Chapter 16 Section 2 Kite Flying

In many parts of China, especially in the north, there are always colorful kites floating in the sky in spring.These kites are exquisitely designed and in various poses. They are proud of the spring breeze in the boundless blue sky, flying and circling to their heart's content, making the world just awakened from hibernation full of vitality.Everyone has met everyone's favorite kite, which has a long history in China. Kites are also called Zhiyuan (yuan yuan, eagle), but the earliest kites were not made of paper on the skeleton made of thin bamboo, but only made of wood and bamboo.During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, the famous craftsman Gong Shuzi used bamboo and wood as materials to make a wooden magpie, which was said to be able to fly continuously for three days ("Mozi·Lu Wen"). This may be the earliest kite.It is not easy to make a flying bird out of bamboo and wood. It is said that it took Mozi three years to make a wooden kite, but it can only fly in the air for one day ("Han Feizi·Wai Chu Shuo").Before the invention of papermaking, making kites was expensive and not easy, so this kind of wooden kite could not be popularized before the Han Dynasty.In the Eastern Jin Dynasty (317-420 AD), kites became popular.In the Tang Dynasty, the heyday of feudal society, the custom of flying kites became very popular, and the technology of kite making also reached a very high level.A poet of the Tang Dynasty described in a poem that a kite in the shape of a bird flew up and down in the sky, looking like a real swan goose. As a companion (Tang Cai's "Paper Kite Fu").In the Tang Dynasty, various kites with lights and whistles appeared, which were like stars in the night sky and a bright moon in the sky.The wind blows into the bamboo tube of the kite high in the sky, making a burst of pleasant sound. It sounds like someone is plucking the strings of the guzheng from a distance. Therefore, the paper kite is also called a kite.

Since the Tang Dynasty, kites have become more popular and become a kind of entertainment that every household loves to see.Small merchants and hawkers selling kites for a living appeared in the cities of the Song Dynasty.There are many types of kites. In the poems of Jin Mo Shi Mo Shiji [Ji Ji], there are various birds such as "birds, kites, and ospreys".In the Qing Dynasty, butterflies, beauties, big phoenixes with soft wings, big fish, big crabs, big red bats, and wild geese were further mentioned.Among them, there are seven wild goose kites in a row, and there is also "the door-sized Linglong Xi character with a ringing whip, which rings like a bell for half a day" (Chapter 70).There are many kite-flying masters in the folk, and some young people are keen on a kind of kite competition of fighting with each other, which is to try to use their own kites to break the opponent's kite line.This kind of kite fighting scene is very lively ("Old Stories of Wulin").Emperor Huizong of the Song Dynasty liked to fly kites very much. The kites he flew in the Forbidden City sometimes fell into the homes of ordinary people outside the city (Wang Mingqing's "Hui Mo Lu").Literati and poets of past dynasties have written countless poems about kites. For example, Kou Zhun, a famous prime minister in the Song Dynasty, said, "When the blue falls, the autumn is quiet, and the strength to fly is still weak. The breeze is as trustworthy, and the white clouds will fly together" ("Paper Kite").Cao Xueqin, a great writer in the late Qing Dynasty, was also an expert in making kites. His good friend Dun Min displayed all kinds of kites made by Cao Xueqin in his home. Grand View" ("Pinghu Maozhai Ji Sheng").Not only that, Cao Xueqin also conducted serious research on kite-making, pasting, painting and flying techniques, and wrote a book on kite-making technology-"Southern Kites and Northern Kites Kao Gong Zhi".It was really not easy at that time for a talented writer who is erudite and knowledgeable to conduct such serious research on the kite that the scholar-bureaucrats despise as a trivial skill.What's more valuable is that Cao Xueqin wrote this book not for self-entertainment, but "to find a way to support oneself for those who think that there is a sickness in the present but don't report it."That is to say, those disabled people who are ill and have no way to seek help can live on by making kites.

Kites are very beneficial to people's health, because flying a kite must choose an open place with fresh air; in addition, flying a kite requires certain physical activities, such as walking with legs, pulling hands, raising head, swinging arms, and concentrating on it. .The ancients already knew that when children fly a kite, they raise their heads and open their mouths, which can dissipate internal heat and eliminate diseases and disasters ("Continued Natural History").Even when adults fly a kite, they will rejuvenate their mental state, "Forget love and worry, and no longer know that old age is coming."

In ancient times, there was also a custom of flying kites with broken strings.It is to wait for the kite to rise to the high altitude, cut the flying line, let the high-altitude air flow carry the kite, fly farther and farther, and finally disappear into the blue sky.This means that sickness, disaster and all kinds of misfortunes will go with the broken kite forever.Lin Daiyu, a sickly young lady, hoped to use kites to "release bad luck", and people around her advised her to fly more, "Just take away the root cause of your illness" (Chapter 70).There is also a similar custom in the Northeast Korean area of ​​my country, which is called "releasing the evil kite".The children there start flying kites at the beginning of every year. On the 14th or 15th, they write all kinds of unlucky words on the kites, smear hideous and terrifying images of tigers, lions, ghosts, etc., and write their own names on the corners of the kites. name.After dark, fly the kite high, and burn the kite line with fire, so all kinds of bad luck will disappear with the wind.

Small kites sometimes came in handy in ancient China.Legend has it that Han Xin, a general under Emperor Liu Bang of the Han Dynasty, was planning to dig a tunnel to attack Weiyang Palace from the ground when he rebelled.In the Northern and Southern Dynasties, Hou Jing, Emperor Wu of Liang Dynasty, rebelled in the third year of Taiqing (549 A.D.) and surrounded Taicheng so that no one could leave.Xiao Gang (later Emperor Wen of Liang Jian) ​​in the city tied the letter to a kite and released it, asking for help (Tang Li Rong's "Duyi Zhi").During the reign of Emperor Dezong of the Tang Dynasty, Tian Yue, the Jiedu envoy, and others rebelled, and the Linming guard general Zhang Yi (pi batch) was besieged. He had no choice but to "use paper as a wind kite, more than a hundred feet high", and sent an emergency letter to the reinforcements to break the siege ( "New Book of Tang·Tian Yue Biography").