With the passage of time, the Spring Festival in 2018 is getting closer and closer. The most important thing for Chinese New Year is to visit relatives and friends. So what do you know about the traditional customs of the Spring Festival? Don't forget yourself!
What are the customs of Spring Festival?
The word "Suan" in Laba Suan is homonymous with the word "Suan". On this day, the ancient businesses would calculate the income and expenditure of a year, and get the profit and loss, including external debt and foreign debt. Therefore, the word "Laba Suan" came into being. On the day of Laba, the creditor would send letters to the people who owed him money and let him prepare to pay back the money. Later debtors replaced the word "Suan" with "Suan" and avoided the word "Suan" of "Suan".
Sacrificial kitchen is a very influential and popular custom among Chinese people. In the old days, almost every kitchen had a God called "kitchen Lord". People called this God "life Buddha" or "kitchen Lord life Buddha". There is a saying that "men do not worship the moon, women do not sacrifice the kitchen". It is said that the Kitchen God looks like a little white face. He is afraid of women's sacrifice to the kitchen. He has a suspicion of men and women. People pay attention to eating dumplings during the festival. They choose to 'send dumplings off to face the wind'.
Since the Han Dynasty, new year's Eve is one of the most important activities. The custom of keeping the age has a long history. It was first recorded in the local chronicles of the Western Jin Dynasty. On New Year's Eve, the whole family gathered all night to watch the night, symbolizing to drive away all the evil plague and look forward to the good luck of the new year. There are two meanings of keeping one's old age in ancient times: the elder's keeping one's old age means' quitting the old age ', which means cherishing time; the younger's keeping one's old age means prolonging the life of their parents.
In order to pray for a happy life, people keep the habit of sticking to door gods. According to the ancients, people with extraordinary looks often have magical temperament and extraordinary ability, so the door god will always be angry and ferocious. Because the door of our country's folk house is usually two opposite, so the door gods are always in pairs. After the Tang Dynasty, in addition to the two generals of Shenpu and Yulei, Qin Shubao and Yuchi Gong were regarded as the door gods.
As early as in the Song Dynasty, special New Year greeting cards, called "famous stabs" or "famous stickers", had been used between the families of royal, noble and noble scholar officials and their relatives. It is cut into two inch wide and three inch long cards with its own name and address on them. A red paper bag is pasted on the door of each house, which is called 'door book'. The name of the owner is written on it to receive the famous stab (name sticker). The worshipers cast famous stabs (name stickers) on the doorbook, that is to say New Year's greetings.
The fifth day of the first month is commonly known as "broken five". From the thirtieth day of the twelfth lunar month to the fifth day of the first lunar month, sanitation is generally forbidden, otherwise good luck will be lost, and a thorough cleaning will be carried out on the day of breaking the fifth lunar month. On that day, the common food custom is to eat dumplings, commonly known as "pinching the mouth of a villain". When making dumplings, you should knead them one by one along the side of the dumplings with your hands. It is said that this way you can avoid slander around you. In some places, dumplings are also wrapped with money, dates, sugar, etc., which means wealth, sweetness and beauty.
With the development of history, the festival period and festival customs of Lantern Festival extended. In terms of the length of the festival, one day in the Han Dynasty, three days in the Tang Dynasty, five days in the Song Dynasty, and ten days in the Ming Dynasty from the eighth day of the first month to the 17th night of the first month. In the Qing Dynasty, the Manchu people came to the Central Plains, and the court no longer held lantern fairs. The Folk Lantern fairs were still spectacular, and the date was shortened to five days. Exquisite and colorful lights make it the climax of entertainment activities during the new year.