The Mid-Autumn Festival and its Legends
(15th day of the eighth lunar month)
October 6, 2006

There are many stories in Chinese mythology that are related to the Mid-Autumn Festival, but none so popular and famous as the legend of “The Lady on the Moon”. Indeed its popularity eclipsed the original intention of the festival which was a harvest thanksgiving since China was traditionally an agricultural nation. In the beginning of times, the King of Heaven had nine sons, each a sun in the solar system. Disobeying their father’s decree to appear one at a time to warm the earth and nurture the crops, they decided to play a trick on mankind by appearing together simultaneously. Earth was in chaos with the unbearable heat which killed all crops, leading to famine and death.

On earth, there was a master archer named Hou-yi. With his blessed bows and arrows, he shot down eight of the suns. Earth returned to normal, and for his great deed, Hou was revered by all and given much power. But, “power corrupts”. Hou gradually turned into an arrogant tyrant, feared by all. Moreover, he wanted to preserve his power and live forever. After much hardship, he finally found the potion for eternal life.

Hou had taken for his wife the most beautiful girl of the land, a lady named Chang-e. Whether it was to preserve her own beauty for eternity, or to save mankind from an eternal tyrant, no one really knew. But she secretly swallowed the potion one night. Suddenly she felt weightless and floating in the air. In the deep of the night, to escape the raging Hou who found out what she had done, she flew towards the biggest object in the nocturnal sky, the moon.

To commemorate her “sacrifice”, people started the tradition of offering small round cakes to the moon on the fifteenth of the eighth lunar month, a time when the moon was said to be at her brightest. Since it was also a time to celebrate the harvest, when people swapped their reapings and exchanged gifts (usually foods and pastries), mooncakes became popular items, being small, handy, and inexpensive.

Early mooncakes were not as sophisticated a delicacy as they are today. But things started to change in the Yuan Dynasty. Under Mongolian rule, the Han Chinese were severely oppressed. A group of militant leaders decided to stage an uprising but had difficulty spreading their word to the public. It was the eighth lunar month, and one leader thought of making use of the custom of exchanging gifts of mooncakes to relay the message by hiding little notes inside the cakes. Though that particular rebellion was unsuccessful, it started a new trend in mooncake making. People began to put fillings in the cakes, such as preserved egg yolks, melon, nuts and other sweetmeats. And so we have the gourmet delight of today.

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