There are many festivals in China, and what to eat at each festival is very particular, what to eat during the Chongyang Festival? Recently, I saw the Qing Dynasty Painting Academy's "December Moon Lingtu September", at the top of the series of pictures depicting Chongyang activities, several people carrying chrysanthemum wine and Chongyang cake and other delicacies, climbing on the rock platform suspended in the air, indicating that Chongyang cake, as a symbol of Chongyang, has become the core food of climbing high and looking far away.
Chongyang is an ancient festival in mainland China, popular among the people such as climbing, chrysanthemum appreciation, and dogwood cutting. Among them, ascending is the highlight of the Chongyang Festival, so the Chongyang Festival is also called the "Ascending Festival". Chongyang climbing mainly includes mountaineering, towering, building, pavilion, stage, etc. The custom of ascending can be traced back to the Han Dynasty, and Liu Xin's "Miscellaneous Records of Xijing" of the Western Han Dynasty recorded: "On the summit in March, Chongyang in September, the game of the warriors and women, and then ascend to the heights." It can be seen that the ascent custom of the Chongyang Festival has been formed in the Western Han Dynasty. As for why Chongyang ascended to the height, according to the record in Liang Ren Wu Jun's "Continued Qi Harmony": "Ru Nan Huanjing traveled with Fei Changfang for many years, and Changfang said: 'On September 9, when there is a disaster in the Ru family, it is advisable to go urgently, let the family make a sac, put Dogwood tied to his arms, climb high, and drink chrysanthemum wine, this calamity can be eliminated. 'Jing Ruyan, Qi family climbing the mountain. At night, when he saw the chickens, dogs, cows and sheep, he died violently for a while, and Changfang heard about it: 'This can be substituted. 'Now the world rises and drinks in September, and women wear dogwood sacs, and the cover begins here. Although this statement is superstitious, its story may be just a legend, but the meaning of Chongyang's ascension to "ward off evil spirits and pray for blessings, eliminate disasters and seek peace" has been handed down. As explained by the Song Ren Fang Spoon: "Nine nine poles of yang, the yang pole turns yin, and ascending is to adjust yin to yang." "The ancients classified all things in heaven and earth into two categories, yin representing darkness, and yang representing light and vitality. Odd numbers are yang, even numbers are yin, the first nine of September, the sun and the moon are on the ninth day, and the two yang are heavy, on this day of heavy yang, the ancients climbed high and yin and yang, defended against all diseases, and gradually became a custom. From this, the traditional custom of eating Chongyang cake was also derived. Chongyang ascends high, "cake" and "high" are the same sound, and there is also the auspicious meaning of rising step by step and being high in everything, so on this day the people eat "cake" to climb high. Also due to the restrictions of urban landscape, especially in some northern areas, if you want to climb high to avoid disasters or have nowhere to collect dogwood, they use food cakes instead of climbing (cakes), and paper flags instead of dogwood, the intention is still to avoid disasters.
Tracing the history of Chongyang cake, as early as the "Xijing Miscellaneous" also recorded, "On the ninth day of September, Pei Zhu, eating bait, drinking chrysanthemum wine, makes people live a long life." "What is bait? Bait is a kind of pastry, pong is a kind of millet rice, and pontoon bait is the Chongyang cake eaten during the Chongyang Festival. Chongyang cake is popular among the people, it should be said that it began in the Tang Dynasty, according to the "Tang Six Classics" and Tang "Recipes" and other books, the Tang Dynasty Chongyang Festival has Ma Ge cake, rice brocade cake and chrysanthemum cake, "Wenchang Miscellaneous" also said: "Tang season objects, September 9 there is dogwood wine, chrysanthemum cake." This can also be quoted in the Tang Dynasty poet Liu Yuxi's "inscribed cake" allusion, according to the "Records of the Shaw Family After Hearing the Record", when Liu Yuxi wrote the poem "Nine Days of Ascension", he wanted to use the phrase "the cake place on the year and year", which was absent in the "Five Classics", and had to be written as "every year on the high place". Later, he was joked by the Song Dynasty lyricist Song Qi: "Liu Lang does not dare to inscribe cake characters, and he is a generation of heroes in the poem." ”
In the Song Dynasty, with the popularity of Chongyang Festival customs, eating cakes evolved into Chongyang's exclusive food. The Southern Song Dynasty Zhoumi recorded in "Old Events of Wulin": "The people of the capital drink new wine in the month, pan with chrysanthemums, and each with chrysanthemum cakes as feeders, mixed with sugar and meat straw noodles, and duck cakes with shredded meat, decorated with grenades, marked with colorful flags." and as a barbarian king lion on top, and chyme chestnuts as crumbs, combined with honey, printed and stripped cakes, as bait. It is also known as Suzi micro-stained plum brine, miscellaneous and cane frost orange jade grenade, known as 'Chunlan Qiu Ju'. "It can be seen that the Song people make Chongyang cakes in a variety of ways. Wu Zimu's "Mengli Record" volume 5 records the custom of Lin'an (present-day Hangzhou): "On this day, the capital shop steamed cakes with sugar noodles... Planted a small bunting, named 'Chongyang Cake'. This flag symbolizes the leading army, planted on the cake, known as the "Chongyang Flag", which means that people who eat Chongyang cake represent climbing the mountain. Later generations have another interpretation in the "Records of the Jinling Dynasty", the Chongyang flag is patterned with five-color paper wisps, and the word "ling" is embedded in it, which originally refers to the royal order flag, eating Chongyang cakes, inserting the ling flag into the lintel, or erecting the middle of the courtyard, which is called celebrating Chongyang and warding off evil spirits and praying for blessings. And this Chongyang cake decorates animals, and there are a variety of mascots. Southern Dynasty Liang Zongwei's "Records of the Year" Yun: Chang'an "On the ninth day of September, the people steamed cakes with flour noodles, placed several deer on top, and ate Lu cakes. Later, he left the reputation of "Fufeng Deer Cake Beijing Walk". Lu You also mentioned a kind of "colorful cat cake" in the poem "Nonzi Nine Days Mountain Climbing Drink": "Old Huai feels more amazing festivals, sick bones should be cold and like thin frost." The orange in the jade neck is still green, and the chrysanthemum is early yellow on the colored cat cake. It can be seen that the auspicious expression of the seasoning ornaments of the Song Shi cake is already colorful.
During the Ming and Qing dynasties, this custom became more popular. "Ji Sheng in the Age of the Emperor" contains: "Jingshi Chongyang Festival flower cake is extremely victorious. There are oil candy stove authors, there are steamed noodle fruits, and there are rice and yellow rice mashers, all of which cut five-color flags as a logo. The people of the city compete to buy, provide for the family, give to relatives and friends. "It not only satisfies the desire of the tongue, but also is a good gift for others during the Chongyang Festival." Qingren Yang Jingting described in "Dumen Zaying on Cakes"; "The Mid-Autumn Festival has only passed and Chongyang, and I have seen flower cakes busy everywhere." And with the popularity of folklore, new connotations and meanings are being added. The Chongyang Festival in Old Jinan, Shandong, also known as Women's Day and Daughter's Day, on this day, the married girl wants to go back to her mother's house to eat flower cakes, and the custom of "taking cakes" is also practiced on the same day. Ming Zhuo Zhao Zhao mentioned in "The Jade Man Trick": "At dawn on September 9, put a piece of cake on my daughter's forehead and wish my daughter a high fortune." In the area of Beijing and Tianjin, according to the 1931 edition of the book "Tianjin Zhiluo of Hebei Province", there are also the following records: "The first nine days of September are the Chongyang Festival, climbing high as the Beidou Meeting, residents eat more mutton hot pot, and eat cakes, cover with wheat flour as cakes, put jujube chestnut candy on top, parents will welcome married women to eat together, so it is also called Daughter's Day." At that time, the Chongyang cakes made by ordinary families will mostly have three layers, two layers above and below, and a layer of chrysanthemums made of yellow flour in between. The rich and noble family should make a nine-layer cake, like a pagoda, with small colored flags and two lambs on the pastry, in line with the meaning of Chongyang (sheep). In the accompanying poem of Shanghai's "Picture Daily", it is said: "Chongyang must eat Chongyang cake, and the slice cake is a wish for Pepsi to be high." This wind does not start today, and the taste of chrysanthemum cake is very satisfying. In the early morning of Chongyang, parents cut Chongyang cakes into thin slices, pasted them on their children's foreheads, and shouted "May the children be tall" three times to wish the children health and smooth growth. This is also the ancient style of Chongyang preserved in Shanghai and Jiangsu and Zhejiang.
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