春节的由来(英文)

春节的由来

(

英文

)

The Origin of Chinese New Year

The Chinese New Year is now popularly known as the Spring Festival

because

it

starts

from

the

Begining

of

Spring

(the

first

of

the

twenty-four

terms in coodination with the changes of Nature). Its origin is too old

to

be

traced.

Several

explanations

are

hanging

around.

All

agree,

however,

that the word Nian, which in modern Chinese solely means year, was

originally

the

name

of

a

monster

beast

that

started

to

prey

on

people

the

night before the beginning of a new year.

One legend goes that the beast Nian had a very big mouth that would

swallow a great many people with one bite. People were very scared. One

day, an old man came to their rescue, offering to subdue Nian. To Nian

he said, I hear say that you are very capable, but can you swallow the

other beasts of prey on earth instead of people who are by no means of

your worthy opponents? So, it did swallow many of the beasts of prey on

earth

that

also

harrassed

people

and

their

domestic

animals

from

time

to

time.

After

that,

the

old

man

disappeared

riding

the

beast

Nian.

He

turned

out

to

be

an

immortal

god.

Now

that

Nian

is

gone

and

other

beasts

of

prey

are

also

scared

into forests,

people

begin

to

enjoy

their

peaceful

life.

Before

the

old

man

left,

he

had

told

people

to

put

up

red

paper

decorations

on

their

windows

and

doors

at

each

year’s

end

to

scare

away

Nian

in

case

it

sneaked

back

again,

because

red

is

the

color

the

beast

feared

the

most.

From then on, the tradition of observing the conquest of Nian is

carried on from generation to generation. The term Guo Nian, which may

mean Survive the Nian

becomes today Celebrate

the (New) Year

as the word