Are red envelopes also distributed in the Qing Dynasty Imperial Palace during the Spring Festival? What kind of dumplings did the emperor eat in the first day? Is the New Year's Day family banquet full of Han Chinese? What kind of New Year paintings should be hung in the harem? ...... On the afternoon of January 16, 2022, Ren Wanping, vice president of the Palace Museum and a court history expert, brought his new book "Greeting the New Year: Celebrating the New Year in the Forbidden City" to the Dongcheng Cultural Development Research Institute, and she answered these questions for the audience one by one.
This new book is a "New Year's Treasure Book" from the Forbidden City launched by the Palace Publishing House near the 2022 Lunar New Year. Written by Ren Wanping, it brings together hundreds of kinds of "annual custom cultural relics" collected by the Palace Museum, and introduces and displays the most authoritative and systematic around the most traditional festival of the Chinese nation, the Spring Festival.
What kind of New Year paintings need to be hung for the New Year in the harem of the Qing Dynasty? Ren Wanping revealed that he wanted to hang up the palace training map. According to historical records, the Qianlong Emperor of the Qing Dynasty ordered the court painters to draw 12 palace training maps, showing the "Yi Practitioners of the Ancient Concubines", and then had praises for each book, hanging them in the East and West Six Palaces where the concubines lived, in order to educate the concubines to obey the rules in the new year and help the emperor. If according to the theory of modern pedagogy, this is an exemplary model law.
The hanging positions of the Six Palaces of the East and West are, Jingren Palace is "Yanjiao Menglan Tu"; Chengqian Palace is "Xu Fei Zhi Zhi Tu"; Zhong Pu Palace is "Xu Hou Feng Case Map"; Yanxi Palace is "Cao Hou Chongnong Tu"; Yonghe Palace is "Fan Ji Zhi Hunting Map"; Jingyang Palace is "Ma Hou Training Clothing Map"; Yongshou Palace is "Ban Ji Ci Ren Tu", etc.
It is worth mentioning that the Manchus call all pasta dumplings. According to the New Year's Eve of the 48th year of Qianlong, Emperor Yinshi ate boiled dumplings at the Hongde Hall on the east side of the Qianqing Palace, and the eunuchs sent 4 kinds of dumplings, the emperor ate 3, and the other 1 was sent to the Buddhist hall for offering. So what kind of stuffing are the dumplings of the Qianlong Emperor? The archive "Qianlong Emperor's Dynasty Journey" is not recorded. However, there are also records of royal dumplings in the archives of the late Qing Dynasty, such as the emperor eating dumplings in the Yangxin Hall on new Year's Day in the eleventh year of Guangxu, the first time into the pork longevity dish (purslane) twelve, the second time into the pork spinach stuffing twelve.
In the lecture, Ren Wanping also exposed the menu of the New Year's Day family banquet in Qianlong's forty-eighth year. The dishes on the emperor's table are: Lala (yellow rice), bird's nest hanging stove duck, hanging stove meat wild intention hot pot, bird's nest hibiscus duck hot pot, evergreen wine stew duck hot pot, bird's nest apple stew fat chicken, soup duck, Erskesen (fermented) deer tail sauce, chopped pheasant, steamed duck deer tail plate, sheep shaved fork (tail bone), roasted venison, roasted wild boar meat, deer tail, steamed fat chicken, bamboo roll steamed buns, sweet potatoes, rice cakes, side dishes 5, boiled soup dumplings, bird's nest winter shoot duck loin soup. 6 tables of food: 1 kind of sugar, 13 kinds of dumplings, 13 kinds of tits, 2 kinds of dishes, 2 kinds of dishes, 2 tables of 8 kinds of dry and wet snacks, 13 kinds of meat dishes and 2 tables, 2 tables of lamb.
"The dishes on the concubine's table are: Lala, 4 kinds of dishes, 3 kinds of plate meat, 1 kind of meat on the plate, and 2 kinds of side dishes. In addition, after the emperor ate it, he would reward the above dishes to the concubines. Ren Wanping said that just looking at this banquet menu, it is not as varied as the "Manchu Han full table" that is rumored in the outside world.
This lecture is also a reproduction of the exhibition of the same name that has used the most Exhibits of New Year's Festival customs since the establishment of the Palace Museum, and has created an atmosphere of the Entire Area using the Forbidden City. In the lecture, Vice President Ren Wanping made a detailed analysis of the new year's weather of the past royal family for the reader on the hundreds (sets) of New Year's theme rituals and pictures involved in the book, combined with the palace system, and explained the excellent traditional cultural significance contained in the court etiquette and customs in a three-dimensional and vivid way, and how we should inherit and promote it today. The lecture not only incorporates the latest research results of experts from the Palace Museum, but also is a wonderful review of excellent exhibitions in the past.
Text/Beijing Youth Daily reporter Zhang Enjie
Editor/Ying Qiao