Roughly two routes, one to the west, into Baotou, Inner Mongolia; One goes east and enters Zhangjiakou, Hebei. The former is westward in a narrow sense, and some Shanxi people make a living by selling beans. The latter is also called the mouth of the cave, and the two are collectively called Xikou, which is a generalized Xikou. Moreover, this one who took the hole finally made the reputation and career of Shanxi merchants. Jiexiu Jia Fan, the head of the famous Huizhou merchants in Qing Dynasty, can be said to be the epitome of Shanxi merchants. Fan was the most prosperous in Fan Yubin's era.
Fan Yubin's grandfather Fan is the year of great disaster. Fan didn't know if he should go west. At night, he dreamed that he was dragged by a cloud to Mianshan Mountain in the southeast of Jiexiu City, and then walked in this fairyland-like landscape. Just when he was fascinated by the scenery of this paradise, he was at a crossroads and was at a loss. Just then, a golden frog ran out of nowhere and went straight to the west. Fan was curious and ran after him. But the chasing frog disappeared, but it became brighter and brighter. ..................... knew that Guan Yu was showing him the way, so he decided to trade Zhangjiakou and enter and leave Liaodong. Before leaving, he took his family to Mianshan to visit Guan Gong, and then took his son Fan Sanba and several assistants to Zhangjiakou.
At that time, Zhangjiakou, especially Fuxuan Town (now Xuanhua, Zhangjiakou), was a military town guarding the border. Xuanhua was known as Fuxuan and robbed several people on nine sides. Thousands of troops are stationed here all the year round, ranging from tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands. Food and clothing for so many petty officers is a big problem. Moreover, the army had scarce salt (salt was controlled and monopolized at that time). They took pains to sell grain and cloth from Henan and Shandong, exchanged salt with the garrison and started military trade business. After entering the customs, the emperor shunzhi knew Dou Yong's name, summoned him and awarded him an official position. He didn't understand the people, so he wrote a letter to the property in Zhangjiakou and transferred it to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, but it was still not allowed in other markets.
Every year, Fan has to pay a certain fee from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and has since embarked on the road of imperial commerce. With the establishment of the Qing dynasty's ruling power in the whole country, with the help of his son Sanba, and relying on the authority of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the privileges and conveniences granted by the Qing dynasty, Fan's business scope was greatly expanded. Fan is also a big copper merchant and a big salt merchant. During the Kangxi period, there was a serious shortage of copper ingots in China, so businessmen were allowed to go to Japan to buy copper ingots. At that time, the person who handled this business was called a foreign copper merchant. At the invitation of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Fan undertook a part of the business of trafficking in foreign copper, and occupied a considerable proportion in this business.
He often owns six or seven foreign copper ships and becomes a major foreign copper merchant, from which he gains huge profits. Since the Fan family arrived in Xikou, every New Year's Eve, the Fan family will go to Mianshan, Shanxi Province to worship Guan Gong, the god of wealth. Every time there is a big business, the delegates will come to pay homage. Later, when fans learned that Mianshan was a treasure house of aura, they restored and renovated Sanguan Temple, Doum Temple, Sanqing Temple, Xingsu Temple, Lingxiao Temple, Jiuyao Xing Jun Temple and Wang Yao Temple.
When it comes to Shanxi merchants and westward journey, people will think of Qiao Family Courtyard, Wang Family Courtyard and Pingyao Ancient City, but few people think of Mianshan, Shanxi Province. There are three reasons to be familiar with Mianshan and Shanxi merchants. Faced with dead wood and smoke, Jin Wengong was very uneasy, so he called Mianshan Jieshan, which means the place where mesons rest. He also ordered that the day when meson Tui was burned to death be designated as the Cold Food Festival. On this day every year, you can't make a fire to cook, you can only eat cold food to commemorate mesons.
Since then, this custom has spread from Shanxi to the whole country. Before the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the main item of the Cold Food Festival was to ban smoking and eating cold food at home, and the time was set in the cold winter. Tomb-Sweeping Day in this period only refers to one of the 24 solar terms that distinguishes between seasonal alternation and farm work. At that time, Tomb-Sweeping Day had nothing to do with the Cold Food Festival. During the Sui, Tang and Five Dynasties, the Cold Food Festival was finally determined in the 150-year planning period after the winter solstice. With the improvement of various living environments and the promotion of official participation in the Tang Dynasty, especially after the imperial edict of Kaiyuan promulgated by Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty increased the content of going to the grave on the Cold Food Festival, it gradually became popular, and it was suitable for going to the grave together to worship the grave-sweeping ceremony, and the grave-sweeping activities of the Cold Food Festival gradually became popular.
During this period, although there were many activities of Cold Food Festival, which lasted for a long time, and many activities were held in Tomb-Sweeping Day, people in China still used the word Cold Food Festival in the process of expression, whether in official documents, literary works or folk titles. During the Song, Yuan, Jin and Liao Dynasties, some grand occasions of the China Cold Food Festival surpassed those of the Tang Dynasty, such as the official organization of poetry-chanting, gift-giving, flower viewing, memorial to the mausoleum and extension of holidays.
The main activities of the Cold Food Festival have gradually changed from sweeping graves to recreational activities such as outings. At this time, the activities of the Cold Food Festival are sometimes called cold food and sometimes called Qingming. The Cold Food Festival and Tomb-Sweeping Day are in a strange period when you and I are mixed. Tomb-Sweeping Day's Cold Food Festival is often a festival in Zhang Guan, and vice versa. For example, the famous peony bloomed immediately after Tomb-Sweeping Day, also known as fifteen thousand-leaf, cold peony. With the passage of time, as the main items of the Cold Food Festival, smoking ban and cold food have been gradually diluted, and the name of the Cold Food Festival has greatly replaced Tomb-Sweeping Day.
By the Qing Dynasty, some popular items of the Cold Food Festival were no longer popular, while folk grave sweeping, official altar and royal mausoleum sacrifice became the main activities of the festival. During this period, although the name of cold food appeared in some documents, local chronicles and literary works from time to time, it was generally known as Qingming. With the development of history, some people find it incredible that Qingming is a cold food, which was said by Focha Dunchong, a folklorist who opened in the Qing Dynasty. In fact, they don't understand the historical process of the Cold Food Festival evolving into Tomb-Sweeping Day.