"Twenty-three, the sugar melon is sticky, and the king of the stove will go to heaven."
The Lunar New Year is a very important folk festival on the mainland, and the main event on this day is the festival stove. Such an important small year, in the north and south of China, the days are not the same, the northerners celebrate the small year on the twenty-third day of the lunar month, while the southerners are on the twenty-fourth day of the lunar month, who is authentic?
Turning to the historical documents that record the local customs in the north, you will find that in fact, from the Song Dynasty to the Ming Dynasty, the northerners have always sacrificed the stove on the twenty-fourth day of the 24th lunar month. Until the early Qing Dynasty's "Kangxi Wanping County Chronicle", it was recorded in this way. It was not until Qianlong's later years in the "Examination of the Old Wen of the Sun" that it was said that "its worship period is twenty-three days, but for customers in Southern Province, it is twenty-four days."
It can be seen that the twenty-fourth day of the Waxing Moon is the most traditional seasonal date of the small year. It was not until the middle of the Qing Dynasty that there was a distinction between the north and the south in the days of the small year. As for what makes the date of such an important traditional festival change, it remains to be examined.
The twenty-third year of the lunar month has become a very important ceremony in the court during the Qianlong period. The emperor not only sacrificed the Eastern Kitchen Stove King with a "national ceremony" on this day, but the entire court also began to display lights on this day.
Whenever the Qianlong Emperor sacrificed the stove, he also sang a song "Visiting the Sages" to express his thirst for talents. From this point of view, although the twenty-fourth day of the Waxing Moon is the most traditional, it seems that the twenty-third day of the Waxing Moon cannot be said to be untrue, not only has the blessing of the court with "national ceremonies", but also has a history of more than 300 years in the north.
If we talk about the tradition of the small New Year festival stove, we probably have the sticky sugar melon left now, which is eaten by the north and the south. Don't underestimate this piece of sugar, it has a history of thousands of years. In the "Record of Dreams and Liang", which records the life of the Song Dynasty, it is said: "For twenty-four days, if you are rich or poor, you will prepare vegetables and beans for the stove." On this day, the market and neighbors sell five-colored rice food, flowers and fruits, gum tooth dumplings, and rice beans, and the sound is boiling. The "gum tooth dumplings" here are the kinds of Kanto sugar and Nan sugar that we eat now.
In fact, Xiao Nian eats caramel, that is, in order to control the mouth of the stove king, so that when he reports to the Jade Emperor, he can only sweetly say good things.
In addition to Kanto sugar, is there anything more special to eat? In fact, there is one in history, that is, the yellow sheep. I don't know if you have heard of an old saying, "Marry a wife and be yin lihua", which is the highest expectation of people in the past for their wives, and this yellow sheep terrier happened in her home.
The Book of Later Han once recorded that Yin Lihua's grandfather, Yin Zifang, was cooking one morning in the waxing moon, when he suddenly saw the king of the stove appear, he fell backwards and worshiped, just because there was a yellow sheep in the family, so he supplied this yellow sheep to the king of the stove. Since then, the Yin family has become abruptly rich, and the original text says, "Violent to great wealth, the field has more than seven hundred acres, and the public horse servants are subordinate, compared to the state jun." That is to say, because the yellow sheep were sent to the king of the stove, the Yin family was once rich and could be an enemy of the country. Later, Yin Lihua also became the empress of the Eastern Han Dynasty. At that time, the world imitated the Yin family in order to become rich and noble in the future, and the yellow sheep sacrifice stove gradually became a festival in the small year.
However, later, around the time of the Ming and Qing dynasties, in addition to the royal sacrifice stove, the yellow sheep had disappeared in the folk small New Year festivals. The reason is probably that this custom is more expensive to consume.
The New Year used to be a very important festival, and from this day on, it officially kicked off the prelude to the Spring Festival. Who is the authentic part of the north and south of the small new year's day? It is estimated that everyone is not very concerned now, and folk festival lovers may even change their tastes for two consecutive days. (Author: Yang Yuan, Liu Yanfeng) (Image from Visual China)