UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritages in China (Ⅲ)

Editor's note:

China has 43 items on the intangible cultural heritage list of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), the most enlisted country in the world. Now, please join us to appreciate some outstanding items.

Dragon Boat festival

The item, "Dragon Boat festival", was inscribed on UNESCO's Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2009.

Beginning on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month, people of several ethnic groups throughout China and the world celebrate the Dragon Boat festival, especially in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River.

A memorial ceremony offering sacrifices to a local hero is combined with sporting events such as dragon races, dragon boating and willow shooting; feasts of rice dumplings, eggs and ruby sulphur wine; and folk entertainments including opera, song and unicorn dances.

The hero who is celebrated varies by region: the romantic poet Qu Yuan is venerated in Hubei and Hunan Provinces, Wu Zixu (an old man said to have died while slaying a dragon in Guizhou Province) in South China, and Yan Hongwo in Yunnan Province among the Dai community.