The Origin of Cold Food Festival
1. Who is the Cold Food Festival to commemorate?
Zhong Er, the son of the State of Jin, fled abroad for 19 years in order to avoid the disaster, and suffered the hardships of the world. On the way from one place to another, meson push followed Zhong Er all the time. Once, they ran out of grain and food and got into trouble. Meson pushes the meat off his leg for Zhong Er to eat. Later, Zhong Er returned to China and became the monarch of the State of Jin, known as Jin Wengong in history. Then, Jin Wengong rewarded the officials who fled with him, but he forgot the meson. Jie Zitui didn't ask Jin Wengong for credit, let alone be a minister with those snobs who made a fortune by credit, so he took his mother to live in seclusion in Mianshan, Jiexiu County, Shanxi Province. After Jin Wengong knew it, he recalled the loyalty of meson tui and regretted it very much. He went to ask meson to push himself down the mountain. Mesons pushed away, but refused to satisfy Jin Wengong. In order to force mesons out of the mountain, Jin Wengong ordered Mianshan to be burned. I didn't expect mesons to go their own way, preferring to be burned to death rather than go out of the mountain. As a result, he and his mother both died holding the tree. Seeing that the life-saving Ai Chen was burned to death, Wen Gong was in agony, so he buried Jie Zhi in Mianshan, built a temple, and ordered the son to ban fire and cold on the day of his death as a sign of mourning, which later became a custom.
The Cold Food Festival has a history of more than 2,600 years since the Spring and Autumn Festival, 358 years earlier than the Dragon Boat Festival. Although it was repeatedly banned by Zhou Ju of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Cao Cao of the Three Kingdoms, Xerox of the Later Zhao Dynasty and Emperor Xiaowen of the Northern Wei Dynasty, it was repeatedly banned and spread throughout the country.
Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty complied with public opinion and issued a decree to include the tomb of the Cold Food Festival in the Kaiyuan ceremony, which was designated as a national statutory festival. "The child is evasive, and the mountain fire burns me. The four seas share the same cold food, and one person is eternal. What's the use of holding a deep grudge? There were no neighbors in ancient times. The soul is full of mountains and rivers, and the wind and thunder are gods. Light smoke, elm and willow fire, resentment, dragons and snakes. Unfortunately, Wen Gongba has been responsible for this minister all his life. The poem "Cold Food Festival" written by Lv Xiang, a poet in the Tang Dynasty, tells the origin of the Cold Food Festival and "pushes Mianshan to burn me".
Second, the custom of the Cold Food Festival
1. No Smoking and Cold Food: Cold Food Festival was also called "No Smoking Festival" in ancient times. Everyone is forbidden to make a fire and eat cold food. However, due to the persistent pursuit of sages by Chinese people, it was repeatedly banned from the Eastern Han Dynasty to the Southern and Northern Dynasties, and the royal family in the Tang Dynasty recognized and participated in it.
2. ancestor worship: the cold food festival was regarded as a "wild sacrifice" from the southern and northern dynasties to the Tang dynasty. Later, it evolved into a royal mausoleum; Official sacrifices to Confucius Temple and sages; People go to sweep graves and so on. At that time, a family or clan went to the ancestral grave to sacrifice, add soil and hang paper money. Then spread swallows and snakes and rabbits on the top of the grave, roll them down, put them on with willow branches or needles, and put them in the high place in the house to show their virtue.
3. Cold food diet: Cold food includes cold porridge, cold noodles, cold pulp, green rice porridge and so on. Cold food offerings include noodles, snakes and rabbits, jujube cakes, refined rye, immortals, etc. There are dozens of drinks, such as spring wine, fresh tea, clear spring and sweet water. Most of them have profound implications, such as offering sacrifices to snakes and rabbits, which means that "snakes and rabbits will be rich", meaning that people are expected to be rich and the country is strong; Push the face, take the word "miss" in Jiexiu dialect, and don't forget to lead the virtuous. ...
4. Cold food willow: the symbol of vitamin cold food festival, originally intended to miss Jie Zhitui's pursuit of political clarity. As early as the Northern and Southern Dynasties, there was a record in the Chronicle of Jingchu that "every family broke willow during the cold food between Jianghuai and Suzhou", and it is still popular to wear mustard flowers and wheat leaves instead of willow branches in Anhui, Suzhou and other places. According to historical records in various places, there are some sayings, such as "willow branches are inserted into graves", "willow branches are folded into households", "willow branches are inserted into the eaves of sleeping stoves", "wearing a head or a tie", "offering Buddha gods in bottles" and "willow branches are inserted into doors", so there is a saying among the people that "Qingming (cold food) does not wear willow, and the beauty becomes bald".
5. Cold food outing: Also called spring outing, Sheng Xing was born in Tang and Song Dynasties. Song Lizhi's words "What I saw in the East Valley" say: "I swept things, and then I went home happily with my brother, wife, relatives and deeds." In the Ming Dynasty, a brief introduction to the scenery of emperors recorded the scene of walking in Beijing: "During the Qingming Festival, people were walking, and there were thousands of tourists, passengers and pedestrians." Can be said to be extremely prosperous.
6. Cold food swing: The swing was originally a palace women's amusement project of the ancient cold food festival. Wang Renyu's "Kaiyuan Tianbao Legacy" in the Five Dynasties recorded that "the Tianbao Palace Mid-solstice Cold Food Festival actually erected a swing, which made the wives and concubines in the palace laugh and thought it was a feast. The emperor called it a semi-fairy play, so the scholars in the capital called it. " Wen Yanbo, the prime minister of the Song Dynasty, wrote the poem "Cold Food Day Crossing the Dragon Gate", which is described as "the willow on the bridge hangs on a line and hangs more colorful ropes."
7. Cold food Cuju: popular in the Tang Dynasty, the Song Dynasty's "Literature General Examination" contained: "Cuju, Gai began in the Tang Dynasty. Plant two bamboos, several feet high, and wrap the net on the net to measure the ball for the door. The ball is divided into friends and friends, and the game is divided into corners. " History: Tang Dezong, Xian Zong, Mu Zong and Jing Zong all like to play cuju, and Yuan Gui, the state capital, wrote: "In the twelfth year of Zhenyuan, Tang Dezong, the Cold Food Festival was held in February, and the Imperial Palace East Pavilion was used to watch Wu Dachen and Wu's children, and a banquet was held for the ministers to be slaughtered." In the Song Dynasty, there was "Taizu Cuju Map".
8. Poetry-chanting in Cold Food Festival: During the Cold Food Festival, the literati homesick for their relatives, or made love through the scenery, with many feelings, sudden inspiration, great poetry and many chanters. According to the survey, there are more than 300 poems by Xuanzong, Zhang Shuo, Du Fu, Han Yu and Liu Zongyuan in Tang Dynasty, and there are more than 100 poems by Song Jinyuan, which has become a wonderful work in China's poetry art. In addition, there are many activities during the Cold Food Festival, such as banquets, flower viewing, cockfighting, egg carving, tug-of-war, drilling wood for fire, flying kites, shooting herbs, throwing pottery, etc. These activities greatly enriched the social life in ancient China.