The Qingming Festival, also known as the Tomb Sweeping Festival, the Ghost Festival, and the Underworld Festival, together with the Mid-Yuan Festival on the 15th of July and the Cold Clothes Festival on the 1st of October, are known as the Three Underworld Festivals, which are all related to the worship of ghosts and gods.
The Qingming Festival, also known as the Treading Green Festival, according to the solar calendar, it is between April 4 and 6 every year, it is the bright and beautiful spring grass and trees spit out the green season, but also is the people of the spring tour (ancient called trekking) a good time, so the ancients have the Qingming trekking, and to carry out a series of sports activities of the custom. The Qingming Festival, also known as the March Festival, has a history of more than 2,000 years.
The Qingming Festival, which falls around April 5 on the Gregorian calendar, is one of the twenty-four solar terms. Among the 24 solar terms, the only ones that are both solar terms and festivals are Qingming and the winter solstice. Its original meaning is that nature has reached the time when it has turned warm, and everything begins to recover so that spring plowing and planting can take place. In ancient China, Qingming was categorized into three seasons: "The first season is when the tung begins to blossom; the second season is when the field mouse turns into a quail; and the third season is when the rainbow begins to be seen." This means that at this time of the year, first the white tung blossoms open, then the voles, which love the shade, disappear and return to their holes in the ground, and then the rainbow can be seen in the sky after the rain.
Because the 24 solar terms objectively reflect the changes in temperature, rainfall and weather conditions throughout the year, the ancient working people used them to organize their agricultural activities. According to the "time of the year and a hundred questions": "Everything grows at this time, are clean and clear. Therefore, it is called Qingming." Qingming, the temperature rises, the rainfall increases, it is a good time for spring plowing and planting. Therefore, there are "before and after the Qingming, point melon planting beans", "planting trees, not more than the Qingming" proverbs. It can be seen that this festival and agricultural production has a close relationship.
But, as a festival, Qingming is different from a pure festival. While a festival is a sign of changes in the climate and the order of the seasons in China, a festival contains certain customary activities and some kind of commemorative significance. Qingming Festival is a traditional Chinese festival and the most important festival for sacrificing ancestors and sweeping tombs. Tomb-sweeping is commonly known as visiting the graves, an activity to honor the dead. Most Han Chinese and some ethnic minorities sweep their tombs on Qingming Day. According to the old custom, when sweeping tombs, people should bring wine, food, fruits, paper money and other items to the cemetery, offer the food in front of their loved ones' graves, then incinerate the paper money, cultivate new soil for the graves, fold a few tender green new branches and stick them on the graves, then bow down and perform rituals to worship, and finally eat the wine and food and go home. Du Mu, a poet of the Tang Dynasty, wrote a poem entitled "Qingming": "The rain falls one after another during the Qingming Festival, and the pedestrians on the road want to break their souls. Where can I find a tavern? The shepherd boy points to the apricot blossom village." The poem "Ching Ming" wrote out the special atmosphere of the Qingming Festival. Until today, the custom of worshipping ancestors and mourning deceased relatives on Qingming Festival is still very popular.
The Cold Food Festival ---- Cold Food means banning fire and eating only cold or pre-cooked food. According to legend, this custom originated in the Spring and Autumn Period, when someone in the state of Jin wanted to kill the grand duke Chong Er, so the loyal minister Jie Zhi Pui (also known as Jie Zi Pui) escorted Chong Er on his escape and even cut off his own flesh to give him to eat in times of hunger and cold, in the hope that he would return to his country in peace and become the king of his country and be diligent in his government and love for his people.
More than a decade later, Chong Er finally returned to his country and became the king of Jin, one of the Five Hegemons of the Spring and Autumn Period, and rewarded those who had assisted him during his exile, but he forgot about Jie Zhi Pui, who was reminded of this by a bystander, and then hurriedly sent someone to ask Jie Zhi Pui to come to collect his reward. However, Jie Zhi Pui and his mother went to live in seclusion in the mountains. Duke Wen of Jin and his ministers searched in the mountain but could not find them. Some people suggested to set fire to the mountain, and Jie Zhi Pui, being a filial son, would surely save his mother out. However, the fire burned for three days and three nights, but still could not see Jie Zhi Tui. After the fire was extinguished, people found Jie Zhi Pui carrying his mother's body under a willow tree. Duke Wen of Jin was very sad and remorseful, and buried them under the willow tree. Duke Wen of Jin designated the day the fire was set on the mountain as the Cold Food Festival, stipulating that the people forbid the use of fire and eat cold food for one day in honor of Jie Zhi Pui's loyalty.
During March and April, when the spring is bright and the peaches are red and the willows are green, the most valued festival in traditional Chinese customs is the Qingming Festival. The Qingming Festival is now the national festival for sweeping tombs. According to the Lord's Day, it falls around April 5, and according to the lunar calendar, it falls in the first half of March. Ancient people divided the year into twenty-four seasons, with this calendar to sow and harvest, Qingming is one of the twenty-four seasons, when the spring equinox fifteen days after, according to the "time of the year hundred questions" said: "Everything grows at this time, all clean and clear. Therefore, it is called Qingming." Therefore, "Qingming" was originally the name of the festival, and later added the cold food ban on fire and no grave customs to form the Qingming Festival