The difference between New Year's Eve and Spring Festival. Both New Year's Eve and Spring Festival are part of Spring Festival.

Which day is the Chinese New Year: New Year’s Eve or the Spring Festival? What is the difference between New Year’s Eve and the Spring Festival? Next, please read the relevant content about New Year’s Eve and the Spring Festival.

The difference between New Year's Eve and Spring Festival

About time

New Year's Eve is one of the most important traditional Chinese festivals. It refers to the last night of the lunar year, that is, the night before the Spring Festival. Because it often falls on the 30th or 29th day of the twelfth lunar month in the lunar calendar, it is also called New Year's Eve. The traditional Spring Festival refers to the period from the La Festival on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month or the Kitchen God Festival on the twenty-third or twenty-fourth day of the twelfth lunar month to the fifteenth day of the first lunar month. The specific Spring Festival generally refers to the first day of the Lunar New Year.

About the name

The "chu" in New Year's Eve is a loanword of "tu", which means "dirty", "ghost plague", and "unlucky". The "夕" in New Year's Eve originally meant "sunset", which was extended to mean "night". Therefore, New Year’s Eve means “sending off the old year and ushering in a new year tomorrow”, that is, “sending out the old and starting a new year”. New Year’s Eve is the most important part of the Spring Festival and the climax of the entire Chinese New Year celebrations.

About the meaning

According to folklorists, the first explanation of New Year's Eve is its calendar meaning, that is, New Year's Eve is the last night of the year; the second meaning is religious worship, that is, New Year's Eve is the night to get rid of bad things. The Spring Festival is the beginning of the lunar calendar. Another name for the Spring Festival is Chinese New Year. It is the grandest, most lively and most important ancient traditional festival in China. It is also a festival unique to the Chinese and the most concentrated expression of Chinese civilization.

About the legend

According to legend, in ancient times, there was a terrible monster named Xi, who usually lived in seclusion in the mountains. However, on the 30th day of the twelfth lunar month, he would run out and eat livestock and people in nearby villages. Later, the people could no longer bear it and had to ask the Kitchen God for help. Then the Kitchen God asked the Jade Emperor to send Nian to the mortal world on New Year's Eve. Finally, on the last day of the lunar calendar, Nian and Xi had a fierce battle, and finally Nian drove Xi away. In order to commemorate this event, later generations called the 30th day of the twelfth lunar month "New Year's Eve", which means getting rid of the eve, and the first day of the first lunar month was called "New Year".