The Dragon Boat Festival is an ancient traditional festival that began in China during the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, and has a history of more than 2,000 years. There are many origins and legends of the Dragon Boat Festival, and here we only introduce the following four:

According to the "Biographies of Qu Yuan and Jia Sheng" in "Records of the Grand Historian", Qu Yuan was a minister of King Huai of Chu during the Spring and Autumn Period. He advocated the promotion of talents, enriching the country and strengthening the army, and strongly advocated the alliance with Qi to resist Qin. He was strongly opposed by the noble Zi Lan and others. Qu Yuan was dismissed from his post, expelled from the capital, and exiled to the Yuan and Xiang River basins. During his exile, he wrote immortal poems such as "Li Sao", "Heavenly Questions", and "Nine Songs" that were concerned about the country and the people. They were unique and had a far-reaching influence (therefore, the Dragon Boat Festival is also called the Poet's Day). In 278 BC, the Qin army broke through the capital of Chu. Qu Yuan saw his motherland being invaded and felt heartbroken, but he could not bear to abandon his motherland. On May 5, after writing his last work "Huai Sha", he threw himself into the Miluo River with a stone and died, composing a magnificent patriotic movement with his life.

Legend has it that after Qu Yuan died, the people of Chu State were extremely sad and flocked to the Miluo River to pay tribute to Qu Yuan. Fishermen rowed boats and fished for his body on the river. One fisherman took out the rice balls, eggs and other food prepared for Qu Yuan and threw them into the river with a "thump, thump" sound, saying that the fish, lobsters and crabs would be full and would not bite Qu Yuan's body. People followed suit. An old doctor took a jar of realgar wine and poured it into the river, saying that it was to make the dragons faint and avoid hurting Qu Yuan. Later, in order to prevent the rice balls from being eaten by dragons, people came up with the idea of ​​wrapping the rice with neem leaves and wrapping them with colored silk, which developed into zongzi.

From then on, on the fifth day of May every year, there was a custom of dragon boat racing, eating rice dumplings and drinking realgar wine to commemorate the patriotic poet Qu Yuan.

The second legend of the Dragon Boat Festival, which is widely spread in Jiangsu and Zhejiang, is to commemorate Wu Zixu in the Spring and Autumn Period (770-476 BC). Wu Zixu was a member of the Chu State. His father and brother were killed by the King of Chu. Later, Zixu abandoned the dark and went to the State of Wu to help Wu attack Chu. After five battles, he entered the capital of Chu, Yingcheng. At that time, King Ping of Chu was dead. Zixu dug a tomb and whipped the corpse 300 times to avenge the killing of his father and brother. After the death of King Helu of Wu, his son Fucha succeeded to the throne. The morale of the Wu army was high, and they won every battle. The State of Yue was defeated. King Goujian of Yue asked for peace, and Fucha promised it. Zixu suggested that the State of Yue should be completely destroyed, but Fucha refused. The prime minister of Wu was bribed by the State of Yue and slandered Zixu. Fucha believed it and gave Zixu a sword, and Zixu died as a result. Zixu was a loyal and honest man who was ready to face death with equanimity. Before his death, he said to his neighbors, "After I die, dig out my eyes and hang them on the east gate of Wujing, so that I can watch the Yue army enter the city and destroy Wu." Then he committed suicide. King Fuchai was furious when he heard this, and ordered Zixu's body to be taken, wrapped in leather and thrown into the river on May 5th. Therefore, it is said that the Dragon Boat Festival is also the day to commemorate Wu Zixu.

The third legend of the Dragon Boat Festival is to commemorate the Eastern Han Dynasty (23-220 AD) filial daughter Cao E who jumped into the river to save her father. Cao E was from Shangyu in the Eastern Han Dynasty. Her father drowned in the river and his body was not found for several days. At that time, the filial daughter Cao E was only fourteen years old and cried along the river day and night. After seventeen days, on May 5th, she also jumped into the river and carried out her father's body five days later. This became a myth and was then passed on to the county governor, who ordered Du Shang to erect a monument for her and asked his disciple Handan Chun to write a eulogy to praise her.

The tomb of the filial daughter Cao E is in Shaoxing, Zhejiang Province. It is said that the Cao E stele was written by Wang Yi of Jin Dynasty. To commemorate Cao E's filial piety, later generations built the Cao E Temple at the place where Cao E jumped into the river. The village where she lived was renamed Cao E Town, and the place where Cao E died for her father was named Cao E River.

A large number of unearthed cultural relics and archaeological research in modern times have confirmed that in the Neolithic Age, there was a kind of cultural relic characterized by geometric stamped pottery in the vast area of ​​the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River. According to experts, the ethnic group of the relic was a tribe that worshipped the dragon totem, known as the Baiyue people in history. The patterns on the unearthed pottery and historical legends show that they had the custom of cutting their hair and tattooing, living in a water village, and comparing themselves to the descendants of the dragon. Their production tools were mostly stone tools, and there were also small bronze tools such as shovels and chisels. Among the pots and jars used as daily necessities, the stamped pottery tripod for cooking food was unique to them and was one of the symbols of their ethnic group. There were still Baiyue people until the Qin and Han Dynasties, and the Dragon Boat Festival was a festival they created to worship their ancestors. In the thousands of years of historical development, most of the Baiyue people have merged into the Han nationality, and the rest have evolved into many ethnic minorities in the south. Therefore, the Dragon Boat Festival has become a festival for the entire Chinese nation.