中国传统节日(中英文对照)

中国传统节日

（中英文对照简介）

目录

The Spring Festival（春节）

Lantern Festival（元宵节）

Qingming Festival（清明节）Dragon Boat Festival（端午节）Double Seventh Festival（七夕）Mid-Autumn Festival（中秋节）Double Ninth Festival（重阳节）Winter Solstice Festival（冬至）

The Spring Festival（春节）

The first day of the first lunar month is the New Year in the Chinese lunar calendar. Among the traditional Chinese festivals, this is the most important and the most bustling. Since it occurs at the end of winter and the beginning of spring, people also call it the Spring Festival. Chinese have many traditional customs relating to the Spring Festival. Since the 23rd day of the 12th lunar montha, people start to prepare for the event. Every family will undertake thorough cleaning, do their Spring Festival shopping, create paper-cuts for window decoration, put up New Year picturesb, write Spring Festival coupletsc, make New Year cakesd, and also prepare all kinds of food to bid farewell to the old and usher in the new.

New Year's Eve is the time for a happy reunion of all family members, when they sit around the table to have a sumptuous New Year's Eve dinner, talking and laughing, until daybreak, which is called "staying up to see the year out". When the bell tolls midnight on New Year's Eve, people eat dumplings. In ancient times, midnight was called zishi (a period of the day from 11 p.m. to 1 a.m.). Dumplings (jiaozi) are eaten because it sounds the same as "change of the year and the day" in Chinese.

From the first day of the lunar year, people pay New Year calls on relatives and friends, which is an important custom for the Spring Festival. Setting off firecrackers is the favorite activity of children in the Spring Festival. According to legend, this could drive off evil spirits. The continuous sound of firecrackers can be heard everywhere, adding to the atmosphere of rejoicing and festivity.

Many places hold temple fairs. The wonderful dragon lantern dance and the lion dance performances, along with various handicraft articles and local snacks attract thousands of people.

With the development of the times, some changes have taken place in the customs of spending the Spring Festival. For example, to prevent environmental pollution, many cities have banned firecrackers. But this

does not have an impact on the happy atmosphere of the festival. On New Year's Eve, family members get together to have dinner while watching TV programs.

For Chinese at home and abroad, the Spring Festival is always the most important festival.

农历的正(zheng)月初一，是中国的农历新年。在中国的传统节日中，这是一个最重要、最热闹的节日。因为过农历新年的时候，正是冬末春初，所以人们也把这个节日叫“春节”。

中国人过春节有很多传统习俗。从腊月二十三起，人们就开始准备过年了。在这段时间里，家家户户要大扫除，买年货，贴窗花，挂年画，写春联，蒸年糕，做好各种食品，准备辞旧迎新。

春节的前夜叫“除夕”。除夕之夜，是家人团聚的时候。一家人围坐在一起，吃一顿丰盛的年夜饭，说说笑笑，直到天亮，这叫守岁。除夕零点的钟声一响，人们还要吃饺子。古时候叫零点为“子时”，除夕的子时正是新旧年交替的时候，人们在这时吃饺子，是取“更岁交子”的意思。这也是“饺子”名称的由来。

过了除夕就是大年初一。从初一开始，人们要走亲戚、看朋友，互相拜年。拜年，是春节的重要习俗。拜年时，大家都要说一些祝愿幸福、健康的吉祥话。

放爆竹是春节期间孩子们最喜欢的活动。传说燃放爆竹可以驱妖除魔，所以每年从除夕之夜起，到处就响起了接连不断的爆竹声。阵阵烟花，声声爆竹，给节日增添了喜庆的气氛。

春节期间，很多地方还要举办庙会。庙会上精彩的舞龙舞狮表演，各式各样的工艺品和地方小吃，吸引千千万万欢度佳节的人们。

随时代的发展，过春节的习俗也有了一些变化。比如，为防止环境污染，很多城市已禁止燃放烟花爆竹。但这并不影响节日的热闹气氛。除夕之夜，家家户户仍然要团聚在一起，一边吃年夜饭，一边看精彩的电视节目，直到大年初一的清晨。

在中国和世界各地华夏子的心中，春节永远是最重要的节日。

Lantern Festival（元宵节）

The Lantern Festival falls on the 15th day of the 1st lunar month, usually in February or March in the Gregorian calendar. As early as the Western Han Dynasty (206 BC-AD 25), it had become a festival with great significance.

This day's important activity is watching lanterns. Throughout the Han Dynasty (206 BC-AD 220), Buddhism flourished in China. One emperor heard that Buddhist monks would watch sarira, or remains from the cremation of Buddha's body, and light lanterns to worship Buddha on the 15th day of the 1st lunar month, so he ordered to light lanterns in the imperial palace and temples to show respect to Buddha on this day. Later, the Buddhist rite developed into a grand festival among common people and its influence expanded from the Central Plains to the whole of China.

Till today, the lantern festival is still held each year around the country. Lanterns of various shapes and sizes are hung in the streets, attracting countless visitors. Children will hold self-made or bought lanterns to stroll with on the streets, extremely excited.

"Guessing lantern riddles"is an essential part of the Festival. Lantern owners write riddles on a piece of paper and post them on the lanterns. If visitors have solutions to the riddles, they can pull the paper out and go to the lantern owners to check their answer. If they are right, they will get a little gift. The activity emerged during people's enjoyment of lanterns in the Song Dynasty (960-1279). As riddle guessing is interesting and full of wisdom, it has become popular among all social strata.

People will eat yuanxiao, or rice dumplings, on this day, so it is also called the "Yuanxiao Festival."Yuanxiao also has another name, tangyuan. It is small dumpling balls made of glutinous rice flour with rose petals, sesame, bean paste, jujube paste, walnut meat, dried fruit, sugar and edible oil as filling. Tangyuan can be boiled, fried or steamed. It tastes sweet and delicious. What's more, tangyuan in Chinese has a similar pronunciation with "tuanyuan”, meaning reunion. So people eat them to

denote union, harmony and happiness for the family.

In the daytime of the Festival, performances such as a dragon lantern dance, a lion dance, a land boat dance, a yangge dance, walking on stilts and beating drums while dancing will be staged. On the night, except for magnificent lanterns, fireworks form a beautiful scene. Most families spare some fireworks from the Spring Festival and let them off in the Lantern Festival. Some local governments will even organize a fireworks party. On the night when the first full moon enters the New Year, people become really intoxicated by the imposing fireworks and bright moon in the sky.

每年农历的正月十五日，春节刚过，迎来的就是中国的传统节日--元宵节。

元宵主要的活动就是看灯。东汉明帝时期，明帝提倡佛教，听说佛教有正月十五日僧人观佛舍利，点灯敬佛的做法，就命令这一天夜晚在皇宫和寺庙里点灯敬佛，令士族庶民都挂灯。以后这种佛教礼仪节日逐渐形成民间盛大的节日。该节经历了由宫廷到民间，由中原到全国的发展过程。

直到今天，元宵点灯的习俗仍然在中国的各地流传的，各式各样美丽的花灯在这一天都会点亮，孩子们提着自制的灯笼走街串巷，非常高兴。

猜灯谜也是元宵节的一项重要活动，花灯的主人会将谜面写在灯笼上，挂在门口，如果有人可以猜中，就能得到小小的礼物。这项活动最早起源于宋朝，因为谜语能启迪智慧又饶有兴趣，所以流传过程中深受社会各阶层的欢迎。

民间过元宵节吃元宵的习俗。元宵由糯米制成，或实心，或带馅。馅有豆沙、白糖、山楂、各类果料等，食用时煮、煎、蒸、炸皆可。起初，人们把这种食物叫“浮圆子”，后来又叫“汤团”或“汤圆”，这些名称“团圆”字音相近，取团圆之意，象征全家人团团圆圆，和睦幸福，人们也以此怀念离别的亲人,寄托了对未来生活的美好愿望。

随着时间的推移，元宵节的活动越来越多，白天有耍龙灯、耍狮子、踩高跷、划旱船扭秧歌、打太平鼓等传统民俗表演。到了夜晚，除了五颜六色的美花灯之外，还有艳丽多姿的烟火。大多数家庭会在春节时留下一些烟花等到元宵节这天燃放，而一些地方政府也会举办烟花大会，当新年的第一个月圆之夜在盛大的烟火表演中来临时，人们都醉在这令人难忘了烟花与皎洁的明月中。

Qingming Festival （清明节）

The Qingming (Pure Brightness) Festival is one of the 24 seasonal division points in China, falling on April 4-6 each year. After the festival, the temperature will rise up and rainfall increases. It is the high time for spring plowing and sowing. But the Qingming Festival is not only a seasonal point to guide farm work, it is more a festival of commemoration.

The Qingming Festival sees a combination of sadness and happiness. This is the most important day of sacrifice. Both the Han and minority ethnic groups at this time offer sacrifices to their ancestors and sweep the tombs of the diseased. Also, they will not cook on this day and only cold food is served.

The Hanshi (Cold Food) Festival was usually one day before the Qingming Festival. As our ancestors often extended the day to the Qingming, they were later combined.

On each Qingming Festival, all cemeteries are crowded with people who came to sweep tombs and offer sacrifices. Traffic on the way to the cemeteries becomes extremely jammed. The customs have been greatly simplified today. After slightly sweeping the tombs, people offer food, flowers and favorites of the dead, then burn incense and paper money and bow before the memorial tablet.

In contrast to the sadness of the tomb sweepers, people also enjoy hope of Spring on this day. The Qingming Festival is a time when the sun shines brightly, the trees and grass become green and nature is again lively. Since ancient times, people have followed the custom of Spring outings. At this time tourists are everywhere.

People love to fly kites during the Qingming Festival. Kite flying is actually not limited to the Qingming Festival. Its uniqueness lies in that people fly kites not during the day, but also at night. A string of little lanterns tied onto the kite or the thread look like shining stars, and therefore, are called "god's lanterns."