What's the difference between New Year's Day and Spring Festival?

New Year's Day, also known as January Day, means the beginning of a year without new moon, new year and harmony. Because the original meaning of "yuan" is "head" and extended to "beginning" The original meaning of "Dan" is also "beginning"

New Year's Day is the first day of every new year. "Yuan" has the meaning of beginning, "Dan" refers to the time of dawn and also refers to a day. New Year's Day is the first day of the year. "In the cultural relics excavation in Dawenkou, China found a picture of the sun rising from the top of the mountain and clouds filling the air. According to textual research, this is the oldest writing method of the word "Dan" in China. Later, the simplified word "Dan" appeared on the bronze inscriptions in the Yin and Shang Dynasties. The word "Dan" is represented by a round sun. The word "one" under "Sun" indicates the horizon, which means that the sun rises from the horizon in Ran Ran. Xiao Ziyun, a literary historian in the Southern Dynasties, recorded in his "Jieya" that "the four spirits live a long life on New Year's Day". It seems that Dan is the beginning of a day and lasts until the first day of the year. Song Wu's "Liang Lumeng" Volume 1 "First Month" entry: "The first day of the first month is called New Year's Day, and the custom is called New Year's Day. "One-year-old festival, this is the first." On New Year's Day, it is called Yuanri in Shushun Hall "; Cui Yuan of Han Dynasty called it "Jacky" in San Zi Ming. In Jin Dynasty, Geng expounded Yang Du Fu and was called "Chen Yuan". The Northern Qi Dynasty called it "Yuan Chun" in Huangxia Ci of Hui Yuan Ge Xiang. Tang Dezong Shili called it "Yuan Shuo" in the poem "Yuan Ri retired from the DPRK to watch the war and return to camp". However, the New Year's Day mentioned by the ancients in China is not 1 day in the Gregorian calendar, but the first day of the first month, which is also commonly known as January. The year number in the history of China is not the year of A.D., but every emperor and every dynasty has a separate year, that is, the Lunar Year. The current calendar year is the embodiment of the western calendar. Based on the birth of Christ in 1 year. It was not until after the Republic of China that China gradually changed its calendar to AD. Therefore, the Spring Festival on the first day of the first lunar month in China is more festive than New Year's Day on the Gregorian calendar. There are different names in Chinese dialects, some are called "New Year's Day", some are called "Big Day", and some are called "New Year's Day", generally called "the first day of the first month".

The month and date of New Year's Day in China are inconsistent. Xia Dynasty is the first day of the first month, Shang Dynasty is the first day of December, and Zhou Dynasty is the first day of November. After Qin Shihuang unified the six countries, the first day of October was New Year's Day. In the first year of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, Sima Qian founded the "taichu calendar", and once again took the first day of the first month as New Year's Day, just like the provisions of the Xia Dynasty, so it was also called "Li Xia", which was used until the Revolution of 1911. After the founding of the Republic of China, Sun Yat-sen went to the countryside in order to "do well in summer"; From the Gregorian calendar, so statistics ",the first day of the first month (the first day of the New Year) is designated as the Spring Festival, and the Gregorian calendar 1 is the New Year. 1949 On September 27th, the first plenary session of China People's Political Consultative Conference passed a resolution: "The people of China * * * and the national calendar adopt the AD calendar method. "That is, the Gregorian calendar is used all over the world. In order to distinguish the Lunar New Year from the Gregorian New Year, and in view of the fact that the "beginning of spring" in the 24 solar terms of the Lunar New Year happens around it, the first day of the first lunar month was renamed as "Spring Festival" and the Gregorian calendar 1 day was designated as "New Year's Day". Since then, New Year's Day has become a national joyful festival in China.

Due to the different longitude positions of countries in the world, the time for countries to enter New Year's Day is also different. For example, Tonga, an island country in Oceania, is located on the west side of the Japanese boundary. It is the first place in the world to start a new day, and naturally it is also the first country to celebrate New Year's Day. Western Samoa, located in the east of international date line, is the latest place in the world to welcome the New Year. China is the first 12 country in the world to greet the dawn of New Year's Day.

The second origin of New Year's Day

People call 1 day in the solar calendar every year "New Year's Day". Why?

It turns out that in Chinese, "Yuan" means the first and the beginning, while "Dan" means a red sun rising from the ground. The harmony between "Yuan" and "Dan" means that people should greet the new year with vigor. On this day, cities and rural areas in China are decorated with lanterns and festive costumes, and many units hang up huge slogans of "Celebrating New Year's Day" to celebrate the New Year. But this is not fixed from the beginning.

In the calendar, people are used to calling the 1 period of the earth around the sun 1 year. However, because the earth's orbit around the sun has no fixed starting point and ending point, the starting point and ending point of a year are artificially stipulated, which leads to the inconsistency of various calendars. According to legend, the word "Chinese New Year" comes from Zhuan Xu, one of the earliest three emperors and five emperors in China. He defined the first month of the lunar calendar as "Yuan" and the first day as "Dan". Later, some dynasties changed the date of New Year's Day, but in principle, the first day of each year is still regarded as New Year's Day. For example, the Xia Dynasty regarded the first day of the first month as New Year's Day, but the Shang Dynasty regarded it as New Year's Day. The Zhou Dynasty was 1 1, and the Qin Dynasty was 1. It was not until Emperor Wu of the Western Han Dynasty that the great historian Sima Qian and others reformulated the calendar, stipulating that the first day of the first month of the first month of each year was New Year's Day, and it has not changed since then.

19 1 1 After the success of the Revolution of 1911, it was decided to adopt the international Gregorian calendar, so the New Year's Day of the lunar calendar was changed to "Spring Festival" and 1 day of the Gregorian calendar was called New Year's Day.

At present, most countries in the world take 65438+ 10 1 as New Year's Day, because most of them adopt the international Gregorian calendar. However, some countries and nationalities have different New Year's Day dates because of their local calendar traditions, religious beliefs, customs and seasonal climate, which makes the world more colorful and ethnic.

The Third Origin of New Year's Day

Around 3500 BC, the ancient Egyptians had changed from nomadism to farming and settled on both sides of the Nile, and their agricultural harvest was closely related to whether there was a flood in the Nile. The ancient Egyptians found that the time of Nile flooding was regular from long-term observation, so they recorded this time on bamboo poles every time, and learned that the interval between two flooding times was about 365 days. At the same time, it was found that when the Nile came near Cairo at high tide today, the sun and Sirius rose from the horizon at the same time. Therefore, the ancient Egyptians set this day as the beginning of the year. This is the earliest origin of New Year's Day.

In modern folk customs, celebrating the Spring Festival is also called Chinese New Year. In fact, the origin of Chinese New Year and Spring Festival is very different.

So how did the year come from? There are mainly two kinds of folk sayings: one is that there was a fierce monster called Nian in ancient times, which went door to door on the thirtieth day of the twelfth lunar month, foraging for human flesh and killing creatures. On the night of the thirtieth day of the twelfth lunar month, Nian came to a village. It happened that two cowboys were fighting for a whip. Nian suddenly heard the sound of whipping in mid-air and ran away in fear. It fled to another village and saw a bright red dress drying in front of the door. It didn't know what it was, so it turned around and ran away. Later, he came to a village, looked into the door of a family, and saw that the lights were brightly lit and dizzy, so he had to slip away again, with his tail between his legs. From this, people realized that Nian has the weakness of being afraid of noise, red and light, so they thought of many ways to resist it and gradually evolved into the custom of celebrating the New Year today.

Another way of saying this is that ancient calligraphy books in China put the word "Nian" in the Ministry of Grain, which means good weather and good harvest. Because cereal crops are usually harvested once a year. "Year" is extended to the name of the year.

Although there was a custom of Spring Festival in ancient China, it was not called Spring Festival at that time. Because the Spring Festival referred to at that time refers to the "beginning of spring" among the 24 solar terms.

The Northern and Southern Dynasties generally referred to the Spring Festival as the whole spring. It is said that the Lunar New Year was officially named Spring Festival after the Revolution of 1911. Because the solar calendar was used at that time, the first day of the first month of the lunar calendar had to be renamed the Spring Festival in order to distinguish between farmers and farmers.

The origin and legend of Lantern Festival;

Lantern Festival is a traditional festival in China, which began in the Western Han Dynasty more than 2,000 years ago. Lantern Festival viewing began in the period of Emperor Han Ming in the East. Ming Di advocates Buddhism. He heard that on the fifteenth day of the first month, monks watched the Buddhist relics and lit lanterns to worship the Buddha, so that all the gentry and ordinary people hung lanterns. Later, this Buddhist ceremonial festival gradually formed a grand folk festival. This festival has experienced the development process from the court to the people, and from the Central Plains to the whole country.

Emperor Wen of the Han Dynasty ordered the 15th day of the first month to be designated as the Lantern Festival. During the period of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, the sacrificial activities of "Taiyi God" were scheduled for the 15th day of the first month. Taiyi: the God who rules the universe. When Sima Qian created the taichu calendar Law, he had already identified the Lantern Festival as a major festival.

Another way of saying it is that the custom of burning lanterns in Lantern Festival originated from the "ternary theory" of Taoism; The fifteenth day of the first month is Shangyuan Festival, the fifteenth day of July is Zhongyuan Festival, and the fifteenth day of October is Xiayuan Festival. The officials in charge of the upper, middle and lower elements are heaven, earth and man respectively. The celestial officials are happy and the Lantern Festival should be lit.

The festivals and customs of Lantern Festival have been extended and expanded with the development of history. As far as the length of festivals is concerned, there is only one day in Han Dynasty, three days in Tang Dynasty and five days in Song Dynasty. In the Ming Dynasty, lights were lit from the eighth day of August until the seventeenth night of the first month, a total of ten days. Connected with the Spring Festival, it is a city during the day, full of excitement, and brightly lit at night, which is spectacular. Especially the exquisite and colorful lights make it the climax of entertainment activities during the Spring Festival. In the Qing Dynasty, there were more "hundred operas" such as dragon dancing, lion dancing, dry boating, walking on stilts and yangko dancing, but the festival period was shortened to four to five days.

There are several interesting legends about the origin of the Lantern Festival:

Legend of lamp

Legend has it that a long time ago, there were many fierce birds and beasts everywhere that hurt people and livestock, so people organized to defeat them. A god bird was trapped and landed on the earth, but was accidentally shot by an unsuspecting hunter. The Emperor of Heaven was very angry when he learned that. He immediately issued a decree, ordering the heavenly soldiers to set fire to the land on the fifteenth day of the first month, burning all the people, livestock and property. The daughter of the Emperor of Heaven is kind-hearted. She couldn't bear to see the innocent suffering of the people, so she risked her life and secretly rushed Xiangyun to the world to tell people the news. When people heard the news, it was like a blow to the head. I'm so scared that I don't know what to do. After a long time, an old man came up with an idea. He said: "On the 14th, 15th and 16th of the first month, every family decorated their houses, set off firecrackers and set off fireworks. In this way, the emperor will think that people have been burned to death. "

Everyone nodded and said yes, and they were ready to go separately. On the night of the fifteenth day of the first month, the emperor looked down and found that for three consecutive nights, the world was red and the noise was deafening. He thought it was the flame of a big fire, and soon. In this way, people saved their lives and property. In order to commemorate this success, every household hangs lanterns and sets off fireworks on the fifteenth day of the first month to commemorate this day.

Emperor Wen of the Han Dynasty set it up to commemorate Pinglu.

Another legend is that the Lantern Festival was established by Emperor Wen of Han Dynasty to commemorate Pinglu. After the death of Emperor Gaozu Liu Bang, Lv Hou's son Liu Ying became Emperor Hui of Han Dynasty. Hui Di was born weak and indecisive, and power gradually fell into the hands of Lv Hou. After Hui Di's death, he monopolized state affairs and turned Liu's world into Lu's. The old courtiers and Liu's imperial clan were deeply indignant, but they were afraid of cruelty and dared not speak out.

After Lv Hou's death, Zhu Lu has been in a state of anxiety, afraid of being hurt and excluded. So, in the general's home, they secretly assembled and plotted to make trouble in order to completely seize Liu's country.

This incident reached the ears of Liu Nang, the king of Qi in the Liu clan. In order to protect Liu's country, Liu Nang decided to fight Zhu Lu. Then, he contacted the founding fathers Zhou Bo and Chen Ping, and planned to get rid of Lv Lu. Finally, the "Zhu Lu Rebellion" was completely put down.

After the rebellion, the ministers made Liu Heng, the second son of Liu Bang, emperor and called him Emperor Wen. Impressed by the hard-won peace and prosperity, Emperor Wen designated the 15th day of the first month of the first month to quell the "Zhu-Lu Rebellion" as a day to have fun with the people, and every household in Beijing celebrated with lanterns and colorful decorations. Since then, the fifteenth day of the first month has become a popular folk festival-"Lantern Festival".

Dong Fangshuo and Yuanxiao Girl

This legend is related to the custom of eating Yuanxiao: According to legend, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty had a favorite named Dong Fangshuo, who was kind and funny. One winter, it snowed heavily for several days, and Dong Fangshuo went to the Imperial Garden to fold plum blossoms for Emperor Wu. As soon as I entered the garden gate, I found a maid-in-waiting in tears ready to throw herself into the well. Dong Fangshuo rushed forward to help and asked her why she committed suicide. It turns out that this maid-in-waiting is named Yuanxiao, and there are parents and a sister at home. She has never seen her family since she entered the palace. Every spring comes, I miss my family more than usual. I think in front of my parents, I would rather die than be filial. Dong Fangshuo expressed deep sympathy for her suffering and assured her that she would try her best to reunite with her family.

One day, Dong Fangshuo left the palace and set up a divination pavilion on Chang 'an Avenue. Many people are scrambling to find him for divination. Unexpectedly, what everyone wants is the signature of "burning us on the 16th day of the first month". Suddenly, there was a panic in Chang 'an. People are looking for a solution to the disaster. Dong Fangshuo said, "On the 13th night of the first month, Vulcan will send a goddess in red to visit the earth. She is the messenger who ordered the burning of Chang 'an. I'll give you the copied poem and let the emperor do something. " Say that finish, then dropped a red pillar and roared off. The people picked up the red post and quickly sent it to the palace to report to the emperor.

Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty took it and read: "Chang 'an is robbing, and the imperial palace is being burned. It has been burning for fifteen days, and the midnight snack is red." He was so scared that he hurriedly invited resourceful Dong Fangshuo. Dong Fangshuo thought for a moment and said, "I heard that Vulcan likes to eat dumplings. Don't Yuanxiao in the palace often make dumplings for you? Let Yuanxiao package jiaozi on 15th night. Long live the incense and offerings, and order every family in Kyoto to pack jiaozi and worship Vulcan together. Then tell the subjects to hang lights together on the fifteenth night and set off firecrackers and fireworks all over the city, as if the whole city were on fire, so that the jade emperor could be fooled. In addition, the people outside the city were informed that they would go to the city to watch the lights on the fifteenth night, and they would eliminate disasters and solve problems in the crowd. Emperor Wu was very happy, so he ordered to do it according to Dong Fangshuo's method.

On the fifteenth day of the first month, Chang 'an City was decorated with colorful lights, crowded with tourists and very lively. The parents of the maid-in-waiting Yuanxiao also took their sister to the city to see the lights. When they saw the big palace lantern with the words "Yuanxiao" written on it, they shouted in surprise: "Yuanxiao! Lantern Festival! " When Yuanxiao heard the shouts, she was finally reunited with her relatives at home.

After such a busy night, Chang 'an was safe. Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty was overjoyed and ordered that glutinous rice balls should be made for Vulcan every year on the fifteenth day of the first month. On the fifteenth day of the first month, the whole city was decorated with lanterns and set off fireworks. Because jiaozi cooked by Yuanxiao is the best, people call it Yuanxiao, and this day is called Lantern Festival.