Dragon Boat Festival (Duanwu)

What is the Dragon Boat Festival?

The Dragon Boat Festival falls on the fifth day of the fifth month on the Chinese lunar calendar. It has a history of more than 2,000 years and is usually in June in the Gregorian calendar.

In 2009, UNESCO added the Dragon Boat Festival to the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, the first Chinese festival to receive this honor.

UNESCO Description

According to UNESCO's official inscription, as quoted by China Daily:

"Beginning on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month, people of several ethnic groups throughout China and the world celebrate the Dragon Boat festival... A memorial ceremony offering sacrifices to a local hero is combined with sporting events such as dragon races, dragon boating and willow shooting; feasts of rice dumplings, eggs and ruby sulphur wine; and folk entertainments including opera, song and unicorn dances."

The hero celebrated varies by region: the romantic poet Qu Yuan is venerated in Hubei and Hunan Provinces; Wu Zixu in South China; and Yan Hongwo in Yunnan Province among the Dai community.

In Commemoration of Qu Yuan

The most popular legend about the festival is in commemoration of Qu Yuan (340-278 BC). Qu Yuan was minister of the State of Chu and one of China's earliest poets.

Legend has it that as the Chu state faced imminent conquest by its adversaries, Qu took his own life by plunging into the Miluo River on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month. Local people raced boats to find his body and dropped rice in the water to distract fish from eating his body. These became traditions observed to this day.

Main Customs

Dragon Boat Racing

People race dragon boats during the festival. Competing teams drive their colorful dragon boats forward to the rhythm of beating drums.

According to Professor Song Junhua, director of the Institute of Intangible Cultural Heritage at Sun Yat-sen University: "The dragon boat originated from worship of nature, tools and totems in traditional Chinese culture. Especially in regions along rivers, people's lives were mainly on the boat, so with the worship of boat and dragon, there came the dragon boat."

Eating Zongzi

Zongzi, a sticky rice dumpling wrapped in bamboo or reed leaves with various fillings, is the must-have food for families across China.

In some regions, on the morning of the festival, parents tie string bands in five colors around their children's wrists, ankles or necks to drive away evil spirits.

Warding Off Evil

Participants also ward off evil by bathing in flower-scented water, wearing five-colour silk, hanging plants such as moxa and calamus over their doors, and pasting paper cut-outs in their windows.

Other customs include picking herbs, drinking realgar wine, and wearing sachets.

Regional Variations

In Nanchang, East China, it is a custom to eat eggs boiled with tea during the Dragon Boat Festival.

In Yanbian, Jilin Province, glutinous rice cakes are eaten by the Korean ethnic group during the festival.

In Fujian Province, every family eats jiandui (a kind of fried round cake made of wheat and rice flour) during the festival.

Source：Chinajob