Nowadays, SMS, WeChat and Weibo are very popular as shortcuts to New Year greetings. How did the ancients pay a quick New Year call?

The ancients also had a quick way to pay New Year's greetings-flying posts to pay New Year's greetings! Like modern people, the ancients also attached great importance to New Year greetings. But sometimes people are too busy to pay New Year's greetings in person, and people will send servants to take business cards instead of their hosts. New Year greeting cards are also called the door. The gates are big and small. The big one is written on a whole piece of paper, and the small one is written on half a piece of paper, which is equivalent to the current New Year greeting cards. This kind of New Year card sent by the servant is called a flying card.

In the Song Dynasty, people used flying cards to pay New Year greetings, which was more popular in the Ming Dynasty. At that time, there were many officials living in Chang 'an Avenue in Beijing. Servants who come to pay New Year greetings to their hosts, whether they know each other or not, throw business cards at the sight of the door, and some even don't dismount. The new year's business card passed in this way no longer contains any real feelings.

In the Qing dynasty, someone simply hung a notebook on the door, and the people who paid New Year's greetings wrote their names on it, even if they paid New Year's greetings. Others will hang a red paper bag on the door to receive business cards, which is called "receiving blessings". People who receive business cards sometimes receive a room full of paper on New Year's Day. Sending business cards during the Chinese New Year has reached the level of chaos, so that a joke of sending business cards through someone else's hand has been made.

Ancient story of climbing over the eaves: According to legend, there was a man named Zhang in the Song Dynasty, who was humorous by nature. On New Year's Day, he wrote a New Year's card, but there was no servant to send it, so he wandered around his door. Just then, his friend Dongzi Shen sent someone to bring his business card. Zhang took out his business card and found that most of the recipients were also his relatives and friends.

He had a brainwave, so he invited his servant to drink, and took this opportunity to secretly change all Dongzi Shen's business cards into his own. The servant didn't find that the business cards had been tampered with, so he foolishly sent them to relatives and friends one by one, and all the business cards sent out were from Si Wu. Dongzi Shen later learned about it and smiled when he saw many business cards that he didn't send. It was a joke then.

Summary: During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, box worship appeared. The servant who sends the New Year greeting cards holds a box, which is rectangular and just big enough to hold greeting cards. After seeing the other host, the servant can't take the card or paste directly with his hand. He must open the box and let the other party take it out in person to show respect.