to this day.

New Year's Customs

Posting Spring Festival couplets and door gods

The custom of posting Spring Festival couplets began about a thousand years ago in the period of the later Shu, which is historically attested. In addition, according to the Jade Candle Canon and the Yanjing Shishiji (Record of the Years and Times of Yanjing), the original form of the Spring Festival couplets was what people called "peach symbols". In ancient Chinese mythology, there is a world of ghosts, in which there is a mountain with a big peach tree covering 3,000 miles, and a golden rooster at the top of the tree. Whenever the golden rooster crowed in the morning, the ghosts that had gone out to roam at night would be rushed back to the ghost world. The gate of the Ghost Realm was situated in the northeast of the peach tree, and by the gate stood two godmen named Shentan and Yubi. If a ghost did something harmful at night, the gods would immediately find it, catch it, tie it up with a rope made of mango reeds, and feed it to the tiger. Therefore, all the ghosts in the world were afraid of Shentian and Yubi. So the folk used peach wood to carve into their likeness and put it in front of their house to avoid evil and prevent harm. Later, people simply carve the name of God Tantui and Yubi on the mahogany board, thinking that this can also suppress the evil to go to the evil. This kind of mahogany board was later called "peach charm".

By the Song Dynasty, people began to write couplets on the mahogany board, one does not lose the significance of mahogany to suppress evil, the second is to express their good wishes, the third is to decorate the portal, in order to beautiful. And write couplets on red paper to symbolize the joy and auspiciousness of the New Year, posted on both sides of the doors and windows, to express people's prayers for good luck in the coming year. In order to pray for a family's well-being, people in some places still retain the habit of sticking door gods. It is said that if two door gods are posted on the front door, all demons and ghosts will be afraid. In folklore, the door god is a symbol of righteousness and force, the ancients believe that people with strange looks often have magical endowments and extraordinary skills. They are upright and kind-hearted, to catch ghosts and demons is their nature and responsibility, people look up to the ghost hunter Zhong Kui, that is, this kind of strange looks. So the folk god of the door is always angry eyes, grim-looking, holding a variety of traditional weapons, ready to fight with the ghosts and demons that dare to come to the door. Since the doors of residential houses in China usually open in pairs, the door gods are always in pairs. After the Tang Dynasty, in addition to the previous two generals Shentian and Yubi, people also took Qin Shubao and Yuchigong, two Tang Dynasty military generals, as door deities. According to legend, Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty was sick and heard the ghosts and demons outside his door, which made him feel uneasy all night long. So he asked these two generals to stand beside the door with weapons to guard it, and the next night there were no more ghosts to disturb him. Later, Emperor Tang Taizong had the images of the two generals painted and pasted on the door, and this custom began to be widely spread among the people. Spring Festival is an ancient festival in China, but also one of the most important festivals throughout the year, how to celebrate this festival, in the development of thousands of years of history, the formation of a number of more fixed customs, many of which are still handed down to this day.

Dust sweeping

"Lunar New Year 24, dust sweeping house", according to "Lv's Spring and Autumn Annals" records, China in the Yao and Shun era, there is a Spring Festival dust sweeping custom. According to folklore: because the "dust" and "Chen" consonant, dust sweeping in the New Year has "in addition to the meaning of Chen Bu Xin", the intention is to all the poor luck, bad luck, swept out the door. This custom is a symbol of people's desire to break away from the old and bring in the new and their prayers for the old and the new. Whenever the Spring Festival comes, every household has to clean up the environment, wash all kinds of appliances, dismantle the bedding curtains, sprinkle clean the courtyard, dust dust cobwebs, dredge the nullahs and ditches. Everywhere overflowing with happy health, clean and welcome the new year's happy atmosphere.

Posting Spring Festival couplets

Spring Festival couplets, also known as door-to-door, spring stickers, couplets, couplets, peach symbols, etc., it is neat, couplets, simple, sophisticated text depicting the background of the times, expressing the best wishes, is China's unique form of literature. Every Spring Festival, whether urban or rural, every family should select a pair of big red spring couplets posted on the door, for the festival to increase the festive atmosphere. This custom began in the song dynasty, in the ming dynasty began to prevail, to the qing dynasty, the spring couplets of ideology and artistry have greatly improved, liang zhang toru prepared by the spring couplets of the monograph "sillian series of words" on the origin of the couplets and all kinds of works of the characteristics of the discourse. There are many kinds of spring couplets, which can be divided into door centers, frame pairs, horizontal approvals, spring strips, bucket squares and so on, according to the places where they are used. The "door heart" is pasted on the center of the upper part of the door panel; the "frame pair" is pasted on the left and right door frames; the "horizontal approval" is pasted on the horizontal wood of the lintel; the "spring strip" is pasted on the horizontal wood of the lintel; the "spring strip" is pasted on the horizontal wood of the lintel according to different contents. "According to the different contents, posted in the corresponding place;" bucket catty "also called" door leaf "for the square diamond-shaped, mostly posted in the furniture, shadow wall.

Stick window and upside down "Fu" character

In folklore, people also like to put a variety of paper cutouts on the window - window flowers. Window flowers not only set a festive atmosphere, but also decorative, appreciative and practical in one. Paper cutting in China is a very popular folk art, for thousands of years by the people's favorite, because it is mostly affixed to the window, so it is also known as "window flowers". Window decoration with its unique generalization and exaggeration will be auspicious events, good wishes expressed to the fullest, will be decorated with festivals red hot and rich. At the same time of putting up Spring Festival couplets, some people have to put large and small "Fu" characters on the door, wall and lintel of their houses. Chinese New Year sticker "Fu" character, is China's folk custom from a long time. The character "福" refers to good fortune and good luck, and it expresses people's desire for a happy life and their wish for a better future. In order to more fully reflect this yearning and wishes, some people simply stick the word "Fu" upside down, indicating that "happiness has arrived" and "good fortune has arrived". Folk there will be "Fu" word fine as a variety of patterns, patterns have the star, peach, carp jump Dragon Gate, the five valleys, the dragon and phoenix, and so on.

New Year's Paintings

The Spring Festival hanging stickers New Year's paintings in urban and rural areas is also very common, thick black colorful New Year's paintings to thousands of families added a lot of prosperity and joy of the festive atmosphere. New Year paintings are an ancient folk art in China, reflecting the simple customs and beliefs of the people and holding their hopes for the future. New Year paintings, like spring scrolls, originated as "door gods". With the rise of woodblock printing, the content of the New Year's paintings has not only limited to monotonous themes such as the God of the Door, become colorful, in some of the New Year's paintings in the workshop produced the "Three Stars of Fortune and Longevity," "Heavenly Officials Provide Blessings," "Five Grains and a Plentiful Harvest," "Six Animals Prosperity," "Welcoming the Spring to receive the blessings of" and other classic colorful New Year's paintings, in order to satisfy people's joyful prayers for the New Year's good wishes. There are three important production areas of Chinese New Year paintings in China: Taohuayu in Suzhou, Yangliuqing in Tianjin and Weifang in Shandong; forming three major schools of Chinese New Year paintings, each with its own characteristics. The earliest collection of Chinese New Year paintings in China is the woodcut New Year paintings of the Southern Song Dynasty, "With the fairness of the country's face", which depicts four ancient beauties, namely, Wang Zhaojun, Zhao Feiyan, Banji and Lvzhu. The most widely circulated folk painting is the one of "The Mouse Marrying Her Marriage". It depicts an interesting scene of a mouse marrying a bride in accordance with the customs of the earth. In the early years of the Republic of China, Zheng Mantuo of Shanghai combined the lunar calendar and New Year's paintings. This is a new form of New Year's paintings. This combination of two and one of the New Year's paintings, later developed into a wall calendar, and is still popular throughout the country.

Watch the New Year's Eve

Watching the New Year's Eve is one of the most important New Year's activities, and the custom of watching the New Year's Eve has a long history. The earliest record is found in the Western Jin Dynasty Zhou Chu's "Land and Customs": New Year's Eve night, each with the gift, known as "feed the year"; wine and food invited, known as "don't year"; young and old get together to drink, wishing to complete, known as the "share the year"; all night, everyone is the most important activity. "The whole night, waiting for the dawn, is called "observing the new year". "One night even double the year, five nights divided into two days", the night of New Year's Eve, the whole family gathered together, ate the New Year's Eve dinner, light up candles or oil lamps, sitting around the stove chatting, waiting for the time to say goodbye to the old and welcome the new, the all-night vigil, symbolizing all the evil plagues and epidemics according to the run away, looking forward to the new year of good luck and good fortune. This custom gradually prevailed, to the early Tang Dynasty, Tang Taizong Li Shimin wrote a "year-keeping" poem: "Cold resignation from the winter snow, warmth into the spring wind". Until today, people are still accustomed to the New Year's Eve to welcome the new year. In ancient times, there are two meanings of year-observing: the elderly year-observing for the "resignation of the old year", there is the meaning of treasuring time and light; young people year-observing is to extend the life of their parents. Since the Han Dynasty, the time of the transition between the old and the new year is usually the middle of the night.

Crackers

Chinese folk "open door firecrackers". That is, at the dawn of the new year, the first thing that families open the door is to set off firecrackers, in the sound of firecrackers to get rid of the old and welcome the new. Firecrackers is a Chinese specialty, also known as "firecrackers", "cannonballs", "firecrackers". Its origin is very early, so far has a history of more than two thousand years. Firecrackers can create a festive and lively atmosphere, is a kind of festival entertainment, can bring people joy and good luck. With the passage of time, the application of firecrackers is more and more widely used, varieties and colors are also increasingly numerous, every major holiday and festivals, and marriage, building, opening, etc., are to set off firecrackers in order to show the celebration, figure a good luck. Now, Hunan Liuyang, Guangdong Foshan and Dongyao, Jiangxi Yichun and Pingxiang, Wenzhou, Zhejiang and other areas is China's famous hometown of firecrackers, the production of firecrackers colorful, high-quality, not only sells well across the country, but also exported to the world.

Welcome to the New Year

The first day of the New Year, people get up early, put on the most beautiful clothes, dressed neatly, go out to visit friends and relatives, each other, wishing good luck for the coming year. Worship a variety of ways, some of them are the same patriarch led a number of people to go door to door to pay tribute to the New Year; some colleagues invited a few people to pay tribute to the New Year; there are also get together to congratulate each other, known as the "group worship". Because of the time-consuming and laborious New Year's visit, some upper-class people and scholars later used the posters to congratulate each other, which developed into the later "New Year's Pieces". Spring Festival to pay tribute to the New Year, the younger generation should first pay tribute to the elders, wishing the elders a long life and well-being, the elders can be prepared in advance of the New Year's money to the younger generation, it is said that the New Year's money can be pressed to the evil spirits, because of the "age" and the "spirit" harmonic, the elders to get the New Year's money can be peaceful and safe! The new year's money is said to keep evil spirits at bay. There are two kinds of New Year's money, one is to colorful rope threaded braided into a dragon shape, placed at the foot of the bed, this record is found in the "Yanjing Yearly Record"; the other is the most common, that is, wrapped in red paper by the parents of the money given to the children. New Year's money can be rewarded in the evening after the New Year's greetings in public, can also be in the New Year's Eve when the child is asleep, by the parents secretly placed under the child's pillow. Nowadays, the custom of giving New Year's money to the younger generation by the elders is still prevalent.

In the ancient agricultural society, about since the eighth day of the Lunar New Year, housewives will be busy with the New Year's food. Because of the long time needed to pickle the preserved meat, it must be prepared as early as possible. Many provinces in China have the custom of pickling preserved meat, of which the preserved meat in Guangdong Province is the most famous. Steamed rice cakes have become a must-have for almost every household because of the sound "nian gao" and the variety of flavors. There are square-shaped yellow and white rice cakes, symbolizing gold and silver, which are meant to make one rich in the New Year, and also to make one's fortune in the coming year. The flavor of rice cakes varies from place to place. Beijingers like to eat jujube rice cakes made of river rice or yellow rice, hundred fruit rice cakes and white rice cakes. People in Hebei like to add jujubes, small red beans and mung beans to the rice cakes and steam them together. Northwestern Shanxi in Inner Mongolia and other places, New Year's Eve used to eat yellow rice flour fried rice cakes, some also wrapped with bean paste, date paste and other fillings, Shandong people with yellow rice, red dates steamed rice cakes. Northern rice cakes are mainly sweet, or steamed or fried, some people simply dip sugar to eat. In the south, rice cakes are both sweet and salty, such as those in Suzhou and Ningbo, which are made of round-grained rice and have a light flavor. In addition to steaming and deep-frying, they can also be sliced and stir-fried or boiled in soup. Sweet rice cakes are made from glutinous rice flour with sugar, lard, roses, osmanthus, mint, and veggie paste, and are delicately crafted and can be steamed or dipped in egg white and deep-fried. The night before the New Year's Eve is called the Night of Reunion, when all those who have left their homes have to travel thousands of miles to come back to their homes, and the whole family has to sit around and eat the New Year's Eve dinner and make dumplings, which is made by making dumpling skins with flour first, and then wrapping them with fillings. The orthodox way of eating dumplings is to boil them in water and then dip them in soy sauce mixed with vinegar, garlic, and sesame oil. There are also ways to eat fried dumplings and branded dumplings (pot stickers). This is because the word "he" means "to merge" and the word "gyoza" harmonizes with "jiao," which means "to merge" and "to merge" and "to merge. The words "合" and "交" have the meaning of getting together, so dumplings are used to symbolize reunion and happiness; they are also taken as the meaning of a new year's handover, which is very auspicious; in addition, dumplings resemble a Yuanbao (元宝), so eating dumplings on New Year's Day carries the auspicious meaning of "inviting wealth and prosperity" (招财進宝). In addition, eating dumplings on New Year's Day also carries the auspicious meaning of "inviting wealth and prosperity". Families get together to make dumplings and talk about the New Year in a happy way.

A Hundred Years of Heaven and Earth, and the Peace between the Mountains and the Rivers, with the following horizontal slogan: "The country is at peace with itself and the people."

A Hundred Years of Good Times, a Thousand Years of Good Times, and a Thousand Years of New Times, with the following horizontal slogan: "The world is at peace with itself and the people."

The Spring Festival Couplet is a song about the peace of the people and the country, with the characters of "Happiness," with the words "Good Times and Moon. Happy, all are happy

The five nights are divided into two years, and every year is satisfactory, and the one night is even two years, and every year is satisfactory, and it is said that congratulations to the New Year

Spring is full of flowers in the world, and the four seasons are always safe in the courtyard, and it is said that the Spring Festival is a joyful occasion

Spring rain moistens everything, and red plums embroider the thousands of mountains, and it is said that the spring is full of joy

Danfeng presents auspiciousness and dragons present Switzerland, and the red peaches congratulate the New Year, and apricots welcome the spring, and it is said that the world is full of blessings

Heshun's family has a good fortune, and it is a happy family.

Harmonious family has a hundred blessings and the word "peace" is worth a thousand pieces of gold. Peace and Fortune and longevity, with the following slogan: "Auspicious Stars Shine High"

All the five lakes and all the seas are in spring, and all the waters and thousands of mountains are in full splendor, with the following slogan: "All the elephants have been renewed"

Happy to live in the treasure land, the millennium will be prosperous, and the blessings will shine on all things at home, with the following slogan: "Happy to Welcome the New Year"

Happy to welcome the new year, and to bid farewell to the old year with a smile on one's face, with the following slogan: Happy to welcome the new year

The sky increases in the years and the moon and the human beings increase in their longevity, and spring is full of the dry Kun and the blessings are full of the building, with the following slogan: "The four seasons will bring long-lasting peace and quiet"

Smooth sailing, lucky stars, all the best wishes, blessings at the door, with the following slogan: "Prosperity of wealth"

A clean sweep of old habits, five lectures, four beauties, and a new wind, with the following slogan: "Resignation of the old and welcome to the spring"

All seasons of the year, spring is always there, and all the purples and reds are in blossom, with the following slogan: "Welcome to the New Year"

.