Photo: Dianchi Lake, Kunming Figureworm Creative
Author: Ma Xiaoqing, cultural scholar, columnist of several media.
Speaking of Yunnan, you can probably immediately think of the news of "elephant family migration", as well as the beautiful scenery of Cangshan Erhai and Yulong Snow Mountain. If you are a martial arts fan, you may also think of Duan Zhixing, the Southern Emperor who is listed as one of the top five kung fu in the novel with "Yiyang Finger", but you may not know that there is really a person in the history of Yunnan.
This article will take you to Kunming, Dali, and Lijiang to see the scenery and tell the historical story of what happened there.
1. Overlooking Dianchi Lake
Landing in Kunming, the first priority is to go to the West Mountain next to Dianchi Lake, visit the ancients, climb the suspension, and taste the feeling of "five hundred miles of Dianchi Lake running to the bottom of the eyes, thousands of years of past events" opposite the big view building, and shoot the railing all over.
It was called the Kingdom of Dian in ancient times. The country is named after the pool, which shows the great momentum of the pool.
The ancient Dian Kingdom was only a distant existence, lacking written records, and even standing on this land, it still felt that it was out of reach. When King Wu of Zhou was cutting down merchants, he gathered the princes of the world, and the indigenous people of Yunnan, known as "Baipu", were among the 800 princes. What is their connection to Xiqi? What kind of vendetta does he have with Yin Shang? No way of knowing.
During the Spring and Autumn Period, King Mu of Chu united with the princes to plot against the Song State. The Moose withdrew halfway, and King Chu mu sent an army to attack the kingdom of Jūn. Taking advantage of the famine in the Chu state, the State of Qi gathered the Baipu tribes of Yunnan to cut down Chu. When the Baipu soldiers came to the city, they found that the skinny camels were bigger than horses, and they could not defeat the Chu state at all, so they had to disband on the spot. Yunnan Baipu and Chu Guo thus formed a bond.
Picture: Kunming Xishan (overlooking Kunming City from Xishan) Figureworm Creative
In 278 BC, King Wei of Chu sent Zhuang Wei to lead an army to Dianchi and divide Yunnan into the Chu state. Zhuang Ji planned to return to China, but found that the Qin army was attacking the Chu state, and the road was impassable. The troops led by Zhuang Ji were only 500 people, and they could not compete with the Qin state at all, so they had to claim the title of king on the spot, establish the State of Dian, and set the capital at Kunming Jincheng. His fate was exactly the same as that of the later King Zhao Tuo of South Vietnam. Zhao Tuo was sent by Qin Shi Huang to attack Baiyue in 204 BC, after being sent by Qin Shi Huang to attack Baiyue, and then divided Guangdong. It can be said that the ancient Dian kingdom predates the South Vietnamese state by seventy-four years.
2. The Dream of the Kingdom of Yunnan
The ancient Dian Kingdom was separated from the Central Plains Mountains and waters, the road was far away, and the information was vague. The archaeological excavation of Shizhai Mountain on the edge of Dianchi Lake in Kunming has opened the mystery of that period of history. The cultural relics unearthed from Shizhai Mountain are all in the Yunnan Provincial Museum. This is a must-visit punch card place, it is one of the three major archaeological discoveries that can be called together with yin ruins and terracotta warriors.
The "Bronze Shell Vessel for the Western Han Dynasty Murder Pillar Scene" unearthed in ShizhaiShan, Kunming, cast 52 figures, as well as pigs, dogs, tigers, and panlong pillars, three kidnapped people, and a noblewoman sitting on the shoulders of four people.
The lid of the tiger bull fighting shell container is carved with two cows and one tiger. The two bulls fought hard, and the tiger had been poked by the horn of the bull, and its eyes were wide open and it kept roaring. In the middle was a tree with two monkeys and two birds, terrified. There is also a famous cow tiger copper case: the tail of the cow is tightly bitten by the tiger, and there is a calf hiding under the cow's body.
Photo: Yunnan Provincial Museum Figureworm Creative
The rich content of the bronze ware of the ancient Dian Kingdom, the complexity of the performance, the peculiarity of the shape, the strong narrative, the plot is vivid and tense, it is simply the historical picture scroll or video record of that year. Seeing the bronzes of the ancient Dian Kingdom, you can also see its natural environment and living conditions, as well as the scenes of war and sacrifice. The most amazing thing is that the bronze culture of the ancient Dian Kingdom does not have an inevitable inheritance relationship with the Culture of the Central Plains.
Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty conquered Yunnan, and it was only when it was incorporated into the central government. After the end of the Han Dynasty, the world fell apart, and the Cuàn clan of Yunnan ruled Yunnan for five hundred years. Cuan is a descendant of Ban Biao and Ban Gu.
After the Sui unified the world, the Cuan clan suffered a fatal blow, the dragons were leaderless, and split into Dong Cuan and Xi Cuan, with Dong Cuan as "Wu Man" and Xi Cuan as "Bai Man". In the Cangshan Erhai region, six ethnic regimes were formed, known as the Six Commandments. In this cross-mix, the Yi and Bai ethnic groups are formed.
Walking down the Western Mountains, bidding farewell to Yunbo, and heading to Dali, you will have a clearer understanding of Yunnan, the most magnificent and turbulent during the Tang and Song dynasties.
3. Cangshan Snow Erhai Moon
The ancient city of Dali in the Cangshan Mountains and under the peak, formerly known as Yang Tho Jū Miē chéng, was once the capital of the Nanzhao State and the Dali State. Visiting here, all you see are the buildings after the early Qing Dynasty.
The ruins of the broken wall a few hundred meters north of the ancient city are the last traces left by Yang Tho City. Seven kilometers to the north, is the ruins of Taihe City, the first capital of Nanzhao, and the Nanzhao Dehua Monument evokes the ancient feelings of every visitor.
Northwest of the ancient city, walking distance to the three pagodas of Chongsheng Temple at the foot of Yingle Peak. Take a boat trip to the Erhai Sea, enjoy the Bai three tea song and dance performance, and land on the small Putuo Island, which is only 100 square meters large, and there is a two-story Mountain Pavilion built in the Ming Dynasty. Little Putuo Island is as small as a bonsai. Here the Xiaguan wind, Shangguan flowers, Cangshan snow, Erhai Moon four scenery, quite prestigious.
Photo: Little Putuo Island Figureworm Creative
The Six Commandments were not self-proclaimed kings of the six indigenous tribes in the Erhai region of Cangshan, but were appointed by the early Tang Dynasty. At the beginning of the Tang Dynasty, the central ruling force arrived in Yunnan, and it was already the end of the strong crossbow, and the whip was beyond reach, so it could only appoint local officials to control the yi. Gaozu Li Yuan appointed Cuan Hongda as the Assassin of Queensland, implemented the tuguan system, and set a precedent for the rule of The Emperor.
This small city of projectiles in the fracture area of high mountains and canyons has played an extremely important role in the vicissitudes of the Tang and Song dynasties for hundreds of years. That period of history makes people feel a lot of emotions, and they can understand the evolution of the world situation more thoroughly.
4. Nanzhao: Struggle in the whirlpool
Tibet in northwestern Yunnan, in the early seventh century, was unified by Songtsen Gampo and established the Tubo regime. The Tang Dynasty used its strength to support Nanzhao, conquest the Cuan clan, and resist Tubo.
The Cuan clan has been in business for hundreds of years, the tree has deep roots, and Pi Luoge is jealous, so he marries two daughters to the Cuan clan and becomes a child's own family. Coincidentally, the Cuan clan was infighting, and Pi luo ge sent troops to kill his son-in-law and his father-in-law, and the Cuan clan was broken by each one.
Non-toxic no husband. On the 25th day of the sixth month of the lunar calendar, Pi Luoge set up a banquet in songminglou and invited the leaders of the Five Commandments to come to worship the ancestors, and when they drank wine, they actually burned all five kings to death with a torch. To commemorate this historic arson, locals designate the day as the "Torch Festival."
Picture: Dali Ancient City Figureworm Creative
Nanzhao grew larger and larger, which made the Tang Dynasty very worried. Tang dynasty magistrates tried every means to oppress Nanzhao, and even prepared to contact Tubo to jointly deal with Nanzhao.
Yang Guozhong did not trust Nanzhao and changed the strategic layout of the Tang Dynasty. Nanzhao went to war with the Tang army and asked Tubo to send troops. Ge Luofeng sent Duan Wei to lead the army to break the Tang army, and was promoted to Qingping official (equivalent to Tang Zhizai). His descendants eventually established the State of Dali.
In the Tang Zhao War, the Tang army won fewer and lost more. Ge Luofeng annihilated 100,000 soldiers and horses of Li Mi of the Tang Dynasty. In this squeeze, Nanzhao formally allied itself with Tibet and was about a "country of brothers".
An Lushan raised an army, tubo and Nanzhao united, and the pressure on the Tang Dynasty was unimaginable. Tubo occupied dozens of prefectures in the northwestern region of Tang, and led more than 200,000 people, including Tuguhun, Dangxiang, and Qiangqiang, into Chang'an. And soon entered Sichuan.
The alliance between Tubo and Nanzhao often involved Tubo sending few troops and Nanzhao sending more troops, with Tubo in the rear and Nanzhao in the front. However, the cities and pools that were captured belonged to Tubo, but the defenders of the city let Nanzhao send troops to pay for it, and Nanzhao swallowed his anger. The alliance between Tubo and Nanzhao began to loosen.
The combined army of Nanzhao and Tubo with more than 200,000 troops attacked the Tang Dynasty's Jiannan Province, and the result was a fiasco. Tubo renamed Nanzhao Yimuxun the king of Nichito, and the brotherly state was reduced to a vassal state. Nanzhao was very upset. The Tang Dynasty again used divisive tactics to make Tubo suspicious of Yunnan and began to send troops there. Nanzhao did not stop doing two things, tore up the alliance with Tubo, and became a vassal regime that honored the Tang Dynasty as Zhengshuo.
After the Tang and Zhao allied, they launched a war against Tibet. Tubo was infighting, split into two, and never unified again. Nanzhao, who had relieved the pressure of Tubo, attacked Tang in a big way, and even captured Jiaozhou, the seat of the Tang Annan Protectorate, which is now Hanoi, Vietnam.
Picture: Night view of Dali Ancient City Picture Worm Creative
Both the Tang Dynasty and Tubo, in their alliance with Nanzhao, were afraid that Nanzhao would sit on the throne, which was the fundamental reason why the alliance could not be consolidated and went far. Pulling in the doubt, being wary in the solicitation, let Nanzhao helpless. The coexistence of the two powers of Tubo and Tang Dynasty gave Nanzhao room to survive.
The Nanzhao state has an interesting custom that is worth mentioning. They take names and implement a system of consecutive names passed down from father to son. Much like the word game we play idiom solitaire, or top real rhetoric. For example, the hereditary succession of the Nanzhao king:
Meng Shepang - Pang Jia Du (Long Jia Du, Du Xi Nu) - Xiao Nu Luo - Luo Sheng - Sheng Luo Pi - Pi Luo Ge - Ge Luo Feng - Yi Mu Xun - Xun Ge Persuasion - Persuade Long Sheng (Persuasion Li Sheng, Persuade Feng You) - Yu Shi Long - Long Shun - Shun Hua Zhen.
Yi Mu Xun is the grandson of Ge Luo Feng and the son of Feng Jia Yi. Because Feng Jia died early, he did not inherit the throne, and was directly inherited by Yi Mu xun, which seems to be broken, but in fact, it is not broken.
When the Tang Dynasty was established, the small slave Luo who lived in Mengshe River was born, and the Great Mongolian State was established later than the 31st year of the Tang Dynasty. At the end of the ninth century and the beginning of the tenth century, Zheng Maisi, the chancellor of Nanzhao, killed Long Shun and Shun Huazhen, the kings of Nanzhao, and the state of Nanzhao fell. Only five years later, Zhu Wen, the Tang Dynasty's powerful minister Liang Wang, killed Tang Zhaozong and forced Emperor Tang to take the throne, and the Tang Dynasty collapsed. The history is strikingly similar. Nanzhao and the Tang Dynasty can be described as the same.
5. Myo Xiang Buddha Tu Dali Kingdom
After the fall of the Nanzhao state, Yunnan successively appeared three dynasties of Great Changhe, Great Tianxingguo, and Dayining, which were divided and frequently replaced by wars, similar to the five generations and ten kingdoms that appeared after the fall of the Tang Dynasty.
Photo: The Three Pagodas of the Chongsheng Shrine Tu Worm Creative
Before Zhao Kuangyin established the Song Dynasty, Duan Siping, the grandson of Duan Jianwei, who commanded Nanzhao's defeat of the Tang army, borrowed thirty-seven barbarian troops from Gao Fang to reunify the Cangshan Erhai and establish the State of Dali. Gao Fang was given the title of Marquis of Yue, and the Gao family became a powerful courtier, and the generations were the prime ministers, which was hot.
The Gao family controls the political power, and the power is beyond the imagination of the world. Even the emperor was so frightened that he had to resign to become a monk. The most cattle Gao Shengtai was able to directly depose the emperor and establish himself as the emperor of Great China.
Because the emperor was forced to become a monk, the emperor who became a monk relied on a little Yu Wei and built many Buddhist temples, forming a situation of "three thousand halls in the Garan Pavilion and eight hundred in the Prajnaparamita Palace". The Three Pagodas of Chongsheng Mosque are the most brilliant representatives of that period.
Duan Suxing, emperor of the Dali State, made pioneering contributions to the construction of gardens in Kunming. He dredged the Jinju River and the Panlong River, and built the Chundeng Causeway and the Yunjin Causeway, which played a great role in irrigation and flood discharge. He planted yellow flowers on the Chundeng Causeway, named Detour Golden Ridge; and planted white flowers on the Yunjin Bridge, named Haunting City Silver Ridge. It is reminiscent of the Bai Causeway and Su Causeway in Hangzhou's West Lake.
The State of Dali not only had to deal with the Song Dynasty, but also had to face Tubo and later Burma, Thailand and other central and southern regions. The relationship between Yunnan and Myanmar, Thailand and other countries in Central and Southern China will be introduced in the relevant travelogue.
6. Naxi Legacy
Going to Lijiang, riding horses on spruce ping, climbing a section of the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain, watching the tiger jumping gorge, and then returning to the ancient city to see the Wooden House, listening to the ancient music of the cave scriptures, is a compulsory course for every traveler. In addition, I will take the leisure time to admire the white sand murals and learn about Naxi hieroglyphs.
Naxi ancient music is a remnant inadvertently left by the Central Plains culture in the isolated northwest of Yunnan. Less delicate and gentle, more rough and sonorous, cold moon and cold wind, lingering pity, is the legacy of war.
Photo: Lijiang Mufu Tu Worm Creative
The Mu regime originated in the Southern Expedition of the Mongol Army, Kublai Khan entered the Naxi region, and the Naxi leader Mai Liang, followed Kublai Khan to attack Dali, and captured the last emperor of Dali, Duan Xingzhi, the last emperor of the Dali Kingdom, who was the Southern Emperor Duan Emperor in "The Legend of the Eagle Shooter", the master of a lamp. He was awarded the "Lijiang Military and Civilian Propaganda and Fu Division", and the tusi tuguan system began to take shape.
Kublai Khan made his fifth son Ku Gechi the King of Yunnan, and then set up the "Dali Road Military and Civilian Governor's Office" in Dali, with The Dali Duan clan as the general administrator, and the first governor was Duan Xingzhi. Guo Moruo's historical drama "Peacock Bile" is written about the story of the king of Yunnan in the late Mongolian Yuan Dynasty, who married his daughter to Duan Gong, the governor of Dali, and appointed him as the political affairs of Pingzhang, but wanted to borrow his daughter's hand and kill his son-in-law Duan Gong. This story tells us that the Duan family took charge of Dali throughout the Yuan Dynasty.
In addition to Duan Xingzhi, the Emperor Duan, the Mongol soldiers also captured Gao Taixiang, who had been the prime minister of Dali for generations. Gao Taixiangning did not surrender and was beheaded in the Wuhua Building in Dali. When Gao Taixiang was about to be executed, he sighed: "Duan Yun cannot return, the heavens make it so, for the subject to die, cover his division." Kublai Khan considered him a loyal vassal, so he arranged for his descendants to be officials for generations and to serve as hereditary toasts in the local area, which lasted for more than 30 generations.
History records that the Mongol army was invincible, invincible, invincible, invincible, and thought it was fierce, but looking at their invasion of Yunnan, how they treated the Naxi Tusi, Dali Duanshi and Gao families, they would feel their gentle strategy, far more effective than the Jinge Iron Horse.
Recommended routes
The south of Caiyun not only has beautiful scenery, but also has a long and interesting history. You can take China Southern Airlines direct flights to Kunming, Dali, Lijiang, Xishuangbanna and other places to explore the historical Yunnan again. Search for the "China Southern Airlines" Mini Program on WeChat to query and book tickets.