(New Year walks to the grassroots) "Carnival" in a thousand-year-old village: making social fires, exhibiting intangible cultural heritage, and welcoming the Lantern Festival
Chinanews.com, Yuncheng, February 3rd, title: "Carnival" in a thousand-year-old village: making social fires, exhibiting intangible cultural heritage, and welcoming the Lantern Festival
Author Yang Peipei
Dragon lantern dancing, stilt walking, Yangko twisting, bamboo horse running, two ghost wrestling... approaching the Lantern Festival on the 15th day of the first lunar month, Quanzhang Village, Xinjiang County, Yuncheng City, Shanxi Province, a thousand-year-old village, is very lively. People from all over the world came to watch, and a "village carnival" was staged locally.
According to records, Quanzhang Village has a history of more than 2,700 years.
Its historical and cultural background is profound, and it has cultural relics and historic sites such as Quanzhang Guandi Temple, Quanzhang Ruins, and Jin Linggong Ruins.
At the same time, the historical pattern and traditional style of the village are preserved here, and it was selected into the fourth batch of Chinese traditional villages in 2016.
A dragon dance performance set off a climax amidst cheers and applause.
Photo by Wu Junjie
In the past few days, Quanzhang Village has been full of gongs and drums, crowds are surging, and performance teams fill the streets and alleys, recreating the scene of "everything is full of people, and everyone is singing and advocating" described in Zhang Dai's "Tao An Meng Yi".
At the performance site, with the sound of musical instruments, more than 30 performers rode "high-headed horses".
This is a traditional folk activity "running a bamboo horse" popular in Shanxi, and it is also an indispensable activity for making social fires during the Spring Festival every year.
Quanzhang Village, Xinjiang County, Yuncheng City, Shanxi Province, a thousand-year-old village, is very lively.
Photo by Wu Junjie
Bamboo Horse Running is a traditional folk dance for self-entertainment. According to legend, it began in the Song Dynasty.
These performers are all local villagers, and Han Hongyu is one of them. She liked singing and dancing since she was a child, and she was very interested in running bamboo horses.
"As soon as the music plays, I feel very energetic, and I really like the chicness of letting the horse gallop." In order to play the role of "leader horse", Han Hongyu often watches horse riding performances on TV, and also observes the horse's running movements on the spot.
Meanwhile, Sun Zhijie's traditional Chinese social fire show "Two Ghosts Wrestling" drew applause from the audience.
Ergui wrestling, also known as Erwa wrestling and Erxi wrestling, is a form of folk dance performed by one person carrying two ghosts (puppet props) on his back.
The gongs and drums in Quanzhang Village were loud, the crowds were surging, and the performance teams filled the streets and alleys.
Photo by Wu Junjie
It can be seen at the scene that Sun Zhijie, under the cover of the props, used his arms and legs to simulate the wrestling movements of two people. He performed routines such as swinging, turning, rolling, flipping, throwing, sweeping, and kicking. The movements were realistic and very dynamic.
"I usually work in Xi'an. This year when I came home for the New Year, I ran into a social fire in the village, so I performed this show." Sun Zhijie said that in 2019, the neighbor who performed "Two Ghost Wrestling" was old, so he taught him the skills .
After studying for two days, coupled with my own thinking, I performed for the first time in the village in the same year.
This year is his second performance of "Two Ghosts Wrestling", and he did not expect it to be so popular.
"Running Bamboo Horse" is a traditional folk activity popular in Shanxi.
Photo by Wu Junjie
Accompanied by the sound of gongs and drums, the 18-meter "long dragon" sometimes soars into the air, sometimes dives, and sometimes hovers under the waves of the villagers... A dragon dance performance set off a climax amidst cheers and applause.
According to Xu Huzi, head of the dragon dance team in Quanzhang Village, this "dragon" has been passed down from generation to generation. For more than a hundred years, generations of people in the village have danced a "dragon" together, and they have a lot of affection for it.
"There must be dragon dances in the community fires in the village. We have loved watching dragon dances since we were young. We learned from the older generation when we were teenagers, and it is passed down from generation to generation." Xu Huzi said that young people in the village can also spontaneously set up dragon dance teams. , they all love traditional culture and are willing to perform.
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