Dongzhi, also known as Winter Solstice, Winter Festival, and Tunji (in Japanese), is the twenty-second solar term of the 24 solar terms. The ancients divided a year into 24 solar periods based on the annual motion of the sun. Each period was called a solar term. The winter solstice festival originated in the Zhou Dynasty, flourished in the Tang and Song dynasties, and is still one of the most significant solar terms today. The court and the people had always attached great importance to it, and emperors had held grand sacrificial ceremonies since the Zhou Dynasty. In the ancient Tang dynasty, the Winter Solstice was even as important as the Lunar New Year. The winter solstice generally falls on December 21 or December 22 in the Gregorian calendar. This year, the Winter Solstice is on December 21, which is on Tuesday. Since the sun is directly over the Tropic of Capricorn, the winter solstice in the northern hemisphere has the shortest day and the longest night. After the winter solstice, the sunlight gradually shifts northward, the night becomes shorter, and the day becomes longer with the approach of spring. In ancient times, people believed that the winter solstice is the day when the yin and yang energy change. Yin and Yang energies are the Chinese philosophical concepts that make up all phenomena of the natural world. After the Winter Solstice, the yin energy gradually decreases, and the yang energy increases. People also predicted the weather of the New Year by the winter solstice. There was a saying “dry winter solstice, wet Lunar New Year”, which means that if the winter solstice has good weather, it may rain during the Lunar New Year.
Now, some places still take the winter solstice as a festival. In the northern regions, there is a custom of eating lamb, dumplings, and wontons during the winter solstice. In the southern regions, people eat rice balls, glutinous rice balls (Tangyuan), and red bean glutinous rice to celebrate the Winter Solstice. Moreover, there is still a custom of offering sacrifices to heaven and ancestors on the day of the winter solstice in various regions. Tangyuan symbolizes completeness and reunion. Eating glutinous rice balls means “taking roundness to achieve or restore yang energy.” In addition, some people in the north spend the winter solstice eating wontons and dumplings, which respectively represent “growth wisdom and good luck” and “prosperous fortune (because the shape of dumplings is similar to gold shoe-shaped ingots called Yuanbao).”
The custom of eating lamb on the winter solstice is said to have started in the Han Dynasty. Legend has it that Liu Bang, the Emperor Gaozu of the Han Dynasty, ate the lamb cooked by Fan Kuai, who was a military general, on the day of the winter solstice. He felt that the taste was so delicious that he was full of praise. Since then, the custom of eating lamb or mutton on the winter solstice has become common practice. In the Jiangnan water town, there is a custom that the whole family gathers to eat red bean glutinous rice on the night of the winter solstice. According to legend, there was a man named Gonggong whose son was not talented and committed a lot of evil. He died on the day of the winter solstice. After his death, he became a demon that caused epidemics and continued to harm the people. However, he disliked red beans, so people cooked and ate red bean glutinous rice on the winter solstice day to drive away the epidemic ghost and prevent disasters and diseases.
Author: Esa Chen
References:
- 中國人民共和國中央人民政府 The Central People’s Government of the People’s Republic of China . 冬至的由來和傳説 The origin and legend of the winter solstice, http://big5.www.gov.cn/gate/big5/www.gov.cn/fwxx/wy/2009-12/21/content_1492795.htm.
- Gavin. “Winter Solstice (Dongzhi) Festival.” Winter Solstice (Dongzhi) Festival in China, 2 Oct. 2021, https://www.chinahighlights.com/festivals/winter-solstice.htm.
- Sigurðardóttir, Linda. “Dongzhi Festival, a Public Holiday.” GBTIMES, 19 Dec. 2016, https://web.archive.org/web/20180815164132/https://gbtimes.com/dongzhi-festival-celebrates-winter-solstice.
Yeh, Joseph. “The Winter Solstice.” Wayback Machine, 23 Dec. 2008, https://web.archive.org/web/20120826232131/http://www.culture.tw/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1053&Itemid=157.
