Charm conferring peace and felicity. Chinese superstitions.

Researches into Chinese superstitions

Charm conferring peace and felicity.

The annexed is a peace-conferring charm, and is commonly styled P‘ing-ngan-fu.

This luck-bearing script is suspended from the cross-beams of the house, especially on the fifth day of the fifth month (1), with the purpose of securing peace throughout the year.

On the top may be seen the seal of one of the local deities, whose statue is erected in some famous temple of the neighbourhood.

Buddhist and Taoist priests, Tao-shi engage in this business, and go from door to door, offering their wares, for which they are handsomely paid.

(1) The fifth day of the fifth month corresponds roughly to some date in our first week of June. In China it is the dragon-boat festival, celebrated in memory of a poet and patriot of the fourth century B. C., who, degraded by his prince, and disgusted with the world, drowned himself in the Siang river Hunan . It is also an auspicious day through-out the country.

Source: Researches into Chinese superstitions by Henri Doré. Translated from the French with Notes, Historical and Explanatory by M. Kennelly. Shanghai: T’Usewei Printing Press, 1914 – 1926.