The Spring Festival is not the grandest festival in Great Qin, the most important festival in Great Qin is the winter solstice wax festival. Ancient people said about the winter solstice is: the Yin pole of the arrival, Yang Qi began to grow, the day to the south, the day short of the arrival, the shadow of the sun is long of the arrival, so it is called "winter solstice".
The people of Daqin believe that after the winter solstice, the days get longer and longer, and the yang energy rises, which is the beginning of a cycle of festivals and an auspicious day to be celebrated. The winter solstice is equal to New Year's Day and the beginning of a new year.
The first day of the Chinese New Year in the 21st century is only the first day of the lunar calendar in the minds of the people of Qin.
The winter solstice has no fixed date in the lunar calendar, to determine which day is the winter solstice, is determined by the twenty-four solar terms. This year's winter solstice is in the middle of November of the lunar calendar, the state of Wu because of the West Marquis is seriously ill, the State of Zhao and in the northwest of the throat of the mouth of the troops watching intently, the most important festival of the year only hastily by the Prince Sheng instead of the West Marquis presided over a passing scene.
Zheng Yuming and Chu Chaohui, both of whom were accustomed to treating the Spring Festival as the most important festival of the year, wanted to perpetuate this habit in Wu, and moreover, in order to give the people of Wu a fresh start psychologically, they decided to make the starting day of the lunar calendar the equivalent of the important festival of the Waxing Sacrifice, and, starting from the New Year's Eve, gave three days' vacation to the ministers of the royal court and to the public officials.
Although the people of Great Qin did not regard the first day of the first month as the beginning of the year, the etiquette of paying respect to one's elders on the first day of the lunar calendar was still in place. Therefore, on the morning of the first day of the Lunar New Year, there was an endless stream of people coming to the Prime Minister's Mansion to pay their respects.
The gate of the Prime Minister's Office usually opens at the early hour, that is, at seven in the morning, but on the first day of the year, the Prime Minister's Office did not open its doors on time, and it was not until nearly eight o'clock that Maren assigned his guards to open the gate, and let in the ministers and nobles who would come to pay their respects in a batch of inspections.
On the main hall of the Prime Minister's Affairs, only Chu Chao Hui, who was wearing a dark blue brocade cotton robe with deep clothes and a face full of spring breeze, sat in the center to receive everyone's obeisance.
"Great General! Why don't we see the Prime Minister?" Guo Huben Guo Si swept a pair of eyes around the grand hall, his infatuation with Zheng Yuming didn't change because Zheng Yuming's identity became the third son of the King of Wu, but instead became even more fervent.
Guo Si was under the jurisdiction of Chu Chao Hui, who hated Guo Si's mesmerized expression that he would stare at Zheng Yuming whenever he saw him, so he either supported Guo Huben to stay away from the royal capital, or kept giving Guo Si errands away from the royal court. Looking at Guo Huben, who was busy with his work, the unknown ministers of the royal court thought that Chu Chao Hui highly valued this newly knighted military general.
Guo Si has not seen Zheng Yuming figure for a long time, he wanted to take advantage of the first day of the first month to pay his respects to the opportunity to see more Zheng Yuming a few eyes, so less than seven o'clock to the Prime Minister's Office waiting at the door, in the cold outside the gate, has been waiting for more than an hour before he was able to get in the door, but when he came to the main hall with excitement, but did not see Zheng Yuming appeared, and Chu Zhaohui has already made a gesture of sending off the guest, which allows Guo Si how can be willing to do so.
Chu Zhaohui's mouth curled slightly, the face that has always had cold lines is exceptionally soft today. He was in a happy mood today, looking at Guo Si who was looking around surprisingly felt a bit cute, not as harsh as the original so piercing his eyes.
"Premier affairs all year round busy with political affairs, daily chicken wake up, no day can be idle, today is the beginning of the calendar year, should let the premier affairs have a relaxing day, so everyone should not disturb him today." The real reason is that Zheng Yuming was not able to sleep until dawn, the person who never snored even snored loudly, Chu Chao Hui woke up after sleeping for more than an hour and could not bear to be alarmed, decided to let Zheng Yuming have a good night's sleep, as for the excuses, General Chu could make one up with a little movement of his brain.
"Oh, so!" Guo Si lost, secretly blame himself for not thinking more about Zheng Yuming's body, it turned out that Zheng Yuming was very busy as a councilor in Nambu, and by the time Ripple Ji rebelled and Gong Ziguang was poisoned, he was even busier and more distracted.
Once Chu Chao Hui explained this, the nobles and ministers who came to pay New Year's visit felt that it made sense that the busiest people should enjoy the benefit of sleeping on New Year's Day. Since then, Wu began to have the first day of the first month, the busiest person in the family can sleep in the custom, this is similar to the twenty-first century in the southern part of the heavenly kingdom, the first day of the first month of the male host to make breakfast custom.
Three days of spring vacation passed in a flash. Early in the morning of the fifth day of the first month of the Lunar New Year, King Sheng of Wu, dressed in a black gold silk and inlaid patterned dragon and phoenix monarch's coronation suit, wearing a white jade beaded nine-tasseled coronet, sat on a four-horse-drawn black passenger moped to welcome Tian's concubine, followed closely behind the passenger moped by two luxurious four-wheeled carriages, which were the same color of black, and apart from these three, all the other attendants and escorts rode on horseback or on foot.
The wedding ceremony of Great Qin follows the Zhou system, the same three books and six rites. The carriage for welcoming the bride is different from the big red one in the later times, but the black one is used to welcome the bride. Black is the symbol of the royal family, and the Qin people not only think that marriage is a lively event, but also a solemn event, so they have to use the most honorable color. Of course, only the Son of Heaven and the king of the country could use the positive black color, while others could only use the light black color. However, only the sons of heaven and the kings of the country and the nobles strictly followed such a complicated wedding etiquette, and ordinary civilians were not in a position to pay attention to this at all.
Wu Wangsheng's moped drove to Tian's residence, Wu Wangsheng himself got off the bus and handed over the geese to the Tian family as a gift. Shortly after the Tian family received the geese, Tian Ji-nui, dressed in black and deep clothes, stepped out of the mansion with the help of her maids, and at this time, the bride did not have the custom of covering her head, but only painted her face with heavy makeup. The fully-dressed Tian Ji-nui first boarded the mikoshi of Wu Wang-sheng, who did not ride with his bride, but sat in the position of the coachman and drove the wheels in place three times with the help of the mikoshi's coachman.
The groom drives the wheel around three times, a symbol of the patriarchal era when men were at the helm and women "followed their husbands when they got married".
After Wu Wangsheng finished his rounds, Tian Ji-nui got off the mikoshi and rode on the black four-wheeled carriage at the back. Wu Wangsheng returned to the palace in his own carriage and went to the gate of the palace wall to welcome the bride. After receiving his bride at the gate of the palace wall, King Wu had to bring his bride to pay homage to his ancestors and tell them and the spirits of heaven and earth that he had married his new wife. After the homage to the ancestors was over, the priests would lead the couple to complete the rite of passage of the husband and wife, and after the rite of passage was completed, the couple went back to the palace where they had their bridal room for the final step - the bridal chamber.
"Ma'am, come and have some snacks! This is a good thing from Ming's place, you can't eat it elsewhere." Although Wu Wangsheng's wedding was much simpler because of the hot filial piety, but after all, it was the wedding of a king of a country, the wedding proceeding procedure could not be reduced at all, Wu Wangsheng woke up before dawn to take a bath and change his clothes, and only ate an early breakfast before he was busy until dark, and when he went into the new room, his eyes were almost green when he saw the dim sums on the case table.
"Ming is Duke Ming?" Queen Tian's voice was gentle and her facial features were soft-looking.
"Uh-huh! Uhm!" Wu Wangsheng was very hungry, but under the stare of the court etiquette officer, he had already changed his habit of grabbing food with his hands, he took a piece of mung bean cake and stuffed it into his mouth, it felt very tasty, and he hurriedly picked up a plate and handed it to Queen Tian.
"Your Majesty, this..." Queen Tian's face blushed slightly, Wu Wangsheng had not treated her at all unkindly.
The fact that the Western Marquis sent someone to her family for marriage was known, and it was an open secret among the nobles of the fiefdom that Shizisheng's head was rather elmish. Although Shizisheng's head was a bit of an elm, the nobles in the fiefdom still very much wanted to marry their own daughters into the Western Marquis' household, because Shizisheng was the only heir to the Western Marquis' fiefdom.
When such a good thing fell to the Tian family, the Tian family was of course overjoyed, and the status of the Tian family in the fiefdom was immediately elevated, and with the generous bride price sent by the Western Marquis, the quality of life of the Tian family was also drastically improved.
Queen Tian is the eldest daughter of the family, at a young age at home to help adults to take care of household chores, than the surrounding girls of the same age to understand, the Western Marquis of the fiefdom is a relatively barren land, although the Tian family is considered a noble family, the family's situation is only a little bit better than the commoners. As the eldest daughter, Queen Tian had suffered a lot since she was a child. She was grateful for the marriage that changed her family's condition. Especially in the fall of last year, when the Western Secretary's troops pressed down on the fiefdom, the Western Marquis himself led the troops to buy time for the evacuees to break the back, and the scene of bidding farewell to his son before his departure made Queen Tian feel sad when she thought of it, and at that time, she secretly vowed in her heart to serve her husband with all her heart when she married his son in the future.
Because Wu Wangsheng's IQ was equal to that of a child, Queen Tian imagined Wu Wangsheng as a child in her heart. She did not want Sheng, who was dressed as a king, to show his royal majesty, and under the guidance of the royal court's ceremonial officers, the wedding ceremony was successfully completed. This kind of King Sheng gave Queen Tian the illusion that her husband was a wise and powerful king.
The flavor of mung bean cake is Su style, which is the taste of Zheng Yuming's hometown, and it is made with honey and oil, with a soft and delicate texture. After Queen Tian tasted it, she immediately fell in love with this kind of confectionery.
"Great King! There's more here." Seeing that Wu Wangsheng had already finished a plate of dim sum, Queen Tian hurriedly handed over the plate she was holding.
Wu Wangsheng stared at the plate for a while before he shook his head ten thousand times, "No, I can't eat it, Ming made an agreement with me that I would only eat one plate of sweets a day."
Queen Tian froze and looked down at the dim sum, "Is this kind of dim sum hard to make? That's why the Duke asked the Great King to abstain?" In Queen Tian's consciousness, only precious and scarce things could not be enjoyed to the fullest by the king.
"Ming said that you have to eat in moderation, lone too will get fat, and you can't eat more sweet things." Wu Wangsheng stares at the plate and swallows his saliva, he wants his bride to offer the treats again, and if Queen Tian offers them again, he'll grudgingly eat more in order to keep his new wife from losing her mind.
"Since Prince Ming said so, the concubine will not offer it to the great king. "Queen Tian didn't see the longing in Wu Wangsheng's eyes, she just brought the plate back and ate the dim sum in small bites.
"..." Wu Wangsheng blinked twice and watched as the last bit of mung bean cake went into Queen Tian's mouth.
Queen Tian finished her mung bean cake, and when she looked up and saw her husband's blear-eyed look, she couldn't help but purse her lips and smile.
Wu Wangsheng's disappointment did not last long before the waiters and waitresses served the newlyweds their evening meal. Nowadays, the kitchens in the palace were all managed by Su Woman, and the recipes were made by Su Woman, and many of the delicacies served at the dinner were fancy preparations that Queen Tian had never seen before. As Queen Tian ate the dinner, she paid attention to the preferences of Wu Wangsheng.
After Wu Wangsheng had his dinner, he felt sleepy and staggered onto the bed, falling asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow. Queen Tian stood by the bedside and froze for a while, before gently helping Wu Wangsheng take off his outer clothes, and she herself also took off her outer clothes and lay down next to her husband. Even if her husband was a fool, he was still her strongest support in this strange palace.
Around the Lantern Festival, the capital of the King of Wu, Kang City, appeared even more lively than the Spring Festival, and knowledgeable people who got the news of the February 2 talent promotion examination flocked to the place from all directions.