The concept of the Spring Festival and the year was originally derived from agriculture. In ancient times, people called the growth cycle of the grain “year”, which means “year” in Shuowen. The ancient people called the growth cycle of the grain “Nian”, “Shuowen. In the Xia and Shang dynasties produced the summer calendar, the cycle of the moon for the month, a year divided into twelve months, each month to the day of the moon for the first day of the first month for the first day of the first day of the first month of the son of the time known as the first of the year, that is, the beginning of the year, also known as the year, the year of the name is from the Zhou Dynasty, to the Western Han Dynasty to formally fixed, and has been continued until today. But the first day of the first month in ancient times was known as “New Year's Day”, until after the victory of the Xinhai Revolution in modern China, the Nanjing Provisional Government in order to comply with the agricultural season and facilitate statistics, the provisions of the summer calendar in the civilian population, in the government agencies, factories, mines, schools and organizations to implement the Gregorian calendar to the Gregorian calendar of the first day of the new year for the New Year's Day, the first day of the first month of the Lunar New Year, known as the Spring Festival.

September 27, 1949, the founding of New China, in the first plenary session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, adopted the use of the world's common calendar, the first day of the first month of the Gregorian calendar as New Year's Day, commonly known as the solar calendar year; the first day of the first month of the Lunar Calendar is usually in the spring before and after the start of the first day of the Lunar Calendar, and therefore the first day of the first month of the Chinese Lunar Calendar is designated as “Chinese New Year,” commonly known as the The first day of the first month of the lunar calendar is usually around the beginning of spring. Traditionally, the Spring Festival is celebrated from the Lunar New Year's Day festival on the eighth day of the Lunar New Year or the Zaos Festival on the twenty-third day of the Lunar New Year until the fifteenth day of the first month of the Lunar New Year, with New Year's Eve and the first day of the Lunar New Year as the climax. During the Spring Festival, the Han Chinese and most of the ethnic minorities in China have to hold a variety of celebratory activities, most of these activities to the gods and Buddha, pay tribute to ancestors, get rid of the old and bring in the new, welcome the Jubilee to receive the blessing, and pray for a good year as the main content. Activities in a colorful form, with a strong ethnic characteristics.

Year-end vigil, that is, in the last night of the old year, do not sleep, stay up to meet the new year's arrival of the custom, also known as New Year's Eve vigil, commonly known as “boiled year”. To explore the origin of this custom, there is an interesting story circulating in the folklore:

Ancient times, there is a fierce monster, scattered in the mountains and dense forests, people call them “year”. It is hideous, ferocious nature, specializing in eating birds and beasts, scales and insects, a day to change a taste, from knocking insects have been eaten to the living, so that people talk about the “year” color change. Later, people slowly mastered the “year” of the law of activities, it is every three hundred and sixty-five days scurrying to the crowd of places to taste a mouthful of food, and the time of the infestation are in the dark, and so on, until the rooster breaks the dawn, they will return to the mountains and forests to go.

Calculated the date of the “year” rampage, the people will be this terrible night as a gate to brake, called “New Year's Eve”, and came up with a set of New Year's Eve approach: every night, every family is done in advance of the evening meal, put out the fire and clean the stove, and then put the chicken coop Cattle fences all tied up, the front and back doors of the house are sealed, hiding in the house to eat “New Year's Eve dinner”, because this dinner has the meaning of bad luck and uncertainty, so it is very rich, in addition to the whole family to dine together to express the harmony and reunion, but also have to be in the meal before the sacrifice to the ancestors, praying for the blessing of the gods of the ancestors, and peacefully through the night, after eating dinner, no one will have a good time, and then the fire will be shut off. After dinner, no one dares to sleep, sitting together in a crowded chat. Gradually formed on New Year's Eve to stay up to keep the New Year's custom.

The custom of keeping the New Year's Eve rose in the North and South Dynasties, and many literati in the Liang Dynasty had poems about keeping the New Year's Eve. “One night is even a double year, and the fifth night is divided into two years.” People light candles or oil lamps and keep vigil all night, symbolizing that all evil plagues and diseases will be driven away, and looking forward to an auspicious new year. This custom has been passed down to this day.

According to legend, in ancient times, there was a young man named Wannian, who saw that the festival was very chaotic at that time, and had the intention to set the festival in order. But the bitter can not find a way to calculate the time, one day, he went up to the mountains to cut firewood tired, sitting in the shade of a tree to rest, the movement of the tree inspired him, he designed a measurement of the sun and shadow counting the time of day sundial, the determination of the time of day, and later, the cliffs on the drip of the fountain inspired him to inspiration, and his hands to do a five-tiered funnel pot, to calculate the time. Over time, he realized that every 360 days or so, the four seasons would rotate and the length of the day would repeat itself.

The king of the country at that time was called Zu Yi, and he was also often distressed by the unpredictability of the weather winds and clouds. Wannian knew, took the sundial and funnel pot to see the emperor, to Zuyi clear reasoning for the operation of the sun and the moon. Zu Yi listened to the dragon's face, feel reasonable. So left Wannian, in front of the Temple of Heaven to build the Sun and Moon Pavilion, built the sundial and funnel kiosk. And hope to be able to measure the sun and moon law, project the accurate morning and evening time, create the calendar, for the benefit of the people of the world.

Once, Zu Yi went to find out the progress of the Ten Thousand Years Test Calendar. When he ascended to the altar of the Sun and the Moon, he saw a poem engraved on the stone wall beside the Temple of Heaven:

The sun rises and sets three hundred and six times, and the cycle begins again from the beginning.

The grass and trees wither and prosper in four seasons, and there are twelve rounds in a year.

Knowing that Wannian had created the calendar, he personally climbed up to the Sun and Moon Pavilion to visit Wannian. Wannian pointed to the sky and said to Zuyi: “It is now the fullness of twelve months, the old year is over, the new spring begins again, I pray that the king of the country to set a festival”. Zu Yi said, “Spring is the first day of the year, let's call it Spring Festival”. This is said to be the origin of the Spring Festival. As winter turned to spring, year after year, Wannian, after a long period of observation and careful projection, formulated an accurate solar calendar, which was full of silver whiskers when he presented it to the succeeding ruler of the country. The king of the country was deeply touched, in order to commemorate the achievements of Wan Nian, the solar calendar named “Wan Nian Calendar”, Wan Nian as the sun and moon life star. Later on, people put up a picture of the star of longevity on New Year's Day, which is said to be in honor of the highly respected Wannian.

The custom of putting up Spring Festival couplets is said to have started about a thousand years ago in the Later Shu period, which is supported by history. In addition, according to the Jade Candle Canon, the Yanjing Yearly Record and other writings, the original form of the Spring Festival couplets is what is known as the “Peach Symbol”.

In ancient Chinese mythology, there is a world of ghosts, in which there is a mountain with a big peach tree covering 3,000 miles, and a golden rooster at the top of the tree. Whenever the golden rooster crowed in the morning, the ghosts that had gone out to roam at night would be rushed back to the ghost world. The gate of the Ghost Realm was situated in the northeast of the peach tree, and by the gate stood two godmen named Shentan and Yubi. If a ghost did something harmful at night, the gods would immediately find it, catch it, tie it up with a rope made of mango reeds, and feed it to the tiger. Therefore, all the ghosts in the world were afraid of Shentian and Yubi. So the folk used peach wood to carve into their likeness and put it in front of their house to avoid evil and prevent harm. Later, people simply carve the name of God Tantui and Yubi on the mahogany board, thinking that this can also suppress the evil to go to the evil. This kind of mahogany board was later called “peach talisman”.

To the Song Dynasty, people began to write couplets on the mahogany board, one does not lose the significance of mahogany to suppress evil, the second is to express their good wishes, the third is to decorate the portal, in order to beautiful. And write couplets on red paper to symbolize the joy and auspiciousness of the New Year, posted on both sides of the doors and windows, to express people's prayers for good luck in the coming year.

In order to pray for a family's well-being, people in some places still retain the habit of sticking door gods. It is said that if two door gods are posted on the front door, all demons and ghosts will be afraid. In folklore, the door god is a symbol of righteousness and force, the ancients believed that the strange-looking people often have magical endowments and extraordinary skills. They are upright and kind-hearted, to catch ghosts and demons is their nature and responsibility, people look up to the ghost hunter Zhong Kui, that is, this kind of strange looks. So the folk god of the door is always angry eyes, grim-looking, holding a variety of traditional weapons, ready to fight with the ghosts and demons that dare to come to the door. Since the doors of residential houses in China usually open in pairs, the door gods are always in pairs.

After the Tang Dynasty, in addition to the previous two generals Shentian and Yubi, people also took Qin Shubao and Yuchigong, two Tang Dynasty military generals, as door deities. According to legend, Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty was sick and heard the ghosts and demons outside his door, which made him feel uneasy all night long. So he asked these two generals to stand beside the door with weapons to guard it, and the next night there were no more ghosts to disturb him. Later, Emperor Tang Taizong had the images of the two generals painted and pasted on the door, and this custom began to be widely spread among the people.