How did Tanabata come about?

Qixi Festival, formerly known as the Qiqiao Festival. Qixi Qiqiao, this festival originated in the Han Dynasty, Ge Hong's "Xijing Miscellaneous Records" of the Eastern Jin Dynasty has "Han Cai women often wear seven-hole needles on the Han Dynasty portrait stone on the seventh day of July, the female dormitory map placket building, people are accustomed to it", this is the earliest record of Qiqiao we see in ancient documents.

"Tanabata" was the earliest in people's worship of nature. Judging from historical documents, at least three or four thousand years ago, with people's understanding of astronomy and the emergence of textile technology, there were records about Altair and Vega. People worship the stars far more than Altair and Vega, they believe that there are seven stars representing directions in the east, west, north and south, collectively known as the Twenty-Eight Nakshatras, of which the Big Dipper is the brightest and can be used to discern the direction at night.

The first star of the Big Dipper is called Kuixing, also known as Kuishou. Later, with the imperial examination system, the champion was called "Da Kui Tian Corporal", and the scholars called Qixi "Kui Xing Festival", also known as "Book Festival", which maintained the traces of the earliest Qixi ** in the worship of the stars.

"Tanabata" is also the worship of time by ancient people. "Seven" is the same as "period", and the month and day are both "seven", giving people a sense of time. The ancient Chinese called the sun, moon and the five planets of water, fire, wood, metal and earth "seven yao".

The number seven is manifested in the folk in terms of time, and the "seven-seven" is often the final game when calculating the time. In old Beijing, when making dojos for the dead, they often thought that they would complete the "Seven Sevens". The current "week" is still preserved in Japanese.

"Seven" is homophonic with "auspicious", and "seven-seven" has the meaning of double auspiciousness, which is an auspicious day. In Taiwan, July is known as the month of "Joy and Prosperity". Because the shape of the word "Xi" in cursive script resembles "seventy-seven", the seventy-seven years old is also called "Xishou".

"Qixi Festival" is also a phenomenon of digital worship, and the ancient folk put the first month and March.

March, May. May, July.

The "sevenfold" of July and September 9, plus the multiples of February 2 and 3, and June 6, are all listed as auspicious days. "Seven" is the number of beads in each column of the abacus, romantic and rigorous, giving people a mysterious beauty. "Seven" has the same sound as "wife", so Tanabata has largely become a festival associated with women.

Why is Tanabata called Tanabata? Qixi Festival, also known as the Qiqiao Festival, Daughter's Day, Seven Sisters Festival, every day on the seventh day of the seventh month of July, that is, Qixi Festival, because of the worship of the Seven Sisters, held on the evening of July 7, so it is called Qixi Festival.

The legend of the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl came.

The Cowherd and the Weaver Girl have a magpie bridge on Tanabata They came to meet.

It's the story of the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl.

The Cowherd wants to meet the Weaver Girl with an excuse.

Just the Cowherd and Weaver Girl. Go to the encyclopedia to take a look.

The Qixi Festival has always been connected with the legend of the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl:

The Cowherd and the Weaver Girl is a famous Han folk love story in ancient China, derived from the star names of Altair and Vega. It mainly tells the story of Niulang is an orphan in Niujiazhuang who relies on his brother and sister-in-law to live. The sister-in-law was mean and often abused him, and he was forced to split up and feed himself on an old cow.

This old cow is very psychic, one day, the Weaver Girl and the fairies went down to play, bathing in the river, the old cow persuaded the Cowherd to meet, and then they talked very well to understand their difficulties, and the Weaver Girl became the wife of the Cowherd. After getting married, they farmed and weaved, gave birth to a son and a daughter, and lived a very happy life. Unexpectedly, the Emperor of Heaven found out about this and sent the Queen Mother to escort the Weaver Girl back to the Heavenly Court for trial.

The old cow couldn't bear to let their wives separate, so he cut off the horns on his head and turned it into a small boat, and let the cowherd carry his children to chase after him in a boat. Seeing that she was about to catch up with the Weaver Girl, the Queen Mother suddenly pulled off the golden hairpin on her head and drew a rolling Milky Way in the sky. The Cowherd couldn't cross the river, so he could only look at the Weaver Girl by the river and weep from afar.

Their steadfast love touched the magpies, and countless magpies flew over and used their bodies to build a colorful bridge across the Tianhe, so that the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl could meet on the Tianhe. The Queen Mother had no choice but to allow the Cowherd and Weaver Girl to meet once a year on the Magpie Bridge on July 7, and the magpie would also be by her side. In the future, the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl will meet on July 7 every year.

It is people who commemorate the legendary Cowherd and Weaver Girl, so there is Tanabata.