Dragon Boat Festival and Qu Yuan

Dragon Boat Festival, also known as Duanyang Festival, Double Ninth Festival, Noon Festival, Dragon Boat Festival, Zhengyang Festival, Magnolia Festival and Tianzhong Festival, is a traditional folk festival in China. Dragon Boat Festival originated from the worship of astronomical phenomena and evolved from the ancient dragon totem sacrifice. On the midsummer Dragon Boat Festival, the black dragon rose to the south of the sky for seven nights, which is the day when the dragon ascended to heaven, that is, as the fifth divination in the Book of Changes said, "the dragon is in the sky"; At this time, Longxing is both "middle" and "middle", which is bound to win, and Enshi is also the aspiration of the people. The origin of the Dragon Boat Festival covers the ancient astrological culture, humanistic philosophy and other aspects, and contains profound and rich cultural connotations. The Dragon Boat Festival combines a variety of folk customs in its inheritance and development, and the festival customs are rich in content. Picking dragon boats and eating zongzi are the two major themes of the Dragon Boat Festival, which have been handed down in China since ancient times and have never stopped. [ 1][2][3][4][5]

Dragon Boat Festival, which originated in China, was originally a festival in which ancient ancestors offered sacrifices to their ancestors in the form of dragon boat races. Qu Yuan, a Chu poet in the Warring States Period, committed suicide by throwing himself into the Miluo River during the Dragon Boat Festival, and later took the Dragon Boat Festival as a festival to commemorate Qu Yuan. In some places, there are sayings in memory of Wu Zixu, Cao E and meson tui. Generally speaking, Dragon Boat Festival originated from dragon totem sacrifice. It began on the "bad month and bad day" in the north, injected the seasonal fashion of "getting rid of diseases and preventing epidemic" in summer, and added commemorative contents to commemorate Qu Yuan's suicide by jumping into the river, which finally formed the cultural connotation of today's Dragon Boat Festival. [6][7][8][9]

Dragon Boat Festival, Spring Festival, Tomb-Sweeping Day and Mid-Autumn Festival are also called the four traditional folk festivals in China. Dragon Boat Festival culture has a wide influence in the world, and some countries and regions in the world also have the custom of celebrating Dragon Boat Festival. In May 2006, the State Council listed the Dragon Boat Festival in the first batch of national intangible cultural heritage list; Since 2008, it has been listed as a national statutory holiday. In September, 2009, UNESCO officially approved its inclusion in the representative list of intangible cultural heritage of mankind, and the Dragon Boat Festival became the first festival in China to be selected as a world intangible heritage.