BEIJING, Beijing, October 23 (Reporter Shangguan Yun) "I hope that you will come and meet me, bringing a basket of wine, and we’ll celebrate together the Mountain Holiday." Double Ninth Festival is a traditional festival in China, also called Ascending Festival, Chrysanthemum Festival, etc. There are various customs such as sunbathing in autumn and drinking chrysanthemum wine.
Dong Deying, distinguished professor of Qingdao University, said that the Double Ninth Festival falls on the ninth day of the ninth lunar month, and the Double Ninth Festival contains beautiful metaphors of long and honorable life, with holiday themes such as exorcising evil spirits and prolonging life.
Many customs also contain people’s demands to respect life and pray for happiness. For example, chrysanthemum has the name of "prolonging life" and "prolonging life". The ancients believed that drinking chrysanthemum wine in Chongyang would prolong life. In addition, we must climb high and overlook, eat Chongyang cake and so on.
The origin of the Double Ninth Festival?
The Double Ninth Festival, which falls on the ninth day of the ninth lunar month, is called "Double Ninth Festival".
In ancient times, people thought that the singular number was Yang, and nine was Yang number. On September 9th, the sun and the moon attached importance to each other, and "99" and "Jiujiu" were homophonic and had a long-lasting meaning.
In addition, during the Double Ninth Festival, the autumn harvest in the north is basically over, and the cold winter is coming soon. People often pray for good weather and good harvests in the coming year when observing the sky on the Double Ninth Festival.
What are the holiday themes?
In the Han Dynasty, the Double Ninth Festival appeared. Later, Wu Jun, a Liang of the Southern Dynasties, mentioned in "Harmony in the Continuation of Qi" that the legend of climbing a mountain on September 9 to avoid disaster made the Double Ninth Festival and the custom of climbing a mountain widely spread.
Since the appearance of the Double Ninth Festival, the main themes of the festival are to ward off evil spirits and prolong life. However, in the early days, holiday customs and life paid more attention to ward off evil spirits, drive away disasters, and be ashamed, and the color of holiday beliefs was stronger.
In the historical development, people pay more attention to the Double Ninth Festival for good luck and so on, and the leisure and entertainment of the festival gradually become stronger.
Why drink chrysanthemum wine?
The custom of seeking longevity on the Double Ninth Festival has appeared since the early days of the festival.
The ninth month of the lunar calendar is the late autumn, the grass turns from green to yellow, and the chrysanthemum blooms brightly, which is an extension of life at the end of phenology. With a bunch of chrysanthemums wishing "the life of Peng Zu", the chrysanthemum is called "the guest of prolonging life" and "the guest of prolonging life", and many poems and songs praise the theme of celebrating the birthday of Chongyang.
Ge Hong’s Miscellaneous Notes on Xijing records that in the Han Dynasty, "on September 9th, cornus was invited to eat tent bait and drink chrysanthemum wine, which made people live longer." The ancients believed that drinking chrysanthemum wine in Chongyang would prolong life, and in addition, chrysanthemum wine would be given to relatives and friends.
Why was there the Double Ninth Festival?
During the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, the Double Ninth Festival was highly valued, and various festivals and customs, such as climbing the mountain for feasting and admiring cornus, were also enriched. In the Southern Dynasties, Liang Zonggu wrote "A Record of the Age of Jingchu": "On September 9, the four people had a banquet in the wild."
During the Tang and Song Dynasties, there were official holidays for hundreds of officials on the Double Ninth Festival. On the Double Ninth Festival, the emperor gave a big feast to his ministers, and the common people climbed up the mountain to have a feast. The custom of the Double Ninth Festival gradually tended to be recreational.
In Song Dynasty, the Double Ninth Festival consists of two sections, namely, Double Ninth Festival and Double Ninth Festival. Lu Yuanming’s "Miscellaneous Notes on the Year of the Year" says: "The capital city is full of scholars, more than the day after the ninth festival, and then the feast is rewarded, and it is called Xiao Chongyang."
Where does the custom of basking in autumn come from?
Some people think that the custom of "basking in the autumn" on the Double Ninth Festival actually comes from the autumn festival ceremony of tasting new ancestors after the autumn harvest.
In terms of time, the Double Ninth Festival coincides with the autumn wind and the approaching winter. The ancients are grateful for the harvest and have a grand sacrifice and taste new activities, praying for evil spirits and long life.
In ancient times, spring festival and autumn festival were important folk ritual activities. Until today, people still attach importance to spring festival and autumn festival, and to the ritual activities of tasting new products and recommending ancestors. For example, in the north, newly harvested wheat is used, and in autumn, newly harvested fruits and vegetables are used to offer ancestor sacrifices.
How to make Chongyang cake?
Double Ninth Cake originated from the custom of tasting new products and recommending ancestors in September. Miscellanies of Xijing mentioned that the bait and cake were the same thing with different names, and the "bait" had the meaning of autumn sacrifice and exorcism. The bait is made of sticky rice, which means the autumn newspaper tastes new.
In Song Dynasty, Chongyang Cake paid more attention to material configuration, modeling technology and color matching, and there were many tricks. "Dream of Tokyo" contains: "Insert ribbon-cutting flags and mix fruits, such as pomegranate seeds, chestnut color, ginkgo, pine nuts and so on." These ingredients add many folk prayers and festive colors to Chongyang cake, such as "chestnut color" which means "smooth".
"Cake" and "Gao" are homonyms for luck. In addition, the "cake" is also related to the "climbing" of Chongyang. Even if you don’t climb the distance, eating some Chongyang cakes at home is also a holiday scene.
Why does climbing the mountain mean "resigning from autumn"?
It is said that the most primitive meaning of climbing high and overlooking is to be awkward. After the Double Ninth Festival, the autumn cold is approaching, and the autumn harvest has been completed. People are about to enter the room for the winter, and climbing the mountain also means saying goodbye to nature, which is full of nature and philosophy of life.
For wanderers who are far away from their hometown relatives, climbing high and overlooking will often arouse the feeling of missing their hometown and relatives. On the mountain holiday thinking of my brothers in shandong by Wang Wei in the Tang Dynasty wrote, "Being a stranger alone in a foreign land, I miss my family more than ever during the festive season", which has been passed down through the ages.
Therefore, from the dual perspectives of time and space, Chongyang Climbing has built people’s belief and humanistic feelings of climbing to avoid disasters and homesickness. The word "Gao" also means "longevity" in people’s age, and "nine" and "long" are homonyms, all of which contain the meaning of praying for longevity.
What other interesting customs are there?
There are also customs such as cornus and chrysanthemum appreciation on the Double Ninth Festival.
Pei cornus is an important festival custom of the Double Ninth Festival. The Records of Local Habits in the Jin and Zhou Dynasties states: "On September 9th, the law counted nine without shooting, and it is still customary to break cornus’s plug on this day, saying that evil spirits were eliminated and the first cold was prevented."
There are many poems in the Tang and Song Poems that admire cornus. For example, Meng Haoran’s New Words in Nine Days mentioned that "cornus is worthy of admiration". In addition to admiring cornus, there are customs such as enjoying cornus and drinking cornus wine on the Double Ninth Festival.
Why fly a kite at this time?
The custom of flying kites on the Double Ninth Festival is said to have originated from the story of Huan Jing and Fei Changfang in Han Dynasty.
On the ninth day of the ninth lunar month, Huan Jing asked Fei Changfang for the medicine to eliminate evil and plague, got lost in the forest, and was guided by pigeons before finding Fei Changfang. In order to commemorate this event, later generations pasted pigeons with paper, and distributed them with them when they climbed the mountain, which meant praying for good luck.
"Zhangzhou Prefecture Records" records: "Climbing in September, the boy made a paper kite and put it in the wild, which is called &lsquo in dialect; Put the fork ’ 。” However, in some places, it is taboo to "break the kite" when flying a kite in Chongyang, and in some places, it is deliberately broken to let the kite go away. (End)