In Chinese tradition, the day when the month and day are the same is mostly a festival, such as January 1 as New Year's Day, or Yun Spring Festival. March 3 is Shangwei Festival. May 5 is the Dragon Boat Festival. June 6 is called the Feast of Heaven or the Festival of Books. Seven seven beggars. Nine-nine chongyang. Most of these festivals have relatively fixed names, and the festival activities are generally similar from ancient times to the present. But February 2, as a festival in ancient times, the situation is different: it has a variety of names, the content of the festival activities, and there are various differences between different regions and eras.
A pick-and-treat festival or a treadmill festival
Although the current Chinese does not take February 2 as a vegetable picking festival and a green festival, this festival, in the Tang and Song dynasties, was paid considerable attention by people. Bai Juyi has a poetry cloud: "On February 2, the new rain was sunny, and the grass sprouts were new for a while." "The ancients often went to the countryside to pick vegetables on this day. The "Chronicle of the Qin Zhongshi" said: "On February 2, qujiang pickers were extremely popular. "During the Tang Dynasty, not only in the Chang'an area, but also in Chengdu, Sichuan and other places. The Quanshu Yiwenzhi says: "Chengdu takes February 2 as the Festival of Walking Green. "The dishes picked on the second day are generally cabbage, maran head, etc., and there are also home-cooked vegetables. At this time, the vegetables are new, picked to make dishes, tender and delicious.
The wind of picking vegetables was still very popular in the Song Dynasty, and in the poetry of the Song people, there were many people who wrote about picking vegetables on the second day. For example, Zhang Qi once wrote a poem entitled "February 2st Pick Vegetable Festival, Heavy Rain Can't Come Out":
Long will be mustard mustard southern soup,
The festival mud is deep and people are not doing it.
I want to see the vegetables in the old garden,
A spring water rumbles.
The custom of picking vegetables on February 2 is basically a fun nature. During the Song Dynasty, it once affected the court. Naturally, people in the palace do not go to the countryside or the garden to pick vegetables, so there is a special activity in the palace to pick vegetables. The Southern Song Dynasty's elaborate "Past Affairs of Wulin" talked about the palace's actions on this day: "On the second day, the palace held a royal banquet to pick vegetables. First, the inner garden prepares vermilion flowers, and the lower volume is made of Luo Shuai, and the books are listed on the top, tied with red silk, and planted with lettuce and flowers. Feast and rejoice, from the nave to the second, each with a gold grate. Such "picking dishes" can naturally only be unique to the palace.
2. Dragon Head Festival or Green Dragon Festival and Spring Dragon Festival
February 2, as a traditional festival such as "Dragon Head Festival" and "Green Dragon Festival", its impact is much greater than that of "Picking Vegetables". The "spring equinox" of the agricultural season is generally around the second day of the second month of the lunar calendar, when the cold winter has gone, the earth has recovered, and the sky is often thunderous in spring, and spring rains are one after another. According to the opinion of the people, the dragon is the one who manages the rainwater, so people imagine that the dragon of the winter sting should rise up and carry out activities on this day.
The Qing Dynasty Fu Cha Dun Chong's "Records of the Yanjing Years" said: "February 2,...... Nowadays, people call the dragon head up, which is called dragon scale cake by the eclipse cake, and the noodle eater is called the dragon whisker noodle. Stop the needle and thread in the boudoir, afraid of hurting the dragon eye also. ”
There are many folk customs that are popular on this day. In some places in Jiangsu, Shandong, on February 2, the daughters who get married have to return to their mother's home. Jiangsu proverb: "On the second of February, the dragon looked up, and the family took over the daughter to break the revenge." Funing's folk proverb is even more interesting: "On the second of February, the dragon looks up, and the family waits for the live monkey." There are steamed buns, food steamed buns, no steamed buns, and smack the old mother's head. The living monkey refers to the girl, and someone explained the reason for the formation of this custom: "Funing customs, the first month of the old calendar, the in-laws do not allow the daughter-in-law to return to the mother's house." But the nature of mother and daughter, mother loves daughter, often New Year's food, always have to keep the money for the woman, so the first month of the first month, to February 2, no matter who the family, to pick up the girl to return to Ningya. (National Customs of China)
The Dragon Head Festival is associated with dragons, so some places hold the form of dragon gods on this day. For example, in the Shouchun area of Anhui Province, on February 2, the folk often burn incense on the banks of the river to sacrifice dragons. Farmers also often pre-empt the news of this year's drought and flood according to the sunny rain on the second day.
In the Qishan folk of Shaanxi Province, on the morning of the second day, people sprinkled ash around the house, which was called "encircling the dragon". Some other places in Shaanxi also have this custom, some do not call it "Weilong" but "Weilong", and "Centipede" is a centipede.
In rural Shandong, there is a "warehouse filling" activity. Warehouse filling activities are also inseparable from furnace ash. For example, in Mencius's hometown of Zou County, on the second day, people drew a granary figure with ash on the ground, and then filled the barn map with grains, and then pressed stones on the small amount of grain, which is "filling the warehouse". The "open hoarding" in Funing, Jiangsu Province, and the "filling in the warehouse" in Zou County are similar. The psychological motivation of this "warehouse filling" activity is to pray for a good harvest. Folk proverb cloud: "On the second of February, the dragon looks up, the big warehouse is full, and the small warehouse flows." "As I said before, on the second day of February, around the spring equinox, the middle of winter has passed, the spring has returned, and people are going to the countryside again to engage in agricultural labor." Of course, it is understandable that activities such as "open hoarding" and "filling warehouses" are held in such a season.
On February 2, Shandong Gaotang also has a strange custom, called "eating scorpion poison", the scorpion is a spider genus, three inches long, blue and black, the whole body is linked, the tail end is poisonous hook, can inject poisonous juice. The people of Gaotang soaked soybeans in salt water, and after a day and a night, filtered the water to dry and fried them in a pot. It means that the spring thunder will roar, and all the stings will rise, and the scorpion of this sting will also come out of the sting. Therefore, eat soybeans, and call scorpion poison. It is said that if you eat all its poison, you will not be stung by it.
The formation of this custom is probably based on the psychology of hoping to avoid the poison of evil insects when the spring breeze blows and everything rises. Although the activity of "encircling the worm" mentioned above is not much different from Gao Tang's scorpion-eating poison, its original intention of praying to avoid poisonous insects and hoping for the safety and health of the human body is quite similar.
3. The Birthday of the Land God
In ancient times, February 2 was the birthday of the land god, and there were various acts of worship.
In some places in Hubei, on this day, it is always necessary to beat gongs and drums to greet the gods of the land. Every family set up a statue of the land god, worshiped the land god, and held a lively banquet.
Gu Lu's "Qing Jia Lu" of the Qing Dynasty said of the situation in Jiangsu: "On February 2, for the birth of the land, commonly known as the land duke, all large and small officials have their ancestral halls. The government offers sacrifices, and the officials offer incense and fire, and each animal is rewarded with pleasure. The village farmers also have pot pulp from household to wish the gods, commonly known as Tian Gong Tian Po. ”
The official government has set up a land shrine, the officials and children also have to go to the land god, and the village farmers wish the tian gong tian po. It can be seen that in ancient times, people attached great importance to February 2, which is the birthday of the land.
Gu Lu believes that the folk custom of sacrificing the land on February 2 is the ancient social sacrifice. However, the day of the ancient shrine gods, after the Han Dynasty, is generally the fifth day after the establishment of spring. Around the Ming Dynasty, there was a distinction between the official society and the people's society. The official society still worships the god of the land on the day of the society, while the civil society is on the second day of the first month of February. Wu Manyun's "Jiangxiang Festival Words and Small Prefaces" Yun: "Hangzhou customs, two-day fried cake fried beans, to worship the land, that is, the ceremony of the Spring Festival." ”
The food of the sacrificial land varies from place to place, but these things, which everyone eats, are consistent in ancient and modern times. In some places, on February 2, there is a custom of eating cakes, which is about the flow of eating the sacrifices of the land gods. The custom of eating cakes is found in many places. In the Jiangsu area, it is a rice cake with a day, fried in oil, called a waist cake. The Qing people have a poem: "On the second day of February, the spring is rao, and the waist is persuaded to eat flower cakes." Support Chai Mi to rely on physical fitness, and do not regret the work of bones and bones all year round. ”
The purpose of the social sacrifice, according to Zheng Xuan of the Eastern Han Dynasty, was "spring events are prosperous, so the worship is to pray for farmers." "Spring is coming, farming is booming, so the land is sacrificed for a good harvest." "Filial Piety" Yun: "She, the lord of the land also." The land is wide and cannot be sacrificed, so the land is sealed as a society to repay the merits. The author of "Filial Piety" believes that the sacrifice of the land, on the one hand, to pray for a good agricultural harvest, on the other hand, to repay the merits of the land, this is more comprehensive.
The above three festivals, and the customs surrounding them, are only the more important aspects of February 2 as a traditional festival. People in some places have different opinions on February 2, such as the Chenggu area of Shaanxi Province, who used to think that Emperor Wenchang's birthday, the elder and the young must be sacrificed. Shaanxi people also have a custom on this day: people go to the countryside with drums and music in the morning, blowing and beating until they return home in the evening, called "welcoming the rich". In addition, there are a variety of customs that are difficult to describe. February 2, in ancient China, can be said to be a dazzling day. I think it will eventually arouse the strong interest of folklorists.
——This article was published in the "Cultural History Knowledge" column of the 2nd issue of "Knowledge of Literature and History" in 1991
(Co-ordinator: Lu Quan; Editor: Si Qi)