The History of Ching Ming Festival
Have you ever heard of the Qingming (say “ching-ming”) Festival? It’s also known as Grave Sweeping Day. It is a special Chinese festival that honours family ancestors and has been celebrated for over 2,500 years.
Did you know Qingming is two festivals put together? It is the Chinese Cold Food Day Festival and Grave Sweeping Day. The festival is celebrated during the first week of April, based on the traditional Chinese lunisolar calendar (a calendar using both the phases and positions of the moon and the sun to determine the date). The next festival will be on April 4th, 2024.What is Qingming?
During Ching Ming, people go to the graves of their ancestors to pay their respects. They clean the gravesite, share a meal, make offerings and burn joss paper (paper that looks like money).
This festival is based on an ancient story of Duke Wen and Jie Zitui.
As most of the stories go:
Jie saved the Prince from starving to death. He made a soup from his flesh, saving the Prince! The Prince promised that he would reward Jie. When the Prince became Duke Wen he forgot about Jie’s reward.
He was ashamed and wanted to reward Jie with a job. But Jie didn’t want the job. So he hid with his mother in the forest.”Unable to find Jie, the Duke started a fire to get him out of hiding. Sadly, Jie and his mother did not survive the fire.
The Duke was saddened. Out of respect made a grave for Jie and his mother under a burnt willow tree…
