1. Spring Festival

Time: the first day of the first lunar month.

origin: the origin of ancient traditional festivals is related to ancient primitive beliefs, sacrificial culture, astronomical phenomena, calendars and other humanistic and natural cultural contents.

custom: during the spring festival, it is found everywhere, such as posting New Year's greetings, observing the new year's eve, having a reunion dinner, and paying New Year's greetings. However, due to different local conditions and customs, the nuances have their own characteristics. The folk customs of the Spring Festival are diverse in form and rich in content, which is a concentrated display of the essence of Chinese life and culture.

2. Lantern Festival

Time: 15th day of the first lunar month.

origin: the formation of the Lantern Festival custom took a long time. According to general data and folklore, the 15th day of the first month has been paid attention to in the Western Han Dynasty, and the activities of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty to offer sacrifices to the "Taiyi" in Ganquan Palace on the "Xin Night" in the first month were regarded by later generations as the prelude to offering sacrifices to the gods on the 15th day of the first month.

custom: as far as the length of the festival is concerned, it was only one day in the Han dynasty, three days in the Tang dynasty and five days in the Song dynasty. In the Ming dynasty, the lights were lit from the eighth day until the night of the seventeenth day of the first month. It is the longest lantern festival in China's history, which is connected with the Spring Festival. It is a lively and spectacular day.

Especially the exquisite and colorful lights make it the climax of entertainment activities during the Spring Festival. By the Qing Dynasty, there were more "hundred plays" such as dragon dancing, lion dancing, roller boating, walking on stilts and dancing yangko, but the festival period was shortened to four to five days.

3. Tomb-Sweeping Day

Time: around April 5th of the Gregorian calendar.

origin: Tomb-Sweeping Day has a long history, which originated from the ancestral beliefs and spring rituals in ancient times.

Customs: Tomb-Sweeping Day has integrated the customs of forbidding fire and cold food in the Cold Food Festival in its historical development. Legend has it that the Cold Food Festival was set up in the Spring and Autumn Period to commemorate Jietui, a loyal minister of Jin State. In folklore, the Cold Food Festival is related to Jietui.

Historical Origin-Formation

The origin, inheritance and development of ancient traditional festivals are the "cultural process of gradual formation and perfection" of human society and the product of the evolution and development of human civilization. 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. The belief in heaven and earth and the belief in ancestors originated from the worship of nature and ancestors in the early days of mankind, which led to various worship and sacrifice activities.

Sacrifice is a belief activity, which originates from the belief that heaven and earth are harmonious. Ancient festivals are folk culture created by people based on primitive beliefs and in order to meet the needs of life. Some festivals and customs activities in ancient times have clearly recorded the rich and colorful social life of the ancients and accumulated profound historical and cultural connotations of China.

In the ancient farming society, when people lived and worked in peace and contentment, they chose a day to worship God and ancestors, so they had various regular festivals. Offering rich offerings to worship God and ancestors developed festivals and feasts, and gradually formed some established ways of celebration, that is, the so-called festival folklore.

The early festival culture reflects the ancient people's humanistic spirit of nature worship, harmony between man and nature, cautious pursuit of the future, solid foundation and thinking of the source; A series of sacrificial activities contain profound cultural connotations, such as respect for morality, ritual and music civilization. The traditional festivals of the Chinese nation are diverse in form and rich in content. They are an important part of the long history and culture of the Chinese nation and the basic framework of a civilized country.

what are the above references? Baidu Encyclopedia-the origin of traditional festivals in China; Baidu Encyclopedia-China Traditional Festival