Chinese New Year From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (Redirected from Spring Festival) Jump to: navigation, search For other traditions of celebrating lunar new year, see Lunar New Year. Chinese New Year Also called Lunar New Year, Spring Festival Observed by Chinese communities worldwide[1] Type Cultural, Religious (Buddhist, Taoist, Confucian) Significance The first day of the Chinese calendar (lunisolar calendar) 2011 date February 3 2012 date January 23 2013 date February 10 Celebrations [Lion dance]]s, fireworks, family gathering, family meal, visiting friends and relatives (拜年, bàinián), giving red envelopes, decorating with duilian (對聯, duìlián). Related to Lantern Festival, which concludes the celebration of the New Year. Mongol New Year (Tsagaan Sar), Tibetan New Year (Losar), Japanese New Year (Shōgatsu), Korean New Year (Seollal), Vietnamese New Year (Tết) Chinese New Year Traditional Chinese 農曆新年 新年 Simplified Chinese 农历 Literal meaning Agriculture / Agricultural / Agrarian Calendar's New Year [show]Transcriptions Spring Festival Traditional Chinese 春節 春 Simplified Chinese 节 Literal meaning Spring Festival [show]Transcriptions This article contains Chinese text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Chinese characters. Chinese New Year is the most important of the traditional Chinese holidays. In China, it is known as 'Spring Festival', the literal translation of the Chinese name 春節 (Pinyin: Chūnjié), since the spring season in Chinese calendar starts with lichun, the first solar term in a Chinese calendar year. It marks the end of the winter season, analogous to the Western Carnival. The festival begins on the first day of the first month (Chinese: 正月; pinyin: Zhēngyuè) in the traditional Chinese calendar and ends with Lantern Festival which is on the 15th day. Chinese New Year's Eve, a day where Chinese families gather for their annual reunion dinner, is known as Chúxī (除夕), literally "remove evening" or "Eve of the Passing Year." Because the Chinese calendar is lunisolar, the Chinese New Year is often referred to as the "Lunar New Year" and Agriculture / Agricultural / Agrarian Calendar's New Year. Chinese New Year is the longest and most important festivity in the Chinese calendar. The origin of Chinese New Year is itself centuries old and gains significance because of several myths and traditions. Chinese New Year is celebrated in countries and territories with significant Chinese populations, such as China, including Hong Kong, [2] Macau, Singapore,[3] Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, Taiwan, Mauritius,[4] Philippines,[5][6] Vietnam, and also in Chinatowns elsewhere. Chinese New Year is considered a major holiday for the Chinese and has had influence on the lunar new year celebrations of its geographic neighbors. Within China, regional customs and traditions concerning the celebration of the Chinese new year vary widely. People will pour out their money to buy presents, decoration, material, food, and clothing. It is also traditional for every family to thoroughly cleanse the house, in order to sweep away any ill-fortune and to make way for good incoming luck. Windows and doors will be decorated with red colour paper-cuts and couplets with popular themes of "good fortune" or "happiness", "wealth", and "longevity". On the Eve of Chinese New Year, supper is a feast with families. Food will include such items as pigs, ducks, chicken and sweet delicacies. The family will end the night with firecrackers. Early the next morning, children will greet their parents by wishing them a healthy and happy new year, and receive money in red paper envelopes. The Chinese New Year tradition is to reconcile, forget all grudges and sincerely wish peace and happiness for everyone. Although the Chinese calendar traditionally does not use continuously numbered years, outside China its years are often numbered from the reign of the Yellow Emperor. But at least three different years numbered 1 are now used by various scholars, making the year beginning in 2012 CE the "Chinese Year" 4710, 4709, or 4649.[7] London: Chinatown with Chinese New Year decoration Contents [hide] 1 Dates 2 Mythology 3 Public holiday 4 Festivities o 4.1 Preceding days o 4.2 First day o 4.3 Second day o 4.4 Third day o 4.5 Fourth day o 4.6 Fifth day o 4.7 Seventh day o 4.8 Eighth day o 4.9 Ninth day o 4.10 Tenth day o 4.11 Thirteenth day o 4.12 Fifteenth day 5 Cuisine 6 Practices o 6.1 Red envelopes o 6.2 Gift exchange o 6.3 Markets o 6.4 Fireworks . 6.4.1 Firecracker ban o 6.5 Clothing o 6.6 Family portrait o 6.7 Symbolism o 6.8 Nianhua o 6.9 Flowers o 6.10 Icons and ornaments o 6.11 Spring travel 7 Festivities outside China o 7.1 Origins o 7.2 South East Asia o 7.3 Other parts of the world 8 Greetings 9 See also 10 Notes 11 References [edit] Dates Chinese New Year eve in Meizhou on February 8, 2005. Main article: Chinese calendar Animal Branch New Year dates 鼠 Shǔ Rat 子 Zǐ 1996-02-19 2008-02-07 2020-01-25 牛 Niú Ox 丑 Chǒu 1997-02-07 2009-01-26 2021-02-12 虎 Hǔ Tiger 寅 Yín 1998-01-28 2010-02-14 2022-02-01 兔 Tù Rabbit 卯 Mǎo 1999-02-16 2011-02-03 2023-01-22 龍 Lóng Dragon 辰 Chén 2000-02-05 2012-01-23 2024-02-10 蛇 Shé Snake 巳 Sì 2001-01-24 2013-02-10 2025-01-29 马 Mǎ Horse 午 Wǔ 2002-02-12 2014-01-31 2026-02-17 羊 Yáng Goat 未 Wèi 2003-02-01 2015-02-19 2027-02-07 猴 Hóu Monkey 申 Shēn 2004-01-22 2016-02-08 2028-01-27 雞 Jī Rooster 酉 Yǒu 2005-02-09 2017-01-28 2029-02-13 狗 Gǒu Dog 戌 Xū 2006-01-29 2018-02-16 2030-02-03 豬 Zhū Pig 亥 Hài 2007-02-18 2019-02-05 2031-01-23 The lunisolar Chinese calendar determines the date of Chinese New Year. The calendar is also used in countries that have adopted or have been influenced by Han culture, notably the Koreans, Japanese and Vietnamese, and may have a common ancestry with the similar New Year festivals outside East Asia, such as Iran, and historically, the Bulgars lands.[citation needed] In the Gregorian calendar, Chinese New Year falls on different dates each year, a date between January 21 and February 20. In the Chinese calendar, winter solstice must occur in the 11th month, which means that Chinese New Year usually falls on the second new moon after the winter solstice (rarely the third if an intercalary month intervenes). In traditional Chinese Culture, lichun is a solar term marking the start of spring, which occurs about February 4. Southeast Asia's largest temple — Kek Lok Si in Penang, Malaysia — illuminated in preparation for the Lunar New Year. The dates for Chinese New Year from 1996 to 2031 (in the Gregorian calendar) are at the left, along with the year's presiding animal zodiac and its earthly branch. The names of the earthly branches have no English counterparts and are not the Chinese translations of the animals. Alongside the 12-year cycle of the animal zodiac there is a 10-year cycle of heavenly stems. Each of the ten heavenly stems is associated with one of the five elements of Chinese astrology, namely: Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, and Water. The elements are rotated every two years while a yin and yang association alternates every year. The elements are thus distinguished: Yang Wood, Yin Wood, Yang Fire, Yin Fire, etc. These produce a combined cycle that repeats every 60 years. For example, the year of the Yang Fire Rat occurred in 1936 and in 1996, 60 years apart.[8] Many confuse their Chinese birth-year with their Gregorian birth-year. As the Chinese New Year starts in late January to mid-February, the Chinese year dates from January 1 until that day in the new Gregorian year remain unchanged from the previous Gregorian year. For example, the 1989 year of the snake began on February 6, 1989. The year 1990 is considered by some people to be the year of the horse. However, the 1989 year of the snake officially ended on February 8, 1990. This means that anyone born from January 1 to February 7, 1990 was actually born in the year of the snake rather than the year of the horse. Many online Chinese Sign calculators do not account for the non-alignment of the two calendars, using Gregorian-calendar years rather than official Chinese New Year dates. One scheme of continuously numbered Chinese-calendar years assigns 4709 to the year beginning January 30, 2011, but this is not universally accepted; the calendar is traditionally cyclical, not continuously numbered. [edit] Mythology Hand-painted Chinese New Year's poetry pasted on the sides of doors leading to people's homes, Lijiang, Yunnan According to tales and legends, the beginning of Chinese New Year started with the fight against a mythical beast called the Nian (Chinese: 年; pinyin: Nián). Nian would come on the first day of New Year to eat livestock, crops, and even villagers, especially children. To protect themselves, the villagers would put food in front of their doors at the beginning of every year. It was believed that after the Nian ate the food they prepared, it wouldn’t attack any more people. One time, people saw that the Nian was scared away by a little child wearing red.