The full moon golden city is half of the autumn and the reunion season is a good time

1 Originated in antiquity, popularized in the Han Dynasty, and flourished in the Song Dynasty

The Mid-Autumn Festival is the worship of ancient celestial phenomena, which is the remnant of the custom of paying homage to the moon, which evolved from the autumn festival of the ancient times. In traditional culture, the moon is like the sun, and these two alternate objects became the object of worship of the ancestors. The Mid-Autumn Festival originated from the ancient people's sacrifice of the moon, and is the remnant and derivation of the Chinese national custom of worshiping the moon. According to research, the original "Festival of the Moon Festival" was set on the day of the "Autumn Equinox" of the twenty-fourth solar term of the Dry Branch Calendar, but due to historical development, the later calendars were integrated and the lunar calendar (summer calendar) was used, so the "Festival of the Moon Festival" was transferred from the twenty-four solar terms of the Dry Branch Calendar to the 15th of August of the Summer Calendar (Lunar Calendar).

The Mid-Autumn Festival originated in ancient times, popularized in the Han Dynasty, fixed in the early years of the Tang Dynasty, and flourished after the Song Dynasty. This festival is also a synthesis of autumn seasonal customs, and most of the festive elements it contains have ancient origins. The Mid-Autumn Festival celebrates the reunion of the people with the full moon, in order to miss the hometown, miss the love of relatives, pray for a good harvest and happiness, and become a colorful and precious cultural heritage. On May 20, 2006, the State Council included it in the first batch of national intangible cultural heritage lists, and the Mid-Autumn Festival has been listed as a national statutory holiday since 2008.

In fact, the Mid-Autumn Festival became an official national festival in the Tang Dynasty. During the Tang Dynasty, the Mid-Autumn Festival custom was popular in the north of China. The Book of Tang and the Book of Taizong records the "Mid-Autumn Festival on the fifteenth day of August". The mid-autumn festival moon viewing custom was extremely popular in the Chang'an area of the Tang Dynasty, and many poets have verses of Yongyue in their famous passages, and combine the Mid-Autumn Festival with myths and stories such as Chang'e Running Moon, Wu Gang Fa Gui, Jade Rabbit Pounding Medicine, Yang Guifei Changing Moon God, Tang Ming Emperor Youyue Palace, etc., making it full of romantic colors, playing with the wind of the moon. The Tang Dynasty was an important period for the integration and stereotyping of traditional festivals and customs, and its main part has been passed down to this day.

2 Every Mid-Autumn Festival, Lanzhou people worship the moon and eat moon cakes

"Every Mid-Autumn Festival, Lanzhou city is full of melons and fruits, and in the early years, Lanzhou people also had many customs such as worshiping the moon and eating moon cakes." Deng Ming told reporters: "Since the Ming and Qing dynasties, on the night of August 15 in Lanzhou, even the daughter-in-law who returned to her mother's house had to rush back to her husband's house and reunite the whole family. In the courtyard, there are moon cakes, watermelons, drunken melons, crispy pears, purple olives, grapes, red dates, red emerald and golden yellow, and the fragrance is full of fragrance. Large late-ripening watermelons are cut into serrated halves that mesh each other and buckle into a whole melon to enhance the beauty and show the skill. Pregnant women count the number of jagged teeth to account for the number of ト: odd numbers give birth to males, even numbers give birth to females. ”

"When the moon rises, people will burn incense, burn paper, and bow their heads, praying to the Emperor of the Yin Dynasty to bless the whole family with peace and a good harvest." He said: "Watching the clouds chase the moon, my grandparents would teach my grandchildren to read the nursery rhyme: 'The moon is bright, and the cat jumps on the tank.'" A piece of meat on the tank, the cat eats it without coughing. 'When the moon is empty and the moonlight is like water in the childish nursery rhymes, the whole family will share the melon and fruit mooncakes and share the joy of the world. ”

"There are also baked mooncakes sold in various stores, filled with osmanthus flowers, bean paste, rock sugar and so on." During the conversation, Deng Ming's thoughts seemed to return to that long time: "Old Lanzhou people have to make their own mooncakes, there are two kinds of searing and steaming: one is the hair oil pot helmet made of searing, and the filling is rose, rock sugar, walnut kernel, red and green silk, crisp and chewy, sweet but not greasy; If you don't put the filling, you mix it with bitter bean powder, which is fragrant and chewy. The appearance should also be tweezered into a full laurel tree or tai chi diagram, which is simple and generous. ”

"There are also dead-faced oil pot helmets, mostly rabbits, dolls, teapots, gourds and other shapes." Speaking of this, he also drew the size and shape of this early Mid-Autumn Festival delicacy with his hands, as if he had smelled the seductive aroma: "The steamed mooncake is also called a mille-feuille cake, which kneads the hair noodles of shihao alkali, rolls it into a cake shape, smears it with clear oil, a layer of turmeric, a layer of red yeast, a layer of bitter bean powder, layers of thick bun shape, the top of the dragon, its section is colorful, gorgeous and lovely." ”

3 Early years of the Salt Farm Fort family "moon dedication"

"In fact, this is the inheritance of a closed farming culture and custom, with the accumulation of Guaguocheng culture, with the joy of celebrating the autumn harvest, containing the belief of reunion, and exuding the consciousness of rewarding the gods." Deng Ming said with emotion: "Relatives and friends and neighbors give each other mooncakes to promote family affection and good neighborliness." Fast forward to the 1980s and 1990s, and after solving the problem of food and clothing, Lanzhou people, like the people of the whole country, began to pursue higher material and spiritual enjoyment. ”

"Reflected in the customs of the Mid-Autumn Festival, the old habit of burning incense and prostrating oneself to the moon has been abolished, and the fine tradition of expounding the folk beliefs of Chinese reunion has been inherited." He said: "After a sumptuous dinner, the whole family tasted a variety of high-grade mooncakes and famous melons and fruits, watched the Mid-Autumn Festival literary and art evening on tv stations, enjoyed the full moon of 'toad light flying on a round', missed relatives and friends who worked and studied in other places, missed compatriots in Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan, and hoped that the motherland would complete the great cause of reunification at an early date." This is a progressive spirit of the times, and it is also a change in lanzhou people's view of festivals. ”

Mr. Yang Hengzhen, an 80-year-old Yanchang Fort man, once recalled to Deng Ming the customs of the Mid-Autumn Festival in the Yanchang Fort area: "The people of the Mid-Autumn Festival Fort make mooncakes. Mooncakes come in a mille-feuille mold steamed from the noodles, and there are also pan helmets made of oil. There are three kinds of oil pot helmets: that is, oil pot helmets with bitter bean flour; Oil pot helmet with sugar filling; Teapot, rabbit, pig, sheep-shaped oil pot helmet for children. When the full moon rises in the east, tables are set up in the courtyard to offer moon cakes and melon fruits, incense candles are lit, paper watches are burned, and the whole family worships, called 'moon sacrifice'. ”

4 Eat mooncakes Play with flower lanterns and enjoy osmanthus flowers

Moon worship is a very old custom in China, and it is actually a kind of worship activity of the "moon god" by the ancients in some parts of china in ancient times. Therefore, since ancient times, there have been folk customs such as moon sacrifice, moon viewing, eating moon cakes, playing with flower lanterns, viewing osmanthus flowers, drinking osmanthus wine, etc., which have been passed down to this day and have lasted for a long time.

It is understood that in ancient times there was a custom of "autumn twilight moon". The sunset moon is the worship of the moon god. Under the moon, the "Luna" tablet is placed in the direction of the moon, the red candle is lit, and the whole family worships the moon in turn and prays for blessings. The moon festival and the moon commemoration express people's good wishes. As one of the important rituals of the Mid-Autumn Festival, the moon festival has continued from ancient times to the present, and has gradually evolved into a folk moon appreciation and moon song activity, and has also become the main form of modern people's desire for reunion and good wishes for life.

There are also many game activities in the Mid-Autumn Festival, the first thing to mention is to play with flower lanterns. As early as the Northern Song Dynasty's "Wulin Past Events", it was recorded that there was an activity of putting "a little red" lamp into the river to drift and play. Mid-Autumn Festival play flower lanterns, mostly concentrated in the south. For example, at the Foshan Autumn Color Festival, there are all kinds of colorful lights: sesame lamps, eggshell lamps, shaving lamps, straw lamps, fish scale lamps, chaff lamps, melon seed lamps and birds, animals, flowers and tree lamps, which are amazing.

mid-autumn festival

With the heat receding and the sky high, people will usher in the Autumn Festival of China's four traditional festivals on the 21st. The Mid-Autumn Festival, also known as the Festival of the Moon Festival, the Birth of the Moon, the Moon Festival, the Autumn Festival, the Mid-Autumn Festival, the Moon Worship Festival, the Moon Festival, the Reunion Festival, etc., is a traditional festival of Chinese folk, and is known as the four traditional festivals of China together with the Spring Festival, Qingming Festival and Dragon Boat Festival. Recently, Deng Ming, a librarian of the Gansu Provincial Museum of Culture and History and an expert in history, was interviewed by reporters and shared the history of the Mid-Autumn Festival and the wonderful folk stories related to the local area.

Chief Planner An Xirong

Li Chao, chief reporter of Lanzhou Daily