Qingming is the second-most-important seasonal festival, after the Lunar New Year, involving ancestral veneration in China. The term literally means clear and transparent, or brightness, implying the arrival of spring, after the dark and cold winter.

Traditional Chinese earth tombs were built above ground and were shaped like round mounds (in southern China) or triangular pyramids (in northern China). Rainfall often washed away part of the soil and defaced the desired smooth surface. Wild grass and small trees also sometimes grew on the tombs. On Qingming day, 5 or 6 April in the Western calendar, offspring of the departed ancestor gather around the tomb in the morning to trim the outgrown vegetation and repair its cracks. They lay sacrifices in front of the tomb, including half-cooked food in dishes (such as a whole chicken, a slice of pork, and fried fish, rice cakes, and fruits) and alcoholic drinks in glasses. Firecrackers are lit to ward off evil spirits, and incense is burned to invite the ancestors spirit to return for the meal.

The offspring take turns to pray (from the most senior ones to the least senior in terms of generation) by kowtowing in front of the tombs. Then they burn square-shaped ritual paper money for the departed ancestor. After that, they place another kind of ritual paper money, in elongated rectangular shape, either white or yellow in color, above the tomb.

Even though Qingming was recorded as a major seasonal node (one of twenty-four in the traditional Chinese calendar) before the Han dynasty (206 BCE–220 CE), there was no indication of tomb-sweeping rituals in that period. Scholars suggest that this was probably an incorporation of two distinct customs. The first one was a Yao tribal custom of spring worship in southern and southwestern China. This Yao festival worships dead females along the riverside on the third day of the third month of the lunar year, which falls approximately a half month after the spring equinox. The second custom was borrowed from nomadic Turks from Central Asia, who celebrated the beginning of the spring season with field outings and picnics. Confucian scholars incorporated these two festivals into an ancestral rite to commemorate the dead on the day of Qingming.