Dragon Boat Festival is the beginning of summer (noon month). In the fifth month of the lunar calendar, there were many viruses and diseases, and the ancients always regarded it as an "evil month". The ancients described the "five poisons exhausted" here, where snakes and insects breed, bite people easily, people get sick easily and plagues spread easily. It can be said that it is an important node for disease elimination and epidemic prevention in ancient times. Most customs are aimed at exorcising evil spirits and removing drugs, and praying for peace and health.
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The two symbolic customs of the Dragon Boat Festival are eating zongzi and dragon boat racing. According to the textual research of Mr. Wen Yiduo's paper on the Dragon Boat Festival Examination and the Dragon Boat Festival History Education (see Wen Yiduo's Complete Works), it is believed that the ancestors of Wu Yue used the dragon as a totem, which not only had the custom of "stabbing hair", but also held a grand totem festival every year. One of the activities is to depict a dragon-shaped canoe in the drums, to compete on the water to sacrifice the dragon god, and to have fun with games. This is the origin of the custom of dragon boat racing.