Lantern Fair
01 · Historical Records
The Lantern Festival is also known as the Festival of Lights. The custom of lighting lanterns at Yuanxiao (the fifteenth night of the first lunar month) originated in the Han dynasty, developed further during the Tang and Song dynasties, and by the Ming and Qing periods lantern fairs across the country had reached their peak.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
The lantern fair is a traditional popular festive celebration of the Chinese people. It is widespread throughout the country and is also quite prevalent in overseas Chinese communities. Lantern fairs are mostly held during the Lantern Festival period, though some places hold them on the fifteenth day of the seventh lunar month; the character of the fairs differs from region to region. According to traditional custom, on the night of the full moon on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, people hang and light colorful lanterns of every kind, while holding celebrations such as viewing, admiring and competing with lanterns, in prayers for family reunion, longevity and abundant harvests. Centered on the lantern fair, localities have developed a series of distinctive Yuanxiao Festival customs, such as guessing lantern riddles, eating yuanxiao (sweet rice dumplings) and walking off the hundred ailments. Over time, Lantern Festival activities have grown ever richer, and in many places traditional folk performances such as dragon lantern dances, lion dances, stilt walking, land-boat dancing and yangge (rice-sprout song) dancing, Taiping drum playing and taige (carried platforms) have been added to the festivities, making the lantern fairs still more lively and exuberant. The Hequ river lantern fair is a grand folk festive activity of the region where Shanxi, Shaanxi and Inner Mongolia meet, and is handed down within Hequ County, Shanxi Province. Every year on the fifteenth day of the seventh lunar month, people from the three provinces on both banks of the Yellow River make their way to Hequ to gather and take part in the river lantern fair together. When the activities begin, a solemn ceremony is first held to offer sacrifices to Yu the Great; monks then chant scriptures, and the participants place the river lanterns they have made as offerings before the shrine, praying that the spirit of Yu will grant favorable weather and abundant harvests and ward off disasters and calamities. In the evening, river-transport organizations such as the Helu Society, the Dukou Society and the Tanchuan Society stage large-scale river-lantern release events to mourn the dead and pray for peace. The entire activity lasts three days, and each evening besides releasing the river lanterns there are theatrical and musical performances for entertainment.
Rite to Yu the Great and the chanting
The fair opens with a solemn rite to Yu the Great; monks chant while worshippers set their homemade river lanterns before the shrine, asking for good weather and freedom from disaster.
River guilds running the lantern release
At night the river transport guilds stage the mass release of lanterns, mourning the dead and praying for safety; the same bodies that carried cargo by day now run the ceremony.
The mid-autumn gathering of three provinces
Each fifteenth of the seventh month, people from the three provinces along the Yellow River converge on Hequ, a county whose festival depends on a shared river deity and a shared waterway.
Three nights of opera beside the lanterns
The festival lasts three days, with opera accompanying the lantern release each night, so that watching lights on the water and watching plays ashore run in parallel.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
The Hequ river lantern fair is practiced within Hequ County, Shanxi Province, and is a festival custom shared across the border region of Shanxi, Shaanxi and Inner Mongolia: every year on the fifteenth day of the seventh lunar month, people from the three provinces on both banks of the Yellow River converge on Hequ, so the participants' native places extend beyond the county, and the liveliness of the festival season cannot be managed by a single village or hamlet. The activity unfolds along the river channel: the ceremony of sacrifice to Yu the Great is held at riverside temples and before shrines, the scripture chanting is undertaken by monks, and the offerings are the river lanterns made by the people themselves; after nightfall, the spectacle of releasing the lanterns is handed over to the river-transport organizations, with societies such as the Helu Society, the Dukou Society and the Tanchuan Society taking charge of the large-scale release. The river-transport societies show a double identity here — by day they are trade bodies carrying Yellow River freight, by night folk organizations mourning the dead; in olden times Hequ had many ferries and frequent boat accidents, and boatmen had their own rites of reverence for the water, so the sacrifice to Yu and the release of lanterns are not isolated religious rites here, but responses that grew out of real risks on the water. The whole activity runs three consecutive days, and each evening besides releasing the lanterns there are theatrical and musical performances for entertainment, showing that the release is not the endpoint — around it stretches a three-night span of viewing lanterns and listening to opera.
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04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
The Hequ river lantern fair has entered the collective memory of the people of Shanxi, Shaanxi and Inner Mongolia and has become an important component of the traditional customs of the Hequ region; it has research value in sociology, folklore and local history and culture.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Lin Wenyi 03-1474
- Shao Chuanfu 03-1475
- Kuang Huofa
- Niujunqi
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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