Your Guide to the Intriguing Riddles on Chinese Lanterns

Your Guide to the Intriguing Riddles on Chinese Lanterns

Introducing Chinese Lantern Riddles

Writing riddles on lanterns has long been a Chinese tradition and is primarily associated with the annual Chinese Lantern Festival, although they are also popular on other occasions such as the Chinese Middle Autumn Festival.

The riddle tradition elevated Chinese lanterns from being merely functional and decorative, to being a fun social activity that heightened celebrations. The riddles were not only written on lanterns, they could also be found on walls or passed around amongst friends to read and solve. Thus they became part and parcel of Chinese culture and history.

History of Lantern Riddles

The lantern riddle tradition dates back more than 2,000 years to the Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD), when it originated as a contest among men. The activity then reached its peak during the Song Dynasty (960-1279), when it became popular throughout all of Chinese society. The first recorded reference to lantern riddles appears in Zhou Wu's memoirs of life in the Southern Song capital of Hangzhou. He tells of how people would paste elegant poems and verses onto silk lanterns.

In ancient China, it was thought that solving a lantern riddle was as difficult as killing a tiger, so these types of riddles were nicknamed "lantern tigers". These have historically made reference to traditional songs, poems, stories or historical events. They were also used to provide poems and verses which cleverly satirised events, including comical pictures of people. They contained obscure words and hidden meanings to ponder over, as well as jokes to poke fun at the reader.

Riddle Format and Rules

Lantern riddles provide a word, poem or phrase from which people must guess the answer. The riddle process has three main parts - the riddle, the hint and the answer. Each riddle is also a play on the various meanings each Chinese character has and in order to guess the correct answer, the reader must think hard to come up with the right meaning that is intended. Another rule is that no character can be repeated between the riddle and the answer.

The Chinese Lantern Festival

The Chinese Lantern Festival (in Chinese, "Yuan Xiao Jie") is held at the end of the 15-day Chinese New Year celebration. Also known as the Spring Festival, it is celebrated on the first night of a full moon during the lunar New Year. To this day, the Chinese derive great pleasure from solving the lantern riddles and at temples on the night of the Lantern Festival people will hold lantern riddle parties. The riddles are attached to Chinese lanterns or on pictures of the Chinese Zodiac animals. Each paper lantern usually has four riddles in total - they are firstly written on vertical strips of red paper before being tethered to the lanterns with a string.

Conclusion

The long standing riddle tradition associated with Chinese lanterns adds an extra dimension to the beauty and joy they bring to people on special occasions. They combine aesthetics with subtle social commentary and sharpening of wits, which is no surprise as this tends to be one of the main defining standards of the Chinese culture and arts.

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