Qinhuai Lantern Fair

When armies returned in triumph, government officials and civilians would gather to hang up lanterns around the city to welcome them home.

Back then, embroidery techniques were passed into Eastern Wu from Shu Han, which stimulated the growth of the textile industry in the region and provided the basis for lantern manufacturing.

During the Northern Song dynasty, the number of nights for hanging lanterns increased to a total of five, adding the seventeenth and eighteenth of the first month.

After the Manchu people entered into China proper and established the Qing dynasty, they continued and developed the local tradition.

Every year during the Lantern Festival, hordes of people gathered in the vicinity of the Confucius Temple with gongs and drums making ear-piercing noises; the liveliness surpassed even the celebrations in the Ming dynasty.

Tseng Kuo-fan attempted to have celebrations reach their former glory by dredging the Qinhuai River and rebuilding the Confucius Temple in 1865.

In 1937, the invading Imperial Japanese Army occupied Nanking, causing great damage to the Confucius Temple.

After 1945, due to the hyperinflation caused by the Chinese Civil War, regular civilians did not have the ability to put on such celebrations, and the tradition of lantern fairs nearly disappeared.

The production of Qinhuai lanterns integrates traditional Chinese handicrafts such as weaving, painting, calligraphy, paper cutting, shadow puppetry, embroidery, sculpture and so on.

The materials that make up the light source vary from the use of pine resin, animal and vegetable oil, lacquer, paraffin, kerosene and other fuels, with bamboo, grass, cotton cores, etc.

Its production process has integrated a series of process techniques and production methods such as carpentry, lacquer, painting, carving, clay sculpture, knotting, mounting paste, welding, mechanical transmission, sound and light sound, electronic program control, etc.

In 2011, for the first time, the first Ming Wall International Light Festival named, invited the United States, Japan, Korea, Singapore, Malaysia and other foreign lanterns to participate in the exhibition.