The seventh day of the seventh month of the lunar calendar is the folk "Begging for coincidences" festival, women in the courtyard on this night set down the wine preserved fruits and melons, pious to the night sky worship, in the hope that the Weaving Maiden star to give skills. Because of the poet's chant, the painter's depiction, the literati's layout, a poignant love story, and then spread to the world, the lingering sorrow, euphemistic and moving, this is the story of the cowherd and the weaving maiden.
There is a poem in the Xiao Ya of the Book of Songs:
"Or with its wine, not recognize its pulp; fine fine girdle, not recognize its length.
The sky has a Han, and there is a light in the light; and the weaving maiden has seven days to live.
Though the seven projects are not a uniform, they are not a uniform; they look at the Altair and do not recognize the uniform box.
To the east there is Qiming, to the west there is Changgeng, and to the west there is Personal Savvy."
This is to say that the star weaver in the sky, sitting at her loom, has no desire to weave silk, but thinks of Altair on the other side of the Milky Way, for which she has longed.
It can be seen that in the Western Zhou Dynasty, there is the imagination and legend of the love story of Cowherd and Weaving Maiden. There are also records of Altair and Vega in the Book of the Heavenly Palace in the Historical Records and in the Astronomical Records of the Han Dynasty. In Jin Dynasty Zonghuai's Jingchu Yishuji (Records of the Years and Times of Jingchu), it is said that the Weaving Maiden is the granddaughter of the Heavenly Emperor, and that she meets with Altair in the Milky Way on the night of the seventh day of the seventh month, which has already sketched out a distinct outline for this love story. To the North and South Dynasties, Ren Jie in the "Description of differences" recorded: "East of the river, there is a beautiful woman, is the son of the emperor, the loom female workers, year after year of hard work, weaving into the clouds of thick silk clothes, hard work is not happy, appearance is not flawless to organize, the emperor of heaven, pity for its solitude, married with the river west Altair as his wife, since then that is abolished weaving yellow label work, greedy for joy does not return. Emperor anger, the responsibility to return to Hedong, once a year to meet." This record accurately he said is "nineteen poems" in the inspiration, one of which describes the "Tanabata Double Star":
"Long distant Altair star, bright river Han female; slender with a hand, ZaZa get the loom. The whole day is not a chapter, sobbing and sniffling like rain; the river is clear and shallow, and the distance between them is not enough. The river is clear and shallow, and we are all so far away from each other that we can't speak."
This poem is even more poignant than the one in the Book of Songs, and speaks of the sadness of a pair of lovers, who love each other in two places and are filled with sadness.
In addition, Yu Bao's "Record of the Search for Gods" in the Jin Dynasty described the twin stars of Cowherd and Weaving Maiden in the sky as the story of a filial son, Dong Yong, and his wife in the Han Dynasty. In Wu Jun's "Renewal of Qi Harmonious Records" during the Northern Dynasties, it was written, "Guiyang Chengwu Ding, an immortal Taoist, said to his younger brother, 'On the seventh day of the seventh month, the Weaving Maiden will cross the river.' His brother said, 'What is the reason for crossing the river?' He said: 'To visit the Cowherd for the time being.' To this day, it is said: 'The Weaving Maiden marries the Cowherd'. Bai Juyi's "Song of Long Hatred" of the Tang Dynasty reads, "On the seventh day of the seventh month in the Palace of Eternal Life, when no one is whispering in the middle of the night; in the sky I wish to be a bird with two wings, and on the earth I wish to be a twig with two branches." Recounting the Tang Xuanzong and Yang Yuhuan, with the example of the Cowherd and the Weaving Maiden, *** vowing the covenant of white heads.
Qin Shao-you of the Song Dynasty wrote a special song "Magpie Bridge Immortal":
The delicate clouds are tricky, the flying stars transmit hatred, and the silver man is a long way in the dark.
The first time we meet in the golden wind and jade dew, it is better than countless other things on earth.
The love is like water, the good time is like a dream, bear to take care of the magpie bridge to return to the road?
If two lovers are in love for a long time, how can it be in the morning and the evening?
In short, there are numerous poems and operas based on the love story of the Cowherd and the Weaving Maiden.
In summary, it can be inferred that the poignant love story of the Cowherd and the Weaving Maiden took place during the Western Zhou Dynasty, when the slave society was very strict in terms of hierarchy, and this story is a reflection of the general public's pursuit of happiness and their repression, which is a reference to the two stars in the sky, which is also the reality on earth.
It is said that during the Western Zhou Dynasty, there was a poor family in Qi, in the area of Shandong today, whose parents were lost early, and whose youngest brother lived by his brother and sister-in-law, and who went out to herd cows every day, and whom people called "Niu Lang".
As Niu Lang grew up, his sister-in-law never liked him, so he took an old ox and wandered off to live in a hut under a barren mountain. One side of the reclamation, one side of the weeping, teardrops dotted on the ground, soon after the birth of a colorful petunia flowers. Then, there are pink butterflies fluttering above, birds in the branches of the Diaoyu chirp and woo, calling endlessly, the field also grew a lush crop.
The old yellow cow's origin is extraordinary, it is the heaven of the golden calf star, because of the violation of the rules of the sky and was banished to the earth to suffer, have a sense of the small master of the cattle on its feeding and love, in addition to thankful for hard work in addition to plowing, but also dug out of the heart for the cattle groom to set up a beautiful good relationship.
Finally, Taurus learned that the seven fairies in the sky, from time to time, came to the earth in pairs to sneak around, and even bathed in the Mirror Lake in the eastern valley. So he sent a dream to Cowherd at night, asking him to go to the lake the next morning before dawn, take one of the fairies' garments hanging on a tree while they were playing in the water, and run back home without looking back, and he would get a beautiful fairy as his wife.
The Cowherd, who had been traveling over the mountains, saw seven beautiful women playing in the lake in the mist of the dawn, dressed in powdered clothes and decorated with flowers and temples, and felt that his heart was swaying; and then he picked up a pink shirt on a low tree, and ran back.
The fairy who was robbed of her dress and could not return to heaven was the Weaving Maiden, and that night she took advantage of the cover of the night to knock on the Cowherd's door naked. In the shadow of the dimly lit lamp, one is honest and simple, strong and handsome young farmer, one is as beautiful as a flower, soft as water, heavenly nymphs, four eyes meet, love at first sight, so in the quiet ragged spring night, the two love each other, with the Wushan cloud and rain.
Happy life is always faster than the life of pain, time flies, blink of an eye for three years, the weaving woman has given birth to a man and a woman for the cowherd two children, the old bull has died, leaving a pair of horns hanging on the wall, the cowherd can not afford to old bull, every day to the horns of the cow flabbergasted. The weaving woman stole down to the mortal world was finally known to the emperor, the heavenly soldiers and generals detained her back to the palace, the cowherd at this time is really now know all the sadness, want to talk about, want to talk about! A pair of small children also cried every day for their mothers, Cowherd's liver, thinking of the old bull that had given him unlimited help and care, hugging the horns and crying. Who expected a careless, the horns fell to the ground, a miracle happened, the two horns turned into two baskets, Cowherd put the two children into the baskets, ready to shoulder, looking for his wife, a gust of wind blew, two baskets like two strong wings, suddenly soared up to the ground, clouds and fog, the wind and lightning, like a flying in the sky, see his wife is in front of him, the Cowherd pursuing, see catching up, but by the Queen Mother noticed, pulling out the horn, and the cow's head, and then the cow's neck. Queen Mother noticed, pulled off the head of the golden hairpin, between the cowherd and the weaving maiden, immediately appeared the waves, white waves of the silver river, from a river east, a river west, far away from each other, but can not see each other.
The magpie bird is very sympathetic to the cowherd and the weaver's love is sincere, every year between summer and fall, while the Milky Way calm, when the group gathered on the river, the mouth and tail, build a magpie bridge, so that the cowherd and the weaver get together. "The bridge of magpies and the river turns, and the weaving girl and the ox meet each other at night." It is said that after Tanabata, the magpie birds will shed a lot of their feathers in bits and pieces, just because of the hard work of building the bridge.
The story of the Cowherd and the Weaving Maiden is more or less the same as the story of the River of Heaven, the Pairing of Heavenly Immortals, and the Meeting of the Magpie Bridge, which are all similar to each other; not only do they immortalize the human beings, but they also mortalize the immortals, so that the fairies can come down to the earth, and the mortals can ascend to heaven, and the story of a heavenly and human love is filled with the rich and sweet taste of human beings, and also with the life of the agricultural and pastoral society, as well as the colors of ethical and moral values.
Du Mu's "Autumn Sunset Poem": "The night is as cool as water in the sky, and I am lying down to watch the Altair and Vega stars." Du Fu's "Poem on the Milky Way": "The ox and the maiden cross the river every year, why is there ever a storm?"
These are recited by the world, and there is also:
"On the eve of Tanabata, the night of the seventh moon, the cowherd and the weaving maiden cross the magpie bridge;
Family begging for coincidence look at the autumn moon, wearing all the red silk of a hundred."
This poem is said to have been written by a six-year-old child, Lin Jie, in the Tang Dynasty, which shows that the general public is already familiar with the story of the Tanabata Festival, and even a six-year-old child can pen a catchy poem.
The love story of the Cowherd and the Weaving Maiden is most admired by young men and women. The so-called "Tanabata Festival" in the Northern and Southern Dynasties, the ban in the Yu-ling play "Magpie Bridge Fairy" opera, into the new fruits, the children of the city holding a lotus leaf, cheering and jumping. In Tang Dynasty, the night of Tanabata climbed high buildings and dangerous trees, and arranged feasts to appreciate the festival order. Song time to Tanabata for the "Daughter's Day", women in the courtyard with a scarf and handkerchief over their faces, looking up at the sky, silent prayers, according to the sight of the misty landscape, in order to foretell their own lifelong events. In the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties, the Tanabata Festival was called the "Festival of Seven Charms", and there were even more tricks on that night.
The most common is to set up incense in the court, Sheng Chen fruits and vegetables, looking at the sky incense worship, and then a breath in the haze to thread even seven needle holes, can have such eyesight, there must be a pair of hands, there are small spiders to catch a small box with, the next morning to watch if the web wire is rounded, called "get coquettish," and other "Throwing needles", a bowl of water, in the starlight, the embroidery needle gently thrown in the water, can float on the surface of the water is called "Daji", in fact, this is the physics of surface tension, as long as careful, probably not difficult to do.
There are also two poems about Tanabata, which can be read in a few words. One is:
"The rain in front of the Beggar's House is clearing up at first, and the curved crescent moon is accompanied by two stars;
the neighboring maidens are all learning from each other, and they are fighting to take the gold basin to divine another life."
One of the songs is:
The maiden begs for the heavenly maiden, and at the end of the night, she is not yet finished;
The jade court opens the powder seat, and the sleeve holds the gold plate.
It is easy to thread a needle to the moon, but difficult to make a thread in the wind;
I don't know who got the skill, but I'll try to find out on tomorrow day."
These two poems describe the activities and mentality of women on the night of Tanabata.
Today, young men and women's emotions have been no barrier, not only the abstract Milky Way can not be isolated, even the substantive constraints on the elders, social morality and law, has not been much effect, but to revisit the story of the Cowherd and the Weaving Maiden, can be young men and women's love, resulting in an illusory and romantic longing, which evokes a more cherished idea, then recognize the eve of the seventh day of the month for the "Valentine's Day", it has a positive meaning.