Each year when traditional Chinese New Year arrives, people busy themselves pasting drawings of door gods or Chunlian, on the gate to their houses. The door gods are widely believed to keep evil spirits from entering people’s houses. The door gods, which come in various images, symbolize Chinese people's desire for peace and luck.
According to ancient Chinese lore, everything world has a responding god, including doors. As "face" of the house the door has been worshipped by Chinese people .
since the Zhou Dynasty (11 century-256 BC). The tradition of pasting door gods on the gates predates the Han Dynasty (206 BC-220 AD). It is believed the earliest images of door gods were of two brave brothers, Shen Shu and Yu 1u, who were capable of subduing spirits and exorcising ghosts. Described in the ancient book Shan Hai Jing, the brothers lived on a mountain called Duoshuo. There was a big peach tree on the top of the mountain, and every morning the brothers sat under the tree and watched the humans below. If they saw a ghost harming the humans, they would catch the ghost and feed to a tiger.
Some people eventually drew the brothers' images on two peach boards, and then hung the images on both sides of a door to fend against all evil spirits. That is how Shen Shu and Yu Iii became the first images of door gods.
During the Tang Dynasty (618-907), the brothers were replaced by two heroic generals, Qin Shubao and
Yuchi Jingde, who helped Taizong, the second emperor of the Tang Dynasty, fight off enemies and eventually reunify China.
According to legend, after he ascended to the throne, Emperor Taizong was in poor health, and, as a result, had many nightmares. He dreamt of spirits and ghosts crying in his palace, and throwing bricks at him. He was so frightened that he couldn't sleep. The emperor's ministers advised him to let the generals stand guard outside the palace. The plan worked.
The emperor stopped having nightmares. He didn't want to trouble the two generals day and night, so Taizong had portraits of them painted. In the images, the generals wore martial arts attire and they carried their weapons. The portraits were hung on the palace's doors, and, legend has it, they kept evil spirits at bay. In the drawings, Qin has pale skin and carries swords, while Yuchi has dark skin and carries batons.
Ordinary families eventually adopted the imperial custom, and they placed such drawings of the two ever-vigilant generals on their front gates, to attract good luck and fend off evil spirits. The tradition has been continued by subsequent generations throughout China. Over time, additional heroes and mythological figures-including some women-became door gods.
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