On the seventh day of the seventh lunar month, China Valentine's Day (also called Oriental Valentine's Day) is a traditional festival of the Han nationality in China. Because the main participants in this day's activities are girls, the content of the festival activities is mainly begging skills, so people call this day "begging skills festival" or "daughter's day" or "daughter's day". Tanabata is one of the most romantic traditional festivals in China and the most important day for girls in the past. That night, women pricked needles to pray for Fu Lushou. On the seventh day, the ceremony was pious and grand, and flowers and fruits were displayed. All kinds of furniture and utensils are exquisite and small, which makes people fondle them.
On May 20th, 2006, China Valentine's Day was listed in the first batch of national intangible cultural heritage by the State Council.
Tanabata is nicknamed "Zhou". Wang Bo's Tanabata Fu "Stay in the Week, Full Moon and Evening" compares the week with the moon and evening, and points out the two most beautiful and touching nights related to family and love in a year. Because of this, later generations call the auspicious day for men and women to get married "Zhou".
On a clear summer and autumn night, the sky is full of stars, and a white galaxy spans the north and south like a bridge. On the east and west banks of the river, there is a shining star across the river, that is Altair and Vega.
It is a folk custom to sit and watch morning glory and weaver girl on Tanabata. According to legend, this night every year is the time when the Weaver Girl and the Cowherd meet at the Magpie Bridge. The Weaver Girl is a beautiful, clever and clever fairy. On this night, ordinary women prayed to her for wisdom and skillful skills, and they also prayed to her for a happy marriage. Therefore, the seventh day of July is also called Begging Festival.
It is said that on Tanabata night, you can look up and see the Milky Way where the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl meet, and you can also eavesdrop on the love story when they meet in the sky under the melon and fruit shelf.
On this romantic night, facing the bright moon in the sky, the girls put the fruits and vegetables of the season in the sky, begging the fairy in the sky to give them intelligent hearts and dexterous hands, so that they can master their needlework skills, and even beg for the combination of love and marriage. In the past, marriage was a lifelong event for women to decide whether they were happy or not. Therefore, on this quiet night, countless sentient men and women in the world will pray for a happy marriage under the stars.
The Origin of Valentine's Day in China
Tanabata, formerly known as the Begging Festival. The Qixi Begging for Qiao Qi originated in the Han Dynasty. Ge Hong's Miscellaneous Notes on Xijing in the Eastern Jin Dynasty recorded that "women in the Han Dynasty often opened the front building on July 7 with seven-hole needles on Han stone reliefs, which was the earliest begging record in ancient documents we have seen."
Qixi originated from people's worship of nature. According to historical documents, at least three or four thousand years ago, with people's understanding of astronomy and the emergence of textile technology, there was a record of Altair Vega. People worship the stars far more than Altair and Vega. They think that there are seven stars representing directions in the east, west, north and south, which are collectively called 28 nights, among which the Big Dipper is the brightest and can be used to tell directions at night. The first star of the Big Dipper is called Kuixing, also known as the champion. Later, with the imperial examination system, the top scholar in the middle school was called "Dakui Scholar in the World", and the scholars called Tanabata "Kuixing Festival" or "Book-drying Festival", which preserved the trace that the earliest Tanabata originated from worshipping stars.
Qixi also comes from the ancient people's worship of time. "Seven" and "period" are homophonic, and both the month and the day are "seven", giving people a sense of time. In ancient China, the sun and moon, together with the five planets of water, fire, wood, gold and earth, were called "Seven Obsidian". Seven figures are staged in time among the people, and the calculation of time often ends with "July 7th". In old Beijing, when doing Dojo for the dead, it was often done by "July 7th". Using "seven obsidians" to calculate the current "week" is still reserved in Japanese. "Seven" and "Auspicious" are homophonic, and "July 7th" has a double auspicious meaning, which is an auspicious day. In Taiwan Province Province, July is called "Joy brings good luck" month. Because the happy character in cursive script looks like "seventy-seven", 77 years old is also called "Happy Birthday".
Tanabata is also a phenomenon of digital worship. In ancient times, people listed the seventh day of the first month, the third day of March, the fifth day of May, the seventh day of July and the ninth day of September as auspicious days, plus the even number of February 2 and the multiple of June 6. "Seven" is the number of beads in each column of the abacus, which is romantic and rigorous, giving people a mysterious aesthetic feeling. "Seven" and "wife" are homophonic, so Qixi has largely become a festival related to women.