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Chinese New Year during the
Ming Dynasty (1368 - 1644)
The female members of a big household are playing
mahjong during Chinese New Year festival.
A Chinese New Year's card produced by royal court of the
Ming Dynasty
A Ming emperor sits in his regal
chair before a dragon image on a massive screen
On the morning of the
New Year's Day he would receive the congratulations from
hundreds of top civil and military officials; in return he
would invite thousands of officials and officers and senior
citizens (over 90 or so) to attend New Year's Day lunch in
Nanjing's then Beijing's Forbidden Cities which they initially
built. The banquet tables were placed in chambers, in open
corridors and on squares before the halls and the gates,
while orchestrates played soothing tune of Southern
Jiangnan (where the royal family, majority court officials
and a large number of pre-Manchu Beijing residents came from)
with string and bamboo instruments, softly punctuated by
drums.
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