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The origin, history and legend of the Cold Food Festival
The origin of the Cold Food Festival

Cold food festival, also known as cooked food festival, no-smoking festival and cold festival. Its date is 105 days from the winter solstice, that is, one or two days before Qingming. The main custom of this festival is to ban fire, not to cook with fire, and only to eat prepared cooked food and cold food, hence the name. The Cold Food Festival has a history of more than 2,500 years. Tomb-Sweeping Day was formed in the Tang Dynasty and prevailed in the Song Dynasty. Later, as the days of Qingming and cold food approached, and cold food was the day when people banned fire to sweep graves, gradually, cold food and Qingming became one, and cold food became another name of Qingming and a custom of Qingming. On Qingming, no fireworks were used, only cold food was eaten.

There are two sources of the Cold Food Festival. One is the custom of forbidding fire in the middle and late spring of Zhou Dynasty. Because of different seasons, the ancients used different trees to drill fire, which was the custom of changing seasons to fire. And every time you change the fire, you have to exchange it for a new fire. People are forbidden to make a fire before a new one arrives. "Zhou Li Qiu Guan Si Ju Shi" says: "In mid-spring, it was forbidden to repair fire with Mu Duo in the middle school." You can't cook during the fire ban, but you have to prepare food in advance for eating during the fire ban. This kind of food is called "cold food".

Another source of the Cold Food Festival is the custom of honoring Jietui in Shanxi, the hometown of Jin State in the Spring and Autumn Period. Jie Zhitui was a loyal follower of Zhong Er (later Jin Wengong), the son of Jin Dynasty in the Spring and Autumn Period, when he was in exile. Later, he was burned by fire and the whole country mourned. The story of Jingchu's age says: "meson push (that is, meson push) was burned by fire on March 5, and Chinese people mourned it. Every spring and evening, it was called' no smoking' because it didn't raise fire, and it would hurt the fields if it was committed."

The History and Legend of Cold Food Festival

According to legend, in the Spring and Autumn Period more than 2,600 years ago, Jin Xiangong's concubine, Li Ji, set a poisonous plot against Prince Shen Sheng in order to let her son Xi Qi succeed to the throne, and Shen Sheng was forced to commit suicide. Shen Sheng's younger brother, Zhong Er, fled into exile to escape the scourge. During his exile, Zhong Er suffered humiliation. Originally, I followed him out, and most of them went out one after another. Only a few heartbroken people remained, following him all the time. One of them is called Jie Zhitui.

On one occasion, Zhong Er fainted from hunger. Jie Zhitui gave a piece of meat, cooked it and gave it to Zhong Er. 19 years later, Zhong Er returned to China and became a monarch, Jin Wengong, one of the five tyrants in the Spring and Autumn Period.

After Jin Wengong came to power, he greatly raised the officials who shared his joys and sorrows, but he forgot to introduce them. Someone cried foul for Jiezhi in front of Jin Wengong. Jin Wengong suddenly remembered the past, feeling guilty, and immediately sent someone to ask Jiezhi to go to court and be sealed. However, Jie's push is firm. Jin Wengong had to go to please. However, when Jin Wengong came to Jiezhitui's house, he saw the door closed. Jie Zhitui didn't want to see him. He had hid in Mianshan (now southeast of Jiexiu County, Shanxi Province) behind his mother's back, preferring to live in seclusion. Jin Wengong asked his body-guard to search Mianshan, but he couldn't find it. So, someone had an idea, saying, it's better to set Yamakaji free, set fire on three sides, and leave one side behind, and when the fire starts, Jiezhi will come out on his own. Jin Wengong ordered Yamakaji to be promoted. Unexpectedly, the fire burned for three days and three nights. After the fire was extinguished, Jiezhi was not pushed out after all. Looking up the mountain, Jie Zhitui and his mother were holding a charred willow tree and were dead. Jin Wengong looked at Jiezhitui's body and wept for a while. Then he buried the body and found that Jiezhitui's back was blocked with a willow tree hole, which seemed to have something. Pulled out a look, turned out to be a piece of skirt, with a blood poem on it:

I hope your master will always be clear. It's better to be a ghost without seeing it, than to accompany you as a remonstrator. If your master has me in his heart, remember my frequent introspection. I have a clear conscience in Jiuquan, and I am diligent and clear.

Jin Wengong hid the bloody book in his sleeve, and then hid it under the charred willow tree. To commemorate Jiezhi's push, Jin Wengong ordered Mianshan to be changed to Jieshan, and an ancestral temple was built on the mountain, and the day when Yamakaji was released was designated as the Cold Food Festival, telling the whole country that fireworks were forbidden on this day every year, and only cold food was eaten. When he left, he cut a section of charred willow and made a pair of clogs in the palace. He looked at it every day and sighed, "What a pity." "The first step" is the name of the ancient people's subordinates to respect each other between their superiors or peers, which is said to come from this.

In the second year, Jin Wengong led his ministers and went hiking in plain clothes to pay homage and express his condolences. Walking to the grave, I saw the old willow tree resurrected, with green branches and branches dancing in the wind. Jin Wengong looked at the resurrected old willow, as if he had seen Jie Zhitui. He walked up to him respectfully, pinched a branch lovingly, braided a hat ring and put it on his head. After the sacrifice, Jin Wengong named the resurrected old willow "Qingming Willow" and named it Tomb-Sweeping Day.

In the future, Jin Wengong often put the blood script on his side as a motto to spur him to be in power. Determined to be diligent and love the people, make every effort to govern the country well. From then on, the people of Jin lived and worked in peace and contentment, and they missed Jie Zhitui, who had made meritorious deeds but did not seek wealth. Every anniversary of his death, everyone commemorates it by banning smoking. He also used flour and jujube paste to knead it into the shape of a swallow, strung it with willow sticks and inserted it in the door to summon his soul, saying, "Push the swallow." Since then, cold food and Qingming have become grand festivals for people all over the country. Whenever there is cold food, people don't make a fire to cook, but only eat cold food. In the north, ordinary people only eat cold wheat cakes made in advance; In the south, it is mostly green balls and glutinous rice sugar lotus roots. Every Qingming Festival, people put wicker into a circle and put wicker branches in front of and behind the house to show their nostalgia.

In the process of the formation and inheritance of the Cold Food Festival, this statement gradually occupied a major position. In some local cold food festivals, sacrificial ceremonies will be held in Jiezhitui Temple. The ceremony of offering sacrifices to Jie Jie was the most grand in Shanxi, the hometown of Jin State. During the long historical period from the Warring States to the Three Kingdoms, people in this area banned cold food and fire for as long as one month. When he arrived in the Three Kingdoms, Cao Cao ordered to get rid of the old custom of banning cold food in Taiyuan for one month, stipulating that cold food should last for three days, and this custom became a habit from then on. There are several traditional foods in ancient cold food festivals: syrup (hence the name "nang"), wheat porridge, glutinous rice cheese, wheat cheese, almond cheese, eggs and lettuce mixed with salt and vinegar. The traditional games of the ancient Cold Food Festival are mainly cockfighting and egg fighting. In the Southern Dynasties, Emperor Zong 'ao of the Liang Dynasty wrote in The Chronicle of the Age of Jingchu: Cold food is "chicken fighting, chicken carving (eggs), chicken fighting". Sui's "Jade Candle Collection" says: "There are many cockfights and egg fights in this section of the city." The custom of cockfighting is still passed down among the people until modern times, but the custom of fighting eggs has been lost. Eggs used in collision and fighting games in the Sui Dynasty and before are dyed and carved eggs, which are called "painted eggs" in ancient times. Painting eggs is mainly to dye the eggshell with blue, red and other colors to form beautiful patterns. The custom of painting and carving eggs came into being during the Warring States Period. For example, the pipe says, "Carving eggs is ripe, so it accumulates and hides, and scatters everything." In the Sui Dynasty, people not only used painting eggs for games, but also used them as gifts to each other during festivals, or put them on trays for several cases as special decorations for festivals.

The Cold Food Festival was still a big festival in the Tang Dynasty. At that time, the poet left a lot of poems praising the Cold Food Festival, such as Wen Tingyun's "Cold Food Festival Day: Looking at Chu" and Yuan Zhen's "Lianchang Palace Ci" said: "The first cold food was 160, and the store was smokeless and the trees were green." Shen Quanqi's "Cold Food on the Ridge" says: "There is cold food outside the ridge, and there is no appetite in spring. Luoyang Xinjiazi, tomorrow is Qingming. " During the Tang and Song Dynasties, the Cold Food Festival held some games, competitive activities and grave-sweeping to worship ancestors. For example, the Book of the Tang Dynasty said, "In the twentieth year of Kaiyuan, cold food went to the tomb, which occupied the L Classic." According to modern legend, sleeping is a city custom, and it is advisable to go to the tomb to worship the ceremony. " "Yueyang Terrestrial Records" contains: "After the Spring Festival, when it comes to the weather, people often go up the mountain one after another, and the state people worship and sweep it. Stop until the cold food. " In fact, all these activities were borrowed or changed from the spring play, wedging and evocation activities last March. Since the Tang Dynasty, the status of the Cold Food Festival has declined day by day, and only seasonal food customs have been passed down to the people in a variety of ways.

Eat cold food at the Cold Food Festival.

Qingming Festival is a good time for people to have a spring outing (called outing in ancient times), so the ancients had a series of custom sports activities such as Qingming outing, swinging, playing cuju, playing polo and inserting willows, which made Tomb-Sweeping Day colorful and interesting.

The Cold Food Festival, also known as "No Smoking Festival", "Cold Festival" and "Hundred Days Festival", is held on the 105th day after the winter solstice of the lunar calendar and one or two days before Tomb-Sweeping Day. When the first day of the day is a festival, smoking is forbidden and only cold food is eaten. Being close to Tomb-Sweeping Day in time and influenced by it, customs such as sweeping, hiking, swinging, cuju, hooking and fighting eggs were gradually added in the development of later generations. The Cold Food Festival lasted for more than 2,000 years, and it was called the largest folk festival.