Because it is said that Qu Yuan, a poet of the Chu State during the Warring States Period, committed suicide by jumping into the Miluo River on May 5, so people later regarded the Dragon Boat Festival as a festival to commemorate Qu Yuan.
The connection between the Dragon Boat Festival and Qu Yuan:
According to legend, Qu Yuan advocated the promotion of talents, enriched the country and strengthened the army, and advocated uniting Qi to resist Qin, but was strongly opposed by the nobleman Zilan and others. , Qu Yuan was slandered and resigned, was driven out of the capital, and exiled to the Yuan and Xiang river basins. In exile, he wrote poems such as "Li Sao", "Heavenly Questions" and "Nine Songs", which were concerned about the country and the people. In 278 BC, the Qin army captured Kyoto, the state of Chu. Qu Yuan saw his homeland being invaded and his heart was cut by a knife.
But he still could not bear to abandon his homeland. On May 5, he wrote: After his final work "Huaisha", he bouldered into the Miluo River and committed suicide, composing a magnificent patriotic movement with his own life. After Qu Yuan threw himself into the river, local people immediately rowed boats to rescue him after hearing the news... In order to express their grief, people went boating on the rivers, and then it gradually developed into dragon boat racing.
People were afraid that the fish in the river would eat his body, so they went home and brought rice balls and threw them into the river to prevent fish and shrimps from destroying Qu Yuan's body. Later, it became a custom to eat rice dumplings. Judging from documentary records, the first person to connect Qu Yuan with the Dragon Boat Festival was the mythical and strange novel "Xu Qi Xie Ji" written by Wu Jun of the Southern Liang Dynasty during the Southern and Northern Dynasties. At this time, Qu Yuan had been dead for more than 750 years.
From the lost text copied by Ouyang Xun of the Tang Dynasty from "Customs" (written by Ying Shao in the late Eastern Han Dynasty), it can be seen that Qu Yuan's shadow may have been included in Dragon Boat Festival folk customs during the time of Emperor Ling of the Eastern Han Dynasty, but this was more than 400 years after Qu Yuan's death. Although many Dragon Boat Festival customs have nothing to do with Qu Yuan, Qu Yuan's patriotic spirit and touching poems have been widely rooted in the hearts of the people for thousands of years, so people "cherish and mourn them, comment on his words from generation to generation, and pass them on from generation to generation".
Therefore, the Dragon Boat Festival commemorates Qu Yuan, which has the widest and deepest influence and occupies a mainstream position. In the field of folk culture, Chinese people associate dragon boat racing and eating rice dumplings during the Dragon Boat Festival with the commemoration of Qu Yuan.
Extended information:
Introduction to the origin and influence of the Dragon Boat Festival:
Dragon Boat Festival (the fifth day of the fifth lunar month), also known as Duanyang Festival, Dragon Festival, and Chongwu Festival Festival, Dragon Boat Festival, Zhengyang Festival, Bath Orchid Festival, Tianzhong Festival, etc. are traditional Chinese folk festivals. The Dragon Boat Festival originated from the worship of celestial phenomena and evolved from the dragon totem sacrifice in ancient times. During the Dragon Boat Festival in midsummer, Cang Long Qisu ascends to the middle sky due to the south, which is the day when the dragon flies to the sky. Just like the fifth line of the "Book of Changes Qian Gua" says: "The flying dragon is in the sky."
The dragon star of the Dragon Boat Festival is both "in the middle" and "in the right direction". It is in a position of great auspiciousness, and the blessings are universal, and the dragon's virtue is prominent. The origin of the Dragon Boat Festival covers ancient astrology culture, humanistic philosophy and other aspects, and contains profound and rich cultural connotations; in the inheritance and development, it has mixed a variety of folk customs into one, and the festival customs are rich in content. Dragon Boat Festival and rice dumpling eating are the two major customs of the Dragon Boat Festival. These two customs have been passed down in China since ancient times and continue to this day.
The Dragon Boat Festival is a festival created by the ancestors of Baiyue in ancient times to worship their ancestors. Because it is said that Qu Yuan, a poet of the Chu State during the Warring States Period, committed suicide by jumping into the Miluo River on May 5th, later people also regarded the Dragon Boat Festival as a festival to commemorate Qu Yuan; there are also sayings to commemorate Wu Zixu, Cao E and Jie Zitui. Generally speaking, the Dragon Boat Festival originated from the ancestors of the Baiyue people in the south who chose the auspicious day of "dragon ascending to heaven" to worship the dragon ancestor, and injected it into the summer season of "curing diseases and preventing epidemics".
The Dragon Boat Festival is regarded as an "evil month and evil day" "It originated from the Northern Central Plains, and is attached to commemorate Qu Yuan and other historical figures. The formation of Dragon Boat Festival customs can be said to be the product of the fusion of northern and southern customs. The Dragon Boat Festival, Spring Festival, Qingming Festival and Mid-Autumn Festival are also known as the four traditional festivals in China. Dragon Boat Festival culture has a wide influence in the world, and some countries and regions in the world also have activities to celebrate the Dragon Boat Festival.
In May 2006, the State Council included it in the first batch of national intangible cultural heritage lists; since 2008, it has been listed as a national statutory holiday. In September 2009, UNESCO officially approved its inclusion in the Representative List of Human Intangible Cultural Heritage, making the Dragon Boat Festival the first Chinese festival to be selected as a world intangible cultural heritage.
Baidu Encyclopedia-Dragon Boat Festival (one of the four major traditional festivals in China)