the Lantern Festival

The Lantern Festival, also known as the Shangyuan Festival, the Little First Month, the New Year's Eve or the Lantern Festival, is on the fifteenth day of the first month of the lunar calendar.

the Lantern Festival

• Introduction to the Lantern Festival
  • The Lantern Festival, also known as the Shangyuan Festival, the Little First Month, the New Year's Eve or the Lantern Festival, is on the fifteenth day of the first month of the lunar calendar.
• Lantern Festival customs
  • Lantern Festival is one of the traditional festivals in China. The Lantern Festival mainly includes a series of traditional folk activities such as watching lanterns, eating glutinous rice balls, guessing lantern riddles, and setting off fireworks. In addition, many local Lantern Festival also added traditional folk performances such as dragon lantern, lion dance, stilt walking, roller boating, Yangko dancing, and Taiping drum playing.
• Origin of the Lantern Festival
  • The Lantern Festival is a traditional Chinese festival. The formation of the Lantern Festival custom has a long process, which is rooted in the ancient folk custom of turning on lights to pray. The "test lamp" is usually started on the 14th night of the first month to pray for blessings. The 15th night is the "positive lamp". People need to light the lamp, also known as "send the lamp", to carry out the activities of offering sacrifices to gods and praying for blessings.
• The historical development of the Lantern Festival
  • The festival period and customs activities of the Lantern Festival are extended and expanded with the development of history. In terms of the length of the festival, it was only one day in the Han Dynasty, three days in the Tang Dynasty, and five days in the Song Dynasty. In the Ming Dynasty, it was the longest lantern festival in Chinese history, from lighting up on the eighth day of the day to setting down on the night of the seventeenth month of the first lunar month. It is connected with the Spring Festival. The day is the city, and it is bustling, and burning lights at night is spectacular. Especially the exquisite and colorful lights make it the climax of entertainment activities during the Spring Festival. By the Qing Dynasty, "hundred operas" such as dragon dance, lion dance, roller boat running, stilt walking and Yangko dancing were added, but the festival period was shortened to four to five days.