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Customs of the Spring Festival The Spring Festival is an ancient festival in China, and it is also the most important festival in the whole year. How to celebrate this festival has formed some relatively fixed customs and habits in thousands of years of historical development, and many of them are still passed down to this day. Sweep the dust "on the 24th of the twelfth lunar month, dust and sweep the house". According to "Lv Chunqiu", China had the custom of sweeping the dust during the Spring Festival in the Yao and Shun era. According to the folk saying: Because of the homonym of "dust" and "Chen", sweeping dust in the Spring Festival has the meaning of "except Chen Buxin", and its intention is to sweep away all bad luck and bad luck. This custom is entrusted with people's desire to break through the old and establish the new and their prayer to bid farewell to the old and welcome the new. Whenever the Spring Festival comes, every household should clean the environment, clean all kinds of appliances, tear down and wash bedding curtains, sweep the six yards, dust cobwebs and dredge open channels and culverts. Everywhere is filled with the joyful atmosphere of engaging in sanitation and welcoming the Spring Festival cleanly. Sticking Spring Festival couplets is also called door couplets, spring couplets, couplets, peach symbols, etc. It depicts the background of the times and expresses good wishes with neat, dual, concise and exquisite words, which is a unique literary form in China. Every Spring Festival, no matter in urban or rural areas, every household should select a red Spring Festival couplets and stick them on the door to add festive atmosphere to the festival. This custom began in the Song Dynasty and became popular in the Ming Dynasty. By the Qing Dynasty, the ideology and artistry of Spring Festival couplets had been greatly improved. Liang Zhangju's monograph "Poems on Spring Festival couplets" discussed the origin of couplets and the characteristics of various works. There are many kinds of Spring Festival couplets, which can be divided into door heart, frame pair, cross-dressing, spring strip and bucket square according to their places of use. The "door core" is attached to the center of the upper end of the door panel; The "frame pair" is attached to the left and right door frames; "Cross-dressing" is attached to the crossbar of the door; "Spring strips" are posted in corresponding places according to different contents; "Dou Jin", also called "door leaf", is a square diamond, which is often attached to furniture and screen walls. Stick grilles and the upside-down posting of the word "Fu" among the people also like to post various paper-cuts on the windows-window grilles. Window grilles not only set off the festive atmosphere, but also integrate decoration, appreciation and practicality. Paper-cutting is a very popular folk art in China, which has been loved by people for thousands of years. Because it is mostly stuck on the window, it is also called "window flower". With its unique generalization and exaggeration, window grilles show auspicious things and good wishes incisively and vividly, and decorate the festival with splendor. At the same time of putting up Spring Festival couplets, some people have to put large and small "Fu" characters on the doors, walls and lintels. Sticking the word "Fu" in the Spring Festival is a long-standing folk custom in China. The word "Fu" refers to good fortune and good fortune, which places people's longing for a happy life and wishes for a bright future. In order to fully reflect this yearning and wish, some people simply paste the word "fu" upside down, indicating that "happiness has arrived" and "blessing has arrived". There are also people who elaborate the word "Fu" into various patterns, such as longevity, longevity peach, carp jumping over the dragon gate, abundant grains, dragons and phoenixes, and so on. It is also common to hang New Year pictures in urban and rural areas during the Spring Festival. The thick black and colorful New Year pictures add a lot of prosperous and happy festive atmosphere to thousands of families. New Year pictures are an ancient folk art in China, reflecting people's simple customs and beliefs and pinning their hopes for the future. New Year pictures, like Spring Festival couplets, originated from "door gods". With the rise of woodblock printing, the content of New Year pictures is not limited to monotonous themes such as door gods, but has become rich and colorful. In some New Year pictures workshops, classic color New Year pictures such as Three Stars of Fu Lushou, heavenly god blesses the people, Harvest of Five Grains, Prosperity of Six Livestock, and Greeting the Spring with Happiness have been produced to meet people's good wishes of celebrating and praying for the New Year. There are three important producing areas of New Year pictures in China: Taohuawu in Suzhou, Yangliuqing in Tianjin and Weifang in Shandong; Three schools of Chinese New Year pictures have been formed, each with its own characteristics. China's earliest collection of New Year pictures in China today is the woodcut New Year pictures of the Southern Song Dynasty, which show four ancient beauties: Wang Zhaojun, Zhao Feiyan, Banji and Lvzhu. The most popular among the people is a New Year picture of Marrying a Mouse. It depicts an interesting scene in which a mouse marries a bride according to human customs. In the early years of the Republic of China, Zheng Mantuo of Shanghai combined the calendar with the New Year pictures. This is a new form of New Year pictures. This new year's picture, which combines two into one, later developed into a calendar and has been popular all over the country. Keeping the New Year's Eve is one of the most important activities, and the custom of keeping the old age has a long history. The earliest record was found in the "Local Records" in the Western Jin Dynasty: on New Year's Eve, all parties gave gifts, which was called "giving the year back"; Wine and food are invited, which is called "don't be old"; It is called "dividing the age" when the young and the old gather to drink and wish a complete song; Everyone stays up all night, waiting for the morning, which is called "keeping the old age". On New Year's Eve, the whole family got together, ate New Year's Eve, lit candles or oil lamps, sat around the stove and chatted, waiting for the time to bid farewell to the old year and welcome the new year, and kept vigil all night, symbolizing driving away all evil diseases and epidemics and looking forward to good luck in the new year. This custom gradually became popular. At the beginning of the Tang Dynasty, Li Shimin, Emperor Taizong, wrote a poem "Shounian": "Cold resigns from winter snow, and warmth brings spring breeze". To this day, people are used to keeping the new year's eve and welcoming the new year. In ancient times, there were two meanings of observing the old age: the old people's observing the old age means "resigning the old age", which means cherishing time; Young people keep their age to prolong the life of their parents. Since the Han dynasty, the time when the old and the new years alternate is generally at midnight. Firecrackers There is a folk saying in China that "open the door to firecrackers". That is, at the arrival of the new year, the first thing for every household to open the door is to set off firecrackers to eliminate the old and welcome the new with the sound of firecrackers. Firecrackers are a specialty of China, also known as "firecrackers", "firecrackers" and "firecrackers". Its origin is very early, and it has a history of more than two thousand years. Setting off firecrackers can create a festive and lively atmosphere, which is a kind of entertainment in festivals and can bring happiness and good luck to people. With the passage of time, the application of firecrackers has become more and more extensive, and the varieties and colors have become more and more numerous. Every major festival and happy event celebration, as well as marriage, building a house, opening a business, etc., firecrackers should be set off to celebrate and make a good luck. At present, Liuyang in Hunan, Foshan and Dongyao in Guangdong, Yichun and Pingxiang in Jiangxi, Wenzhou in Zhejiang and other regions are famous hometown of fireworks in China. The firecrackers produced are of many colors and high quality, which are not only sold well in the whole country, but also exported to the world. On the first day of the New Year, people get up early, put on the most beautiful clothes, dress up neatly, go out to visit relatives and friends, and wish each other a happy New Year. There are many ways to pay New Year's greetings, some of which are led by the same clan leader to pay New Year's greetings door to door. Some colleagues invite several people to pay New Year greetings; There are also people who get together to congratulate each other, which is called "group worship". Because it took time and effort to pay a New Year call at home, some elites and scholars later used stickers to congratulate each other, thus developing the later "new year card". When paying New Year greetings during the Spring Festival, the younger generation should first pay New Year greetings to their elders, wishing them a long and healthy life. The elders can distribute the lucky money prepared in advance to the younger generation. It is said that the lucky money can suppress evil spirits, because "old" and "special" are homophonic, and the younger generation can spend one year safely with the lucky money. There are two kinds of lucky money, one is to thread colored rope into a dragon shape and put it at the foot of the bed, which is recorded in Yanjing Year; The other is the most common, that is, parents wrap the money distributed to their children in red paper. The lucky money can be given in public after the younger generation pays New Year's greetings, or it can be secretly put under the child's pillow by parents when the child falls asleep on New Year's Eve. It is still popular for elders to distribute lucky money to younger generations. In the ancient agricultural society, since the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, housewives have been busy preparing food for the Spring Festival. Because it takes a long time to marinate preserved meat, it must be prepared as soon as possible. Many provinces in China have the custom of marinating preserved meat, among which Guangdong Province is the most famous preserved meat. Steamed rice cakes, because of their homophonic "high age" and varied tastes, have almost become a must-have food for every family. The styles of rice cakes are square yellow and white rice cakes, which symbolize gold and silver and express the meaning of making a fortune in the New Year. The taste of rice cakes varies from place to place. Beijingers like to eat red date rice cakes, hundred fruit rice cakes and white rice cakes made of glutinous rice or yellow rice. Hebei people like to add jujube, red bean and mung bean to the rice cake and steam it together. In northern Shanxi, in Inner Mongolia and other places, it is customary to eat fried rice cakes with yellow rice flour during the New Year, and some of them are stuffed with bean paste and jujube paste, while Shandong people steam rice cakes with yellow rice and red dates. The rice cakes in the north are mainly sweet, steamed or fried, and some people simply eat them with sugar. The rice cakes in the south are both sweet and salty, such as those in Suzhou and Ningbo, which are made of japonica rice and have a light taste. In addition to steaming and frying, you can also slice and fry or cook soup. Sweet rice cakes are made of glutinous rice flour with white sugar, lard, rose, sweet-scented osmanthus, mint, vegetable paste and other ingredients. They are fine in workmanship and can be steamed directly or fried with egg white. The night before the real Chinese New Year is called reunion night. Wanderers who are away from home have to come home from Wan Li for thousands of miles. The whole family has to sit around and wrap jiaozi for the Chinese New Year. jiaozi's practice is to make dumpling skins with flour first, and then use leather bags to stuff them. The contents of the stuffing are varied, and all kinds of meat, eggs, seafood and seasonal vegetables can be stuffed. The orthodox jiaozi method is to cook them in clear water and mix them with vinegar, minced garlic and vegetables after fishing. There are also ways to fry jiaozi and bake jiaozi (fried dumpling). Because the word "He" in dough mixing means "He"; Jiaozi's "Jiao" and "Jiao" are homophonic, and "He" and "Jiao" have the meaning of reunion, so jiaozi is used to symbolize reunion of acacia; It is very auspicious to take the meaning of making friends at an older age; In addition, jiaozi, shaped like an ingot, eats jiaozi during the Chinese New Year, which also has the auspicious meaning of "making a fortune". All the families get together to make a package for jiaozi, so it's fun to celebrate the Spring Festival.

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Origin of the Spring Festival: There are many legends about the origin of the Spring Festival, which are widely circulated among the people, among which the story of ten thousand years is more popular. I chose this story to have a deep understanding. The outline of this story is: A long time ago, there was a small village under the beautiful Dingyang Mountain. On the hillside at the head of the village, there is a small stone house where a young man named Wannian lives. He came from a poor family and made a living by chopping wood and digging medicine. At that time, the festivals were so chaotic that farmers could not farm. Wannian is a young man with calculation. He wants to set the festival accurately, but he doesn't know where to start. One day, Wannian went up the mountain to cut firewood and sat under a tree to rest. The movement of the shadows inspired him, so he made a sundial and measured the shadows to calculate the length of the day. However, it is cloudy, cloudy, foggy and rainy, which affects the measurement. He wanted to make another timekeeper to make up for the sundial. That day, he went up the mountain to dig medicine and came to the spring to drink water. The spring on the cliff was ticking rhythmically, which caught his attention. He looked at the spring and lost his mind After thinking for a while, I came home, drew a picture, tried it, and made a five-story clepsydra. From then on, he measured the sun's shadow, looked for leaks, and worked hard. Slowly, he found that every 360 days, the length of the days would be repeated from the beginning. The shortest day is in the winter solstice. At that time, the son of heaven was called Zu Yi, and the festival was out of order, which made him very anxious. He called a hundred officials to discuss the difficulty of the festival. The festival official's name is Ah Heng. If he doesn't know the laws of the sun and the moon, he says that people have done things carelessly and offended the gods. Only by kneeling devoutly can we get God's forgiveness. Zu Yi took a vegetarian bath, led hundreds of officials to the Temple of Heaven to offer sacrifices, and sent a message to the whole country to set up a platform to offer sacrifices to heaven. But the sacrifices come and go, and there is no effect, and the season is still very chaotic; People from all over the country have to serve in order to build the altar, and they have to donate. It's really bile mixed with coptis, which makes the pain worse. I couldn't help it for ten thousand years, so I took his sundial and clepsydra to visit the son of heaven. I met the son of heaven in ten thousand years, talked about the winter solstice, and talked about the cycle of the sun and the moon. When Zu Yi listened to this, he was overjoyed. Even if he built a large-scale building, he built a Sun Moon Pavilion, a sundial platform and a leaky pot pavilion in front of the Temple of Heaven. Twelve boys were assigned to serve for ten thousand years, and six boys kept the sundial and six boys kept the leaky cauldron, carefully recorded and reported on time. One day, Zu Yi asked Ah Heng to go to Riyuege to inquire about the calendar making. Wannian pointed to the calendar and said, "Sunrise and sunset are 360, and it starts all over again. The vegetation is divided into four seasons, and there are twelve circles in a year. " Hearing this, Ah Heng was deeply sensible, but his heart was uneasy. He thought to himself: if the festival is fixed in ten thousand years, the son of heaven will be happy and reuse it for ten thousand years, who will listen to me? Ah Heng thought and thought, bent on getting rid of Wan Nian. One day, when Ah Heng found out that he was a good shooter, he sent someone to his house and put on a wine feast, explaining the reason and promising him a heavy gift. The assassin promised to assassinate him that night. At the second drum of the day, the assassin left Aheng while intoxicated and ran to Riyuege. However, around the Temple of Heaven, your Excellency Sun Moon was guarded by guards, and the assassin could not come near, so he drew his bow and arrow and shot at Wannian, who was watching the stars on the Sun Moon Pavilion. Who knows that the assassin drank too much, his eyes were faint, and the arrow only hit Wan Nian's arm. Ten thousand years fell to the ground with a sigh, and all the boys cried for the thief. When the guards heard the shouts, they went out together, caught the assassin and twisted to see the son of heaven. Zu Yi asked the truth, sent a command to put Ah Heng in prison, and made a seal out of the palace to visit Riyuege for ten thousand years. Wan Nian was very moved, pointing to Shen Xing, and said, "Shen Xing has caught up with the silkworm, and the astrology has recovered. When the children are handed in at night, the old year is over, and it is spring again. Let's hope that the emperor will make a festival." Zu Yi said, "Spring is the first year of the year, so let's call it Spring Festival. Ai Qing entered the cabinet for three years, and she was brave enough to make a lunar calendar based on the full moon. It was really a great achievement. Now that Aiqing has been assassinated by a traitor, come with me to the palace to recuperate. " Wan Nian said, "Although the lunar calendar was originally created, it is still not very accurate, and there are still a few hours left at the end of the year. If you don't embellish the end of this year, the sun and the moon will fly like a shuttle, and it will be wrong to come and go. I am disappointed by the expectations of all sentient beings, and I am deeply grateful to the Emperor. I am willing to break my heart, carefully calculate and set the grass calendar. " In this way, ten thousand years in the sun and moon pavilion, carefully observe the prosperity and decline of vegetation and wheat bran, carefully calculate, and moisten the end of the year. In May of that year, Zu Yi went to the Temple of Heaven to offer sacrifices to the gods, and then boarded the Sun and Moon Pavilion to give the May peaches to the gods for ten thousand years. The lunar calendar was presented in ten thousand years, and Zu Yi looked forward to the ten thousand years of hard work day and night. His eyebrows were white and his beard was white. He was deeply moved, so he named the lunar calendar the perpetual calendar and named it the birthday star of the sun, the moon and the moon. Therefore, later, people also called the Spring Festival Year. Every time during the Spring Festival, Shou Xingtu was hung in the house, symbolizing the longevity of the new year, and it was also a nostalgia for the ten thousand years of meritorious service.