Tomb Sweeping Festival

Tomb Sweeping Festival, also known as Qingming Festival, is one of the four Traditional Chinese Festivals together with Spring Festival, Dragon Boat Festival, and Mid-Autumn Festival. Both natural and cultural meanings are contained in the two names. In this festival, people go to tombs to commemorate their family ancestors and pay tribute to deceased relatives; also, “Qingming”, literally “Clear and Bright”, shows the blooming of spring, naturally encouraging people to go spring outing and enjoy the beautiful scenery of the season. Since 20^th May, 2006, the festival was officially included in the representative list of Masterpieces of the Intangible Heritage of Humanity.

For thousands of years, many poems and articles have been created to show the charm of the festival. Du Mu, one of the famous poets in the Tang Dynasty (618-907), once wrote:

“A drizzling rain falls like tears on the mourning day; the mourner's heart is going to break on his way. Where can a wine shop be found to drown my sad hours? A cowherd points to a cot amid apricot flowers.” ( translated by Xu Yuanchong)

Customs

Tomb sweeping

The tradition of tomb sweeping originates from the Qin Dynasty. People worship their ancestors by burning incense and paper money at their ancestors’ grave sites to show their endless nostalgia and respect. However, nowadays, online tomb sweeping (cloud sweeping) has gained increasing popularity considering the pandemic prevention and control.

Spring outing

Despite the fact that people express great sorrow for the deceased, this festival also blends joy and hope for the resurgence of the earth and the revival of the spring. When everything turns green, people go outing and enjoy the warming temperature and feel the spring blossoms.

Food

Qingtuan

Qingtuan or Green rice balls, are made of  glutinous rice mixed with Chinese mugwort or barley grass. This is then usually filled with sweet red or lack bean paste. In south of the Yangtze River, people usually eat this food on Tomb Sweeping Day.

San zi

San zi, also known as fried dough twist, is famous traditional food both in Northern and Southern China. In the former region, the food is often made of wheat and in the latter it is made of rice. San zi is yellow, bright, crispy and light.

References：

China Daily; People’s Daily Online