Spring Festival Trivia 春节冷知识

Singapore - Chinatown

新加坡 — 牛车水

As we all know, the Lunar New Year is the Chinese New Year's Day.

众所周知农历新年是华族的元旦。

"Yuán" means "first" and "dàn" means "day", so Yuándàn is New Year.

“元”意思为“首”，“旦”意思为“日”，所以元旦即是新年。

What is the difference between Yuándàn and Spring Festival?

那元旦和春节又有什么区别？

Before 1912, China did not use the Gregorian calendar, but the lunar calendar.

在1912年之前，中国是不用阳历的，中国用的是农历。

In ancient times, the Xia Dynasty used the Xia calendar, and the Xia calendar used Meng Xi month (Yuan month) as the first month.

古时候的夏朝使用夏历，夏历以孟喜月（元月）为正月。

However, in the Shang Dynasty, the Yin calendar used by the Shang Dynasty used the La month (twelfth month) as the first month.

但到了商朝，商朝使用的殷历以腊月(十二月)为正月。

The Zhou calendar used the winter month (eleventh month) as the first month.

周朝的周历以冬月(十一月)为正月。

After Qin Shihuang unified China, he decided to use Yangchun month (tenth month) as the first month.

秦始皇统一中国后，又决定以阳春月（十月）为正月。

In other words, "the first day of the tenth month" became "New Year's Day" at that time.

也就是说，这时候的“十月初一”变成了“元旦”。

It was not until the period of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty that the previous state of "changing back and forth" of the New Year's Day basically ended.

直到汉武帝时期，才基本结束之前元旦“变来变去”的状态。

During Taichu period of the Han Dynasty, Deng Ping and others created the "Taichu calendar" and reset Meng Xiyue (Yuan month) as the first month.

太初元年，邓平等人创立“太初历”，重定夏历孟喜月(元月)为正月。

The first day of Meng Xiyue (the first day of the first month in the Xia calendar) is called New Year's Day, which was used until the end of the Qing Dynasty.

把孟喜月的第一天(夏历的正月初一)称为元旦，一直沿用到清朝末年。

In 1912, in January of that year, Sun Yat-sen issued the "Order of the Provisional President on the Promulgation of Almanacs", requiring the Ministry of Internal Affairs to compile and print a new almanac, and then stipulated that January 1 of the Gregorian calendar is the "New Year", but it was not called "Yuándàn".

1912年，那一年1月份，孙中山发布《临时大总统关于颁布历书令》，要求内务部编印新历书，随后又规定阳历1月1日为“新年”，但不叫“元旦”。

In January 1914, the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the then government proposed in a report to the president: "It is proposed to designate the lunar calendar Yuándàn as the Spring Festival, the Dragon Boat Festival as the Summer Festival, the Mid-Autumn Festival as the Autumn Festival, and the Winter Solstice as the Winter Festival".

1914年1月，当时政府的内务部在给大总统的呈文中提出：“拟请定农历元旦为春节，端午为夏节，中秋为秋节，冬至为冬节”。

Later, only Yuándàn "Spring Festival" was approved, so the traditional Lunar New Year was renamed "Spring Festival".

后来只有元旦为“春节”被批准，所以传统农历新年易名为“春节”。

The traditional name "Yuándàn" was placed on January 1 of the Gregorian calendar.

传统的“元旦”名称被搁在了公历的1月1日。