|
Dragon Boat Festival
The Dragon Boat Festival ( zh, s=端午节, t=端午節, first=t, p=Duānwǔ jié, cy=Dyūnńgh jit) is a traditional Chinese holiday that occurs on the fifth day of the fifth month of the Chinese calendar, which corresponds to late May or early June in the Gregorian calendar. The holiday commemorates Qu Yuan who was the beloved prime minister of the southern Chinese state of Chu during the Warring States period, about 600 B.C. to 200 B.C., and is celebrated by holding dragon boat races and eating sticky rice dumplings called ''zongzi'', which were southern Chinese traditions. Dragon Boat Festival integrates praying for good luck and taking respite from the summer heat. In September 2009, UNESCO officially approved the holiday's inclusion in the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, becoming the first Chinese holiday to be selected. Names The English language name for the holiday is "Dragon Boat Festival", used as the official English translatio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chinese Lunisolar Calendar
The traditional Chinese calendar, dating back to the Han dynasty, is a lunisolar calendar that blends solar, lunar, and other cycles for social and agricultural purposes. While modern China primarily uses the Gregorian calendar for official purposes, the traditional calendar remains culturally significant. It determines the timing of Chinese New Year with traditions like the twelve animals of the Chinese Zodiac still widely observed. The traditional Chinese calendar uses the sexagenary cycle, a repeating system of Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches, to mark years, months, and days. This system, along with astronomical observations and mathematical calculations, was developed to align solar and lunar cycles, though some approximations are necessary due to the natural differences between these cycles. Over centuries, the calendar was refined through advancements in astronomy and horology, with dynasties introducing variations to improve accuracy and meet cultural or politi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chinese Zodiac
The Chinese zodiac is a traditional classification scheme based on the Chinese calendar that assigns an animal and its reputed attributes to each year in a repeating twelve-year (or duodenary) cycle. The zodiac is very important in traditional Chinese culture and exists as a reflection of Chinese philosophy and Chinese culture, culture. Chinese folkways held that one's personality is related to the attributes of their zodiac animal. Originating from China, the zodiac and its variations remain popular in many East Asian and Southeast Asian Sovereign state, countries, such as Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Singapore, Nepal, Bhutan, Cambodia, and Thailand. Identifying this scheme as a "''zodiac''" reflects superficial similarities to the western astrology, Western zodiac: both divide time cycles into twelve parts, label the majority of those parts with animals, and are used to ascribe a person's personality or events in their life to the person's particular relationship to the cycle. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mi (surname)
Mi is the Chinese tones, atonal Wade–Giles and pinyin romanization of Chinese, romanization of various Chinese language, Chinese Chinese surname, surnames. Transcribing the character , it was the name of the royal house of the ancient China, ancient ancient Chinese states, state of Chu (state), Chu. It is also the transcription of the surnames , , and , along with a few other less common names. Mǐ (芈) The surname ''Mǐ'' () was originally an onomatopoeia for Caprinae, caprine bleating with the reconstruction of Old Chinese, reconstructed Old Chinese pronunciation *''meʔ''. As the Chinese family name, family name of the royal house of Chu (state), Chu, it was apparently used to transcribe a Kam–Tai languages, Kam–Tai word in the Chu language, Chu dialect meaning "Asian black bear, bear". This was then calqued into Old Chinese as (''Xiong (surname), Xióng''), used as the Chinese clan name, clan name of the ruling branch of the family. The Mi also ruled Kui () and some Chu s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Zhou Dynasty
The Zhou dynasty ( ) was a royal dynasty of China that existed for 789 years from until 256 BC, the longest span of any dynasty in Chinese history. During the Western Zhou period (771 BC), the royal house, surnamed Ji, had military control over territories centered on the Wei River valley and North China Plain. Even as Zhou suzerainty became increasingly ceremonial over the following Eastern Zhou period (771–256 BC), the political system created by the Zhou royal house survived in some form for several additional centuries. A date of 1046 BC for the Zhou's establishment is supported by the Xia–Shang–Zhou Chronology Project and David Pankenier, but David Nivison and Edward L. Shaughnessy date the establishment to 1045 BC. The latter Eastern Zhou period is itself roughly subdivided into two parts. During the Spring and Autumn period (), power became increasingly decentralized as the authority of the royal house diminished. The Warring States ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chu (state)
Chu (, Old Chinese: ''*s-r̥aʔ'') was an Ancient Chinese states, ancient Chinese state during the Zhou dynasty. Their first ruler was King Wu of Chu in the early 8th century BC. Chu was located in the south of the Zhou heartland and lasted during the Spring and Autumn period. At the end of the Warring States period it was annexed by the Qin (state), Qin in 223 BC during the Qin's wars of unification. Also known as Jing () and Jingchu (), Chu included most of the present-day provinces of Hubei and Hunan, along with parts of Chongqing, Guizhou, Henan, Anhui, Jiangxi, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, and Shanghai. For more than 400 years, the Chu capital Danyang (Chu), Danyang was located at the junction of the Dan River (China), Dan and Xi Rivers near present-day Xichuan County, Henan, but later moved to Ying (Chu), Ying. The house of Chu originally bore the Chinese surname#Xing, ancestral temple surname Nai ( OC: /*rneːlʔ/) which was later written as Mi (surname), Mi ( OC: /*meʔ/). Th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
State (Chinese)
Ancient Chinese states () were dynastic polities of China within and without the Zhou cultural sphere prior to Qin's wars of unification. They ranged in size from large estates, to city-states to much vaster territories with multiple population centers. Many of these submitted to royal authority, but many did not—even those that shared the same culture and ancestral temple surname as the ruling house. Prior to the Zhou conquest of Shang, these ancient states were already extant as units of the preceding Shang dynasty, Predynastic Zhou or polities of other cultural groups. Once the Zhou had established themselves, they made grants of land and relative local autonomy to kinfolk in return for military support and tributes, under a system known as '' fengjian''. The rulers of the states were collectively the ''zhuhou'' (). Over the course of the Zhou dynasty ( 1046–256 ), the ties of family between the states attenuated, the power of the central government waned, and the states ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Artemisia (plant)
''Artemisia'' ( ) is a large, diverse genus of plants belonging to the daisy family, Asteraceae, with almost 500 species. Common names for various species in the genus include mugwort, Artemisia absinthium, wormwood, and sagebrush. Some botanists split the genus into several genera, but DNA analysis does not support the maintenance of the genera ''Crossostephium'', ''Filifolium'', ''Neopallasia'', ''Seriphidium'', and ''Sphaeromeria''; three other segregate (taxonomy), segregate genera—''Stilnolepis'', ''Elachanthemum'', and ''Kaschgaria''—are maintained by this evidence. Occasionally, some of the species are called sages, causing confusion with the ''Salvia'' sages in the family Lamiaceae. ''Artemisia'' comprises hardiness (plants), hardy herbaceous plants and shrubs, which are known for the powerful chemical constituents in their essential oils. ''Artemisia'' species grow in temperate climates of both hemispheres, usually in dry or semiarid habitats. Notable species include ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Acorus Calamus
''Acorus calamus'' (also called sweet flag, sway or muskrat root, among many other common names) is a species of flowering plant with psychoactive chemicals. It is a tall wetland monocot of the family Acoraceae, in the genus ''Acorus.'' Although used in traditional medicine over centuries to treat digestive disorders and pain, it has no clinical evidence of safety or efficacy and may be toxic if ingested, and so has been commercially banned in the United States. Description Sweet flag is a herbaceous perennial, tall. Its leaves resemble those of the iris family. Sweet flag consists of tufts of basal leaves that rise from a spreading rhizome In botany and dendrology, a rhizome ( ) is a modified subterranean plant stem that sends out roots and Shoot (botany), shoots from its Node (botany), nodes. Rhizomes are also called creeping rootstalks or just rootstalks. Rhizomes develop from .... The leaves are erect yellowish-brown, radical, with pink sheathing at their base ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Portuguese Language
Portuguese ( or ) is a Western Romance language of the Indo-European language family originating from the Iberian Peninsula of Europe. It is the official language of Angola, Brazil, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, Portugal and São Tomé and Príncipe, and has co-official language status in East Timor, Equatorial Guinea and Macau. Portuguese-speaking people or nations are known as Lusophone (). As the result of expansion during colonial times, a cultural presence of Portuguese speakers is also found around the world. Portuguese is part of the Iberian Romance languages, Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several dialects of Vulgar Latin in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia and the County of Portugal, and has kept some Gallaecian language, Celtic phonology. With approximately 250 million native speakers and 17 million second language speakers, Portuguese has approximately 267 million total speakers. It is usually listed as the List of languages by number of native speaker ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hong Kong
Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the world. Hong Kong was established as a colony of the British Empire after the Qing dynasty ceded Hong Kong Island in 1841–1842 as a consequence of losing the First Opium War. The colony expanded to the Kowloon Peninsula in 1860 and was further extended when the United Kingdom obtained a 99-year lease of the New Territories in 1898. Hong Kong was occupied by Japan from 1941 to 1945 during World War II. The territory was handed over from the United Kingdom to China in 1997. Hong Kong maintains separate governing and economic systems from that of mainland China under the principle of one country, two systems. Originally a sparsely populated area of farming and fishing villages,. the territory is now one of the world's most signific ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Macau
Macau or Macao is a special administrative regions of China, special administrative region of the People's Republic of China (PRC). With a population of about people and a land area of , it is the most List of countries and dependencies by population density, densely populated region in the world. Formerly a Portuguese Empire, Portuguese colony, the territory of Portuguese Macau was first leased to Portugal by the Ming dynasty as a trading post in 1557. Portugal paid an annual rent and administered the territory under Chinese sovereignty until 1887, when Portugal gained perpetual colonial rights with the signing of the Sino-Portuguese Treaty of Peking. The colony remained under Portuguese rule until the 1999 handover to China. Macau is a Special administrative regions of China, special administrative region of China, which maintains separate governing and economic systems from those of mainland China under the principle of "one country, two systems".. The unique blend of Port ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
