"Spring Festival in Beijing" Lao She by Dawu Painting Comic Strip Publishing House
Chinese New Year's Eve have a reunion dinner in Dawu Painting
Gum tooth dumplings - a good wish for longevity. Xiao Fang provides
Guizhou Spring Festival Xiao Fang provides
Fu Hu Cheng Jianli paper-cut works
Tu Su wine profile picture
Editor's Note
In the sound of firecrackers, the spring breeze sends warmth into Tu Su.
Thousands of households always exchange new peaches for old charms.
The Song Dynasty poet Wang Anshi's poem "Yuan Day" describes the scene of the Spring Festival in addition to the new year: lighting firecrackers, drinking Tusu wine, changing new peach charms, showing the joyful atmosphere and folk life of the New Year.
On the occasion of the New Year of the Tiger in 2022, Guangming Yue Reading specially invited Xiao Fang, a professor of folklore at Beijing Normal University, to talk about the New Year's festival items that everyone is familiar with or not familiar with: gum tooth dumplings, New Year wine and Chinese New Year's Eve rice. And with all the readers, gently open the literature of life at the age, understand the unique age system of the Chinese, and feel the rich atmosphere of the ancestors' life at the age.
Celebrating the New Year and welcoming the New Year, the New Year allows us to enter a special ceremonial time and space. The abundance of life, the harmony of human feelings and the flow of thrift, warm the hearts of Chinese, meet the ideals of life Chinese, and are full of expectations for the smoothness of future life.
Festivals are the flowers of life, festivals are people's perception of the time node of the season, and it is an important time for people to coordinate with the phenology of heaven and earth. The New Year is at the junction of the time to resign the old and welcome the new, and people will accumulate the love and things of the year to this highlight moment to celebrate the New Year, which has become the warmest time Chinese since Zhou Qin.
A documentary record of life at the age of one
Chinese's perception of time, like people in other countries in the world, has undergone the transformation of natural time into social time, but China is a country with a long agricultural tradition, relying on agricultural life based on natural conditions, so that the concept of time Chinese, has a strong natural characteristics, and the feeling of seasonal age is particularly strong. Chinese has a unique system of years, and the basic structure of the years is to correspond to the seasonal life of the four seasons of the year. Chinese attaches great importance to the recording and preservation of life at the age, and invented the form of documentary records of life in the years very early, and formed a unique tradition of "chronicles".
Since the Southern Dynasty Liang Ren Zongyi wrote the "Jingchu Chronicle" and created the style of writing the chronicle of the year, a series of "Chronicles of the Ages" have appeared in Chinese history. At the end of the Tang Dynasty, Han E's "Nian Hua Ji Li", the Northern Song Dynasty Lü Yuanming's "Miscellaneous Records of the Years", the Southern Song Dynasty Meng Yuanlao's "Tokyo Dream Hualu", Yuan Fei's "Years of Hua Ji Li", Ming Lu Qihong's "Beijing Chronicles", Qing Pan Rong's "Emperor Jing Shi Ji Sheng", Gu Lu's "Qing Jia Lu", Pan Zongding's "Jinling Chronicles", etc., the influence of the "Chronicles of the Ages" even extended as far as East Asia, and the "Chronicles of the Eastern Kingdom" and "The Chronicles of the Japanese Chronicles" appeared. As long as we gently open the "Chronicle of the Ages" literature, the rich breath of life of the ancestors will come to the fore. In traditional Chinese time and life, people attach importance to the four hours and eight festivals, especially in the four hours and eight festivals.
New Year, welcome the New Year, the New Year let us enter a special ceremonial time and space, the original cold winter life, because our New Year's Festival arrived, and suddenly turned into a glittering world of life, the abundance of life, the harmony of human feelings and the flow of festivals, warming the hearts of Chinese, satisfying the ideals of Chinese life, but also full of expectations for the smoothness of future life.
II. Specific traditions of the New Year's diet
The first new year is the starting point of the new annual cycle, and the New Year's diet has a special symbolic meaning. As early as the end of the year and the beginning of the year of the Book of Poetry, people gathered in the public hall and "called him a man of honor, and his life is boundless." Jin Ren Cheng Gongzi An's "Jiao Hua Ming" also said: "Zhao Wei Year First, Moon Zheng Yuan Day, Wei Wei Zhen, Eliminate Hundred Diseases". The intrinsic value of the first year diet is to do a good job in the maintenance of the body and the pacification of the mind at the time node of the alternation of the old and the new, and to determine the expectation of the unknowable future, which is the spiritual motivation for the Chinese to pay special attention to the New Year's diet since ancient times. The Yuan-day diet recorded in the Jingchu Chronicle is extraordinary, with pepper liquor, peach soup, Tusu wine, gum tooth dumplings, five spice plates, shi Yu San, but ghost pills and chickens, all of which have symbolic significance. This is the era of the prosperity of Taoism, and the concept of food cultivation is embodied in the New Year's diet festival. Of course, such food concepts and dietary contents constitute a specific tradition of Chinese New Year's diet, and we often read about such New Year foods in the annals and poems of the past dynasties. Here we mainly talk about the New Year's festival items that everyone is familiar with or are not familiar with: gum teeth, New Year wine and Chinese New Year's Eve rice.
Gum gum tooth for solid tooth regimen with sweet will of stove sugar
Gum tooth dumplings are later stove sugar, it is a sugar made of grain, with stickiness, the Six Dynasties people used it as a special food for practicing teeth and solid teeth in the New Year, folk belief, "those who glue teeth, cover so that their glue does not move" ("JingChu Chronicles"). The ancients understood the significance of strong teeth for good health. Among the festival rewards of the Tang Dynasty, there are still rubber teeth. Bai Juyi said in "Yuan Ri To Wine": "Three glasses of blue tail wine, a plate of gum tooth dumplings"; another poem in "Nian Ri Family Feast Shows Brothers and Nephews and Presents Zhang Shi Yu Yin Judge": "After the year, push the blue tail wine, and the spring plate first persuades the glue tooth dumplings." In the Song Dynasty, there was a similar custom in Nian Dan, and Hong Mai said after quoting the poetic allusions of the gum tooth dumpling: "With the glue tooth, the custom is also to chew amber dumplings in the year dan to test the firmness of the teeth" (see "Rong Zhai Four Strokes"). The popular northern saying "good teeth, good body" is the best explanation for this traditional New Year's custom.
In the Ming Dynasty, rubber tooth dumplings have been combined into the customs of sacrificial stoves, rubber tooth dumplings are no longer the food of the old dan solid teeth, people use rubber tooth dumplings, that is, maltose to sacrifice stoves, "there are gluttons on the plate as grease, may the mouth of the gods be as sweet as food" (Chen Zhaofu's "Sacrifice Stove Line"). Legend has it that the god of Vesta is sacrificed with highly sticky gum teeth, so that the god of Vesta, who reports to the heavens once a year, either cannot open his mouth or his tongue is sweet as food. The New Year's gum tooth dumplings have also been transformed into old stove candy, which was originally a sweet offering for solid teeth training into a blessing for the world. During the Republic of China, Lu Xun once wrote "Gengzi Sending Stoves to Things", "Only chicken gum candy, canonical clothes for petal incense." If there is no long thing in the house, there will be few yellow sheep." Mr. Lu Xun, who is proficient in ancient meaning, has a clear understanding of the past and present lives of stove sugar. Of course, people taste this ancient sugar delicacy that has spanned thousands of years in the name of the sacrificial stove, which is also a blessing. From the nursery rhyme "New Year's Day, Sugar Melon Festival Stove" popular in the northern region, we tasted the children's eagerness to taste the sugar melon of the matsuri stove.
New Year wine to ward off the epidemic and pray for blessings
New Year wine. Wine is an important drink in the New Year's ceremony, and the worship of gods, the celebration of the acacia, the removal of plague, the blessing and the celebration of blessings are all mediumd by wine. The wine has been for thousands of years, the wine has been continuous, and the wine has a profound feeling. The New Year is close to Lichun, the New Year festival is full of spring, and the New Year's wine is also called spring wine, "Poetry Sutra , Fengfeng • July": "October gets rice, for this spring wine, to introduce eyebrows." Tang Lu Zhaolin's poem said: "People sing small wine, flowers dance Tang Dynasty Spring." "This kind of spring wine for blessing and longevity also had a specific name in the Han and Tang Dynasties, which was called pepper cypress wine or pepper wine in the Han Dynasty, and the wine was made of pepper flowers and cypress leaves to ward off evil spirits and health care." Zhengdan to dispel evil wine, New Year's long life cup. The cypress leaves follow the inscription, and the pepper flowers come one by one." Yu Xin poetry is exactly the first New Year wine of the Han and Wei Dynasties, and praying for life and blessing with New Year Spring Wine is a folk tradition since the Zhou Qin. During the Tang and Song dynasties, Tusu wine was popular in the New Year. According to the "Year Hua Jili" record, Tu Su wine got its name from the legend, it is said that Tu Su is the name of the grass temple, some people live in the grass temple, he gives a medicine to the nearby residents every night, let people use cloth sac to soak in the well, the first day to take well water in the wine vessel, for the family to drink, in order to "not be sick plague". Later generations knew the recipe of this medicinal liquor, but they did not know the name of this person, so it was called Tu Su wine. Some people also explain the name of Tu Su wine, saying that the word "Tu Su" means: slaughter ghosts and evil spirits, and awaken people's souls. In the Song Dynasty, Yuan Ri still drank Tu Su, and Wang Anshi's poem "Spring Breeze Sends Warmth into Tu Su" tells the relationship between New Year wine and spring. After the Song Dynasty, Tu Su wine gradually faded out of the New Year festival, and the Ming Dynasty New Year wine has been called Spring Wine. The last time I was a visiting scholar in Japan, on new Year's Day of the Gregorian calendar, a university colleague gave me a post of Tu Su San and a bottle of sake, and I knew that this ancient custom still existed in Japan. In any case, the Spring Wine of the New Year is a good wine to dispel the epidemic and pray for blessings and call for spring.
Ancient New Year drinking, there is a special way, drinking from the young people. This can be called a miracle in ancient times, where respect for the elderly was regarded as a social ethic. Why is this so, we see the ancients explained that "the first to drink in the first month of the month is small, and the small one is old, and the wine is congratulated first." The old man lost his age, so after with wine. (Dong Xun is quoted in the "Jingchu Chronicle") that is to say, when the New Year arrives, the small one should be one year older, which is worth celebrating; the elderly are dying for another year, so they do not celebrate. This New Year's drinking custom that arose from the Han Dynasty was still there during the Tang and Song dynasties, some of them were confident and young, "knowing that their age should be less, they first tu su would not let the spring" (Pei Yizhi), and some of them felt old and open-mindedly "tu su let the teenagers" (Gu Situation). The song dynasty talented but ill-fated Su Dongpo Chinese New Year's Eve is still on the road, staying outside Changzhou at night, feeling sad and desolate, but still firm, "but the poor and worried, do not quit the last drink Tu Su." Hong Mai, a native of Poyang, said: "This person drinks Tu Su on the first day of the new year, and has been with him for a long time since he was a child, but he has an inherent place" (Rong Zhai Essay Continuation). The wine of the New Year is the wine of hope, the blessing of youth, "praise only the sense, celebrate in the children", we see children celebrate the New Year, there is a reason for it. Since the Ming and Qing dynasties, New Year's drinking has become a way of social and life entertainment, and the Republic of China's "Jinling Chronicle": "The New Year invites guests to drink, called drinking spring wine, which is flourished before the first half of the first month." Contemporary people new year, wine is still an indispensable drink, but most of them drink red wine to add to the festive atmosphere. New Year's Day wine can be there, but there is no need to climb the name, there is it, he rejoices, without it, a cup of tea, but also sobering.
Three Chinese New Year's Eve rice full of warm happiness
Home is the warmest place and the safest haven. The New Year is a huge magnet, people who are wandering away, "have money and no money, go home for the New Year" and "don't rush for a year, catch up Chinese New Year's Eve late". The New Year is a grand festival for family reunions, and the Chinese New Year's Eve meal is a reunion communion to bid farewell to the old and welcome the new. In traditional societies where supplies are scarce, Chinese New Year's Eve meal is the most sumptuous dinner of the year. It is also the most ritualistic and symbolic dinner.
Chinese New Year's Eve rice, also known as New Year's Soup Rice, New Year's Meal, Year's Feast, Tuan New Year Meal, etc. During the Ming and Qing dynasties, "family gathering" was called "year of division" or "year of the regiment". Traditional Chinese New Year's Eve rice, food dishes full of meaning. In the northern region, dumplings are wrapped and boiled for the New Year, and some dumplings are also put with coins and candy, and whoever eats it will get the New Year auspicious rui. The shape of the dumplings, similar to the yuanbao, the white-faced dumplings with large fillings mean abundance and happiness. Chinese New Year's Eve in southern China have two dishes on the table, one is a fish with a complete head and tail, symbolizing "more than one year". In the old days, it was not easy for poor people in mountainous areas to get a fish for the New Year, and in some places they had to use a carved wooden fish instead. Now someone has invented the New Year fish dish, which is the glutinous rice as the raw material of the rice. The fish is not only vivid, but also sweet in taste. The second is the ball, commonly known as the round son in the south, symbolizing the reunion.
Some dishes are very ordinary, but very special, such as purslane, which appeared in the Kaifeng New Year recipes in the Song Dynasty, and we see in the "Tokyo Dream Record" that there is a horsetooth dish (that is, purslane). In the contemporary Yingshan, Hubei Province, there is a dish of purslane on the New Year table, and the family, young and old, must taste it, and it is said that if you taste the dish, you will be happy for a year. Folklore calls purslane as "five elements of grass" and "longevity dish", which has a high vitamin content and has the effect of clearing heat and detoxification. According to medical experts, it has a strong inhibitory effect on dysentery bacillus, E. coli, Staphylococcus aureus, etc., and is known as a "natural antibiotic". Our ancestors recognized the extraordinary medicinal properties of plants such as purslane, so they formed a festival of eating it at the beginning of the year in order to pray for the New Year's Anji. This empirical therapeutic diet is quite expressed in seasonal food, and in the old days, Beijingers must have water chestnuts in their Chinese New Year's Eve meals, and the harmonic sound "Bi Qi" said that the family must be reunited when eating Chinese New Year's Eve meals. In fact, water chestnut also has the effect of clearing heat and detoxification, and is also the first dish to prevent diseases.
The "Chronicle of the Jinling Dynasty" records the "Ten Scenic Dishes" Chinese New Year's Eve by the people of Nanjing, and people use soy sauce ginger, melon, carrots, golden needle vegetables, fungus, winter shoots, white parsley, dried soy sauce, 100 pages, gluten ten kinds, finely cut into silk, fried in oil, called "Ten Scenes". There are also ruyi dishes made of soybean sprouts, etc., all of which take their auspicious meaning. Suzhou people Chinese New Year's Eve rice, commonly known as "family fun". There are also comfort dishes in the dishes of Chinese New Year's Eve, but it is made with dried tomatoes mixed with other fruits and vegetables. People eat Chinese New Year's Eve meals, and they must taste this first in order to seek good fortune. Zhou Zongtai's "Gusu Bamboo Branch Words" Yun: "Wife and child are reunited in a room, fish, flesh, melon and eggplant mixed fruit plate." Xia Zhen frequently teaches listening to proverbs, and families are happy at home. (Qing Jia Lu, vol. 12) Simple home-cooked side dishes, because of their meaning and function, have become indispensable dishes in the Chinese New Year's Eve meal. It embodies the wisdom of Chinese frugality and hygiene.
Chinese New Year's Eve meal is a concentrated expression of family affection and wishes, and many foods are specially made for the New Year, which has symbolic significance. In southern Fujian, some dishes are indispensable and indispensable: leeks are new things to taste in the new spring, and they are also the new offerings of the gods in early spring. Future generations attach importance to the harmonic sounds of "leek" and "long", which means long life. The family sits around the table with the stove, the elders take the lead in eating a handful of leeks first, and the whole family follows the move to eat the leeks, while tasting the delicacies, while blessing each other, happy and harmonious. This is about a modern version of the scene of "sacrificing the leek at the end of the ancient years" in the Book of Poetry, Feng Feng, and July. After the meal, some desserts mean that life is sweet; eat some citrus, which means auspicious; nibble some sugar cane, which means sweet and sweet, step by step.
Chinese's Chinese New Year's Eve meal is a family reunion dinner. The most sumptuous dinner of the year is the dinner of man and God. All the relatives who have passed away have been greeted and invited back by their masters. It was only after the ancestors had eaten the Chinese New Year's Eve that people began to enjoy it. This is about the practice of life cultivated Chinese sense of history and ethics.
(Author: Xiao Fang, Professor, Department of Anthropology and Folklore, Chinese Academy of Social Management/School of Sociology, Beijing Normal University)
Source: Guangming Daily