The origin of the Spring Festival couplets for the New Year
According to legend, in the "Classic of Mountains and Seas" in ancient Chinese mythology, there is a world of ghosts, with a mountain in the middle, and there is a big peach tree covering 3,000 miles on the mountain, and there is a golden rooster on the treetop. Whenever the golden rooster crows in the morning, the ghosts that wander out at night will drive back to the ghost realm.
The gate of the ghost domain is located in the northeast of the peach tree, and there are two gods standing by the door, named Shen Tu and Yu Lei. If the ghost did something unreasonable at night, Shen Tu and Yu Lei would immediately find out and catch it, tie it up with a rope made of mango reeds, and send it to feed the tiger. Therefore, the ghosts of the world are afraid of the gods and gloom.
So the Han people carved their appearance with peach wood and put it at the door of their house to ward off evil and prevent harm. Later, people simply carved the names of Shen Tu and Yu Lei on the peach wood board, believing that this could also suppress evil and eliminate evil. This kind of peach plank was later called "peach charm".
In Wang Anshi's poems, there is a sentence "Thousands of households always replace the new peach with the old one". The Spring Festival couplets are really popular among the people, written on red paper, and thus become one of the customs of the year, which is a matter of the Ming Dynasty, and the peach charm was renamed "Spring Festival couplets" at that time.
At the end of the Ming Dynasty and the beginning of the Qing Dynasty, Chen Shanggu's "Hairpin Cloud Building Miscellaneous Sayings" recorded: "The establishment of the Spring Festival couplets began with the Ming Taizu. Jinling, the first capital of the emperor, suddenly passed the decree before Chinese New Year's Eve: A pair of Spring Festival couplets must be added to the door of the Gongqing Shishu's house. After Zhu Yuanzhang promulgated the holy decree, the style of writing Spring Festival couplets and pasting Spring Festival couplets began to become popular among the people, and the custom of pasting Spring Festival couplets has been followed to this day. In short, the Spring Festival couplets sprouted in the pre-Qin and Han dynasties, grew up in the Six Dynasties, and took shape in the Tang and Song dynasties. As for the popular custom, it was after the Ming Dynasty.
Now, when the Lunar New Year arrives, every household will always put on a new Spring Festival couplets when they are cleaning, in addition to using auspicious words to place new expectations for the new year, and hope to usher in good luck.
But do you know that there are taboos for seemingly simple Spring Festival couplets?! If you want everything to go smoothly in the new year, then first familiarize yourself with the taboo of sticking Spring Festival couplets!
Taboo 1: Don't paste the left and right links wrongly
When posting Spring Festival couplets, there are often people who paste the upper and lower couplets in the wrong position, and the Spring Festival couplets have two straight couplets, and the last word of each has a flat, up, go, into and other sound rhymes.
The correct way to paste it is: first distinguish the upper and lower heads of the door. When facing the gate, the right hand side is the upper head, and the left hand side is the lower head. When pasting the Spring Festival couplets, the upper link is pasted on the top, the lower link is pasted on the bottom, and the upper and lower links cannot be pasted on the contrary.
How to distinguish between upper and lower links?
Judging by the tone of the word: the upper and lower couplets of the couplet should be distinguished from the flat sound of the last word. The last character of Shanglian is often the first character of the Chinese pronunciation.
Three or four tones), the lower link is mostly flat (generally referred to as the first.
1, 2 tones).
Judging by chronological order: the couplet with the time before is the upper link, and the couplet with the time behind is the lower couplet. Or in other words, the first thing to be done is the upper link, and the second thing to be done is the lower link. For example, "the door welcomes spring, summer, autumn and winter, and the household accepts the east, west, north and south".
Judging according to the scope of the scene: such as "every year is good every year, the moon is full of moons", "a city of flowers and rain, mountains and rivers are strong, and the courtyard is full of spring breeze and sun and moon". In terms of time, the year is larger than the month, and in terms of space, the city is larger than the courtyard, that is, in terms of time, space and specific things, it is generally from large to small.
Taboo 2: The time to paste the Spring Festival couplets
I don't know if you have heard of "twenty-four, write big characters", this is a folk proverb that has been passed down for a hundred years, which means that after the twenty-fourth day of the lunar month, you can write Spring Festival couplets, but when to paste Spring Festival couplets is also particular.
There is a myth and legend among the people: the Spring Festival couplets are the gods in the sky, when the Spring Festival couplets are torn, they will ascend to the heavens, and go to report the situation of every household to the Jade Emperor, hoping that the gods can bring good luck to the folk families.
In China, starting from Chinese New Year's Eve, the Chinese New Year officially opens, and the best time to post the Spring Festival is between 6 am and 12 noon on Chinese New Year's Eve, because this time is the most yang and vibrant time. Tear the old Spring Festival couplets, which means that they are bad luck, and they have the meaning of removing the old cloth and the new, and they can no longer be pasted on the first day of the New Year.
Taboo 3: The Spring Festival couplets are upside down and knowledgeable
For example, the wealth is pasted upside down, which means that the wealth arrives, and according to the ancient rites, it is synonymous with the to, so the wealth comes to the paste, which means that the wealth is poured out. Folklore speaking, in ancient times, only the water tank, wine tank and other storage tanks were pasted on the pot, which means that the blessing cannot be poured out, expressing the wish of happiness. Like the door of the house or in a public place, the word blessing cannot be pasted upside down, otherwise the blessing will be poured out.
Taboo 4: The singular is auspicious
Paste the Spring Festival couplets at the gate, remember to paste the odd number, the singular number symbolizes auspiciousness, and do not stick the spring word at the door of the house, you can paste the blessing, fortune and treasure, etc., because in ancient times, only Yihong Yuan will paste the spring word at the door.
The word Fu is upside down, and the wrong thing is wrong
Many families, during the New Year's holiday, will post the word "Fu" in the appropriate position at home, meaning good luck and auspiciousness, and many people think that the word Fu is to be pasted upside down, taking the meaning of "Fu to". Is that really the case?
In China's traditional position science, there is indeed a saying that the word Fu is pasted upside down, and the homonym of "pour" and "to" is taken, which means "Fu has arrived". Here, there are several main situations in which the word Fu is inverted.
The first case of the inverted posting of the word FuThe first case of the blessing word upside down is the water tank, garbage bin, and the cabinet at home. On water tanks and bins, because the contents of the tanks and bins have to be poured out of them. In order to avoid pouring out the blessings of the family, the word blessing was pasted upside down. This practice is to skillfully use the homophone "to" of the word "pour", and use "Fu Zhi" to offset "Fu Go", which is used to express the yearning for a better life.
The second case of the inverted posting of the word FuOn the cabinet in the house, the cabinet is the place where the items are stored, and the word "blessing" is pasted upside down to indicate good fortune (also wealth), which will always come to the house, in the house and in the cabinet.
The third case of the inverted posting of the word FuIn particular, remind friends that there are the following situations where the word Fu needs to be pasted upside down: if someone in the family unfortunately dies or other disasters occur during the year, such as: fire, car accident, etc., friends who want to transfer can paste the word Fu upside down; In order to please the old society, the word Fu was deliberately pasted upside down.
The specific situation is like this: if there is a child who knows how to read at home, the family deliberately pastes the word Fu upside down; Summoned the child and asked: Is our family portrait posted correctly? If the child says: "The blessing has fallen (arrived)", he can get a candy; If the child is unfortunate enough to make a mistake: the adult takes out the pre-prepared straw paper and wipes the child's mouth. Implication: The sentence just now is not spoken, it doesn't count! And immediately afterwards, the word "Fu" was coming back.
The research of the word "Fu" upside down
The custom of sticking the word "Fu" upside down comes from the palace of Prince Gong in the Qing Dynasty.
Legend has it that in order to please his master, the chief steward wrote many words of "Fu" and had them posted on the treasury and the gate of the palace. A family member who was illiterate mistakenly pasted the word "Fu" on the door. The chief housekeeper knelt on the ground and said: Prince Gong's longevity and blessing are great, and now the great fortune has really arrived, which is an auspicious omen. Fu Jin listened to it and thought: No wonder pedestrians say that Prince Gong's mansion is blessed (down), Ji Yu said a thousand times, gold and silver increased by 10,000 yuan, and he was happy to reward the housekeeper and the family who pasted the blessing.
Afterwards, the custom of pasting the word "Fu" upside down was introduced to the people's homes by the official mansion, and they were all willing to say a few words to passers-by or naughty children: Blessing has arrived, blessing has arrived!
There is also a legend that the word "Fu" is pasted upside down in the folk: Zhu Yuanzhang, the Taizu of the Ming Dynasty, used the word "Fu" as a secret mark to prepare to kill. In order to eliminate this disaster, the kind-hearted Queen Ma ordered every family in the city to put a blessing on their doors. Naturally, no one dared to disobey Queen Ma's will, so the word "Fu" was posted on the door of every house. Among them, one family was illiterate, and even pasted the word "Fu" upside down.
The next day, the emperor sent people to check on the street: he found that every house had pasted the word "Fu", and only one had pasted the word "Fu" upside down. The Emperor was furious when he heard the report, and immediately ordered the Imperial Guards to behead the family. Queen Ma said to Zhu Yuanzhang: That family knew that you were visiting, and deliberately pasted the word Fu upside down, this is not'Blessings'What do you mean? As soon as the emperor heard that it made sense, he ordered the release of the people, and a catastrophe was finally eliminated. Since then, people have pasted the word "Fu" upside down: one seeks good fortune, and the other is to commemorate Queen Ma.
The blessing word on the door must be pasted
In addition to the above, not all blessing characters should be pasted upside down, especially on the door. The blessing word on the door must always be pasted. The word blessing on the door has the meaning of "welcome blessing" and "blessing", and the gate is the entrance and exit of the family, a solemn and respectful place, the blessing word pasted, must be solemn, dignified and generous, so it should be pasted.
Special reminder
1. Friends must keep in mind: the gate is a place to welcome blessings, and the word blessing should be pasted.
2. The word "Fu" posted on the door must be pasted, meaning to open the door to welcome the blessing, the auspicious reputation of the blessing to the door, if the door of the "Fu" word is upside down, you can pour the blessing outside the door, and run to someone else's house! The word "Fu" must also be pasted along the way, so that it can play a positive role, otherwise the word "Fu" will be knocked down, and the blessing will slip away.
3. However, the word "Fu" posted in the house is suitable for upside down, even if the "Fu" is knocked down at home, it is also in your own home, and the blessing is also locked in your own house, and the house is full of blessings! In addition, the small word "Fu" attached to the toilet, garbage can, and wardrobe must also be pasted upside down!