DCAM Lantern Festival | Dunhuang Lantern Festival: Lights Illuminate the Past Thousand Years

Lanterns Light Up the Millennia

In regions across Longyuan, the customs of appreciating lanterns and praying through lion dances during the Lantern Festival have been passed down through generations.

And in Dunhuang,

this lantern feast adds a unique splendor exclusive to the Gobi Desert.

"Upon entering early spring, and encountering the fifteenth. Lanterns and fiery trees compete to light up the nine thoroughfares; dance platforms and song feasts, grandly initiating the night of a thousand lanterns.

These few words reflect the grandeur of the late Tang Dynasty Dunhuang folk's Lantern Festival night, with "fire trees and silver flowers combined" and "lantern shadows connected along the nine paths."

Heavenly maidens gracefully twirl with lanterns in hand,

lantern wheels falling like stars,

the grand night banquet of the Tang Dynasty court seems to transcend time and space, becoming a millennia-old spectacle shared and intoxicated by both Chang'an and Dunhuang.