Is the Cold Clothes Festival the Lower Yuan Festival? Who is the Cold Clothes Festival commemorating?

The Cold Clothes Festival is a relatively traditional sacrificial festival in China. Since this festival is collectively called the Ghost Festival together with Qingming Festival, Zhongyuan Festival and Shangsi Festival, is the Cold Clothes Festival the Lower Yuan Festival?

Is the Cold Clothes Festival the Lower Yuan Festival?

The Cold Clothes Festival is not the Lower Yuan Festival.

The Cold Clothes Festival, as a traditional sacrificial festival, has been passed down from ancient times. It is one of the four major ghost festivals together with the Tomb-Sweeping Day (April 5th in the Gregorian calendar), the Zhongyuan Festival (July 15th in the lunar calendar), and the Shangsi Festival (March 3rd in the lunar calendar). The Ghost Festival is not as scary and outrageous as it is portrayed in movies and TV dramas. It is just an important traditional sacrificial festival and has nothing to do with superstition. Chinese people attach the most importance to blood ties, and ancestor worship stems from gratitude, remembrance and nostalgia for ancestors. It is a ritual to express family affection. Chinese people have always believed that the souls of their ancestors still exist and influence their descendants. This belief rooted in the heart has fermented for thousands of years and gradually formed ancestor worship.

Who is the Cold Clothes Festival in memory of?

The first day of the tenth month of the lunar calendar every year is my country's traditional festival "Cold Clothes Festival", also known as the "Ancestor Worship Festival". The Cold Clothes Festival is popular in the north. Many northerners will pay homage to their deceased relatives on this day, which is called sending cold clothes.

We all know that this comes from the legend of Meng Jiangnu. The story of Meng Jiangnu crying down the Great Wall is widely circulated. Her lover went on an expedition and was buried in a foreign land. As the cold winter approaches, relatives come to meet in dreams, cut paper clothes and pay tribute to the deceased, hoping that they will no longer suffer from hunger and cold in the cold other world.

When is Cold Clothes Festival in 2021?

The Cold Clothes Festival in 2021 is November 5th.

It is said that the custom of sending winter clothes originated in the Qin Shihuang period. At that time, there was a couple. The husband Fan Xiliang was captured and sent to build the Great Wall in the northern border. His wife Meng Jiangnu traveled thousands of miles to find her husband and send him winter clothes. When she found her husband at the foot of the Great Wall, she learned that he had died and was buried under the city wall. She was so heartbroken that she cried down the Great Wall... This sad love story has been widely circulated for thousands of years.