Today is the fifth day of the fifth lunar month, so let’s honor the Dragon Boat Festival.

The tradition commemorates Qu Yuan, the right hand of a ruler in what is now China’s Hubei Province during the Warring States Period (475-221 B.C.). By one account, he set up a legal code, helped the poor and advocated resistance in Chu State to the dominant Qin State.

Spies and rivals brought him down, the story goes, and the Chu king exiled him. Distraught, he wandered and composed the sorrowful “Songs of the South,” a masterwork of classical Chinese verse.

When he learned that the Qin had invaded Chu — on this day of the lunar year in 278 B.C. — he drowned himself. Supporters launched boats to try to save him, and, to keep fish from his body, dropped rice balls into the water. The Dragon Boat Festival was born.

The celebration has spread to Japan, Melbourne, Australia, and Prague.

Charles McDermid contributed reporting.

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