Introduction to Tomb-Sweeping Day:
Tomb-Sweeping Day is the most important sacrificial festival in China, which usually falls on April 5th of the Gregorian calendar.
China people have been polite and respectful to their ancestors since ancient times, so the tradition of Spring Festival gradually took shape during the Qingming period. Every year when I go to Tomb-Sweeping Day, many places will hold various commemorative activities to remember the revolutionary ancestors and war heroes. There are folk customs such as hiking, grave sweeping and ancestor worship.
Cultural connotation:
Tomb-Sweeping Day is the most solemn ancestor worship festival of the Chinese nation, and it belongs to a traditional cultural festival of remembering ancestors and being cautious from beginning to end. Tomb-Sweeping Day embodies the national spirit, inherits the sacrificial culture of Chinese civilization, and expresses people's moral feelings of respecting and honoring their ancestors. Sweeping the grave is a "tomb sacrifice", which is called a "time to respect our ancestors". Spring and Autumn Festival has existed since ancient times. Tomb-Sweeping Day has a long history, which originated from ancient ancestral beliefs and spring ceremonies. According to the research results of modern anthropology and archaeology, the two most primitive beliefs of human beings are the belief in heaven and earth and the belief in ancestors. According to archaeological excavations, a 10,000-year-old tomb was found at the Qingtang site in Yingde, Guangdong Province, which is the earliest tomb in China, indicating that ancient ancestors had a clear sense of burial behavior and customs thousands of years ago. The custom of "tomb sacrifice" has a long history, and Qingming "tomb sacrifice" is the synthesis and sublimation of traditional spring customs. The establishment of the chronology of ancient cadres and branches provided decisive conditions for the formation of festivals. Ancestor belief and sacrificial culture were important factors in the formation of ancestral rituals and customs in Qingming Festival. Tomb-Sweeping Day is rich in customs, which can be summarized into two festivals and traditions: one is to respect the ancestors and be cautious to the end; The second is outing and getting close to nature. Tomb-Sweeping Day not only has the theme of sweeping, remembering and remembering, but also has the theme of taking an outing and enjoying the body and mind. The traditional concept of "harmony between man and nature" has been vividly reflected in Tomb-Sweeping Day. Through historical development, Tomb-Sweeping Day has integrated the customs of Cold Food Festival and Shangsi Festival in the Tang and Song Dynasties, and integrated various folk customs, which has extremely rich cultural connotations.
The origin and legend of Tomb-Sweeping Day;
The traditional Tomb-Sweeping Day in China began in the Zhou Dynasty and has a history of more than 2,500 years. Tomb-Sweeping Day was originally a very important solar term. As soon as Qingming arrives, the temperature rises, which is a good time for spring ploughing and planting. Therefore, there is a saying that "melons and beans are planted before and after the Qingming Festival". The agricultural proverb "Planting trees is not as clear as Qingming". Later, with the approaching of Qingming and cold food, which is a day when people are forbidden to burn fire to sweep graves, cold food and Qingming gradually became one, and cold food became another name and a custom of Qingming. In Qingming, no fireworks were used, only cold food was eaten.
Sacrifice to sweep the grave:
Since the Tang Dynasty, the imperial court has given officials a holiday and asked them to go to their hometown to visit their graves. According to "Dream of Liang Lu" in the Song Dynasty, every time I go to Tomb-Sweeping Day, "officials and scholars walk out of the graves of suburban provinces to show respect for their thoughts." The number of grave-sweepers is not limited to men and women. They often go out with their families. In this way, grave-sweeping activities before and after the Qingming Festival often become the personal participation of the whole society. Within a few days, the country people came and went, and the scale was extremely prosperous.
Before and after the Qingming Festival, there were differences in different places. In the past, Beijingers paid homage to sweep graves not in Tomb-Sweeping Day, but on Singles Day near Tomb-Sweeping Day. Only monks offer sacrifices to sweep graves in Tomb-Sweeping Day. In Lishui, Zhejiang, grave-sweeping takes place in the first three days and the last four days in Tomb-Sweeping Day, which is called "the first three days and the last four days". In Shandong, in the past, most areas visited graves in Tomb-Sweeping Day, a few areas such as Zhucheng visited graves during the Cold Food Festival, and some places visited graves in the first four days of Tomb-Sweeping Day. Nowadays, people usually visit graves in Tomb-Sweeping Day. People in southern Shanxi divide the time for sweeping graves into two times. On one occasion, a few days ago in Tomb-Sweeping Day, my family went to visit the grave separately. The second time was in Tomb-Sweeping Day, where family representatives of the same surname in a village went to the cemetery to worship their common ancestor. When Shanghainese sweep graves, the new graves are different from the old ones. Those who have recently died and have not held the ceremony of turning over after 7749 days should invite monks and nuns to chant Buddhist scriptures or go to the Dojo on this day in Tomb-Sweeping Day. If it is an old grave, it may not be necessary to sweep the grave on Qingming Festival, but it can be relaxed before and after, but not sweeping the grave can go beyond the first seven days and the last eight days. As the saying goes: "The first seven days and the last eight days, the nether world is on holiday." This means that it will fail too early or too late.
Qingming willow:
As an important cultural symbol in Tomb-Sweeping Day, the willow tree has never declined since the Tang, Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties. This is in sharp contrast with the custom of cold food.
In the capital of the Southern Song Dynasty, during the Qingming period, placing willows under the eaves has become a common practice.
At that time, everyone went to the west lake to fold willows, and even destroyed the willows by the lake. Therefore, some poets lamented: "Don't fold all green flowers, especially in the Ming Dynasty."
Willow belongs to Salicaceae, which refers to more than 500 species of Salix and Salix. Willow also has gender differences, which can be divided into "Liu Nan" and "Liu Nv". Liuhua inflorescence is composed of several small flowers, which is called Liuhua inflorescence.
In ancient times, Routi was often compared to a woman's hand, praising it as soft and smooth. The Book of Songs Shuo Ren describes: "The hands are soft and the skin is solidified." ... beautiful eyes! "
The ancient people's love for willow can be seen through the metaphor of willow flowers.
After each small catkin flower matures, the small capsules in the flower gradually crack and fly all over the sky with the white catkins of the seeds.
Willow is a native tree species in China. In addition, it is also one of the earliest recorded artificially cultivated plants in China, and the word "willow" has existed in Oracle Bone Inscriptions.
Why did the ancients choose to insert willow branches on the door during the Qingming Festival? Later generations have different interpretations and there are many differences.
Dr. Xiao Fang has his own opinions. He believes that the ancients chose willow branches to ward off evil spirits, mainly because willow is a good tree in spring and the first tree in spring. When the field is vast, willows are the first to spit out new green. So willow is often used as a sign of spring.
Another statement seems to be more convincing and quite practical. It is reported that in some places, wicker is inserted on the eaves during Qingming Festival to forecast the weather. This statement is in line with the old saying that "the wicker is green and it rains; The wicker is dry and the sky is clear.
More interestingly, willow leaves don't lose wicker. In summer and autumn, willow leaves turn white before rainy days, and make a guest appearance as a "weatherman".
Seasonal food:
Cold food: As the cold food custom of the Cold Food Festival was transplanted to Tomb-Sweeping Day, some places in northern China still retain the habit of eating cold food in Tomb-Sweeping Day. In Shandong, Jimo eats eggs and cold cakes, while Laiyang, Zhaoyuan and Long Island eat eggs and cold sorghum rice. It is said that if we don't do this, there will be hail. Taian eats cold pancakes and rolls bitter vegetables. It is said that his eyes are bright. Jinzhong area still retains the habit of banning fire the day before Qingming. In many places, after the sacrificial ceremony is completed, the sacrificial food will be divided. When people in the south of Shanxi celebrate Tomb-Sweeping Day, they are used to steaming steamed bread with white flour and putting walnuts, dates and beans in the middle. The records of folk cold food customs almost suddenly appeared in the documents of the Eastern Han Dynasty, mainly concentrated in Shanxi. Even in the Tang and Song Dynasties, when the custom of cold food was quite popular, its spread did not go out of the north. The book "Zhong Ye Ji" written by Jin Dynasty first talked about the special food in cold food: "On the day of cold food, you can cook bacon cheese, japonica rice and wheat as cheese, and apricot red as porridge." Until the Tang and Song Dynasties, people were still eating this cold barley porridge.
Tomb-Sweeping Day Cake: In some areas in southern China, Tomb-Sweeping Day has the custom of eating Youth League, which is also called Tomb-Sweeping Day Cake, Flour Cake, Cike Cake, Qingming Baba, Aijie, Qingming Fruit, Bobo Cake, Qingming Cake and Ai. In Tomb-Sweeping Day, the hometown of overseas Chinese in southern Fujian, we always cook some cakes, cakes and rice cakes for our families around Tomb-Sweeping Day. According to the old custom in Shanghai, steamed cakes for sacrifice should be put on wicker and dried and stored. When they arrive in the long summer, they will be fried and given to children. It is said that eating them in summer won't make you sick. In Huzhou, Zhejiang, every household in Tomb-Sweeping Day has dumplings, which can be buried as a sacrifice or as dry food for hiking. As the saying goes: "Qingming Zongzi is real." Around Qingming Festival, snails were fat and strong. Eating lotus root is to wish silkworm babies long and good silk. Eating germinated beans is the oral color to win "wealth". Eating fresh vegetables such as Malantou is to take the word "green" to match the "green" of "Qingming".
Is life convenient?