From Xinhua – English:
As many other celebrations like the Double Seventh Festival and Dragon Boat Festival have gradually faded from public attention, Spring Festival, or Chinese Lunar New Year, seems to be the last tradition still cherished today, although a lot of its cultural content has been lost or changed.
According to 56-year-old Cao Baoming, vice chairman of the Chinese Folk Literature and Art Society, in ancient China, based on the Sun’s apparent movement on the ecliptic, people divided the solar year into 24 seasonal division points. The traditional calendar starts the solar year with the Beginning of Spring (marking the Sun’s position at 315?) to suit seasonal changes in the North China Plain and the Lower Yangtze Basin.
