The Truth About the Fall of the Jin Dynasty Introduction
The Jin dynasty of the Yan clan began in the first year of Taizu's completion of the Yan (Ah KuanTa) conquest (1115), and finally the completion of the Yan Shouxu (NingJiasu) Tianxing three years (1234) of the Emperor Of Sorrows. In the long river of Chinese history, although this 120-year history is a short period, it is indeed an important period that cannot be ignored. First, it is a dynasty established by the Jurchens in the white mountains and black waters of the northeastern frontier, so history has given many characteristics to the rule of this dynasty, and it can be seen from it how the dynasty established by the rulers of ethnic minorities has evolved. Second, it was a regime that appeared again after the North-South Dynasty for a long period of confrontation between the North and the South, and it more fully reflected the characteristics of the historical development of the North-South confrontation stage. Third, it developed after the destruction of the Liao and Northern Song dynasties, which were both more advanced than themselves, which made the history behind this dynasty more complicated. In the end, the Jin Dynasty did not escape the historical law of "its rise and fall, and its demise was also neglected", and it went through a historical process of development, prosperity and decline, leaving profound historical lessons and experiences to future generations like other dynasties.
Devour the Liao and Song Dynasties
The Jurchens, who inhabited today's tohoku region, belonged to the Tunguska language family. This is a very ancient nation, the pre-Qin period of sustenance is its distant ancestors, the so-called "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" so-called Luo Lou, the Northern Wei so-called Beji, Sui called the Black Water Department, the Tang called the Black Water, GaiQidi also. During the Zhenguan period, Emperor Taizong of Tang conquered Goryeo and Zuozhi and "fought very hard". In the five dynasties, it was called Jurchen, and those who lived in the south of the same river were called mature Jurchens, and the north of the river was called Jurchens, all of whom submitted to the Khitan and later avoided the Khitan and changed their name to Nüzhi.
The Birth Daughters were divided into many tribes, and at first, there was more than one person named "Complete Face". Among them, the Guanyanbu, which lived in the basin of the Hushui River (in present-day Harbin, Heilongjiang, east of the Ashe River), was the most powerful. This was the one that later established the Jin Dynasty. The cold climate, dense forests and harsh natural environment of the Shengnuzhen region have created their hard-working, heroic and warlike character. Its customs are all braided hair, decorated with pig teeth as ornaments, pheasant tails on the head, and economic life is generally in the stage of semi-farming and half-pastoralism, so the productivity level of the jurchen society at that time was only equivalent to that of the Western Zhou Dynasty in the Central Plains or earlier. The development of Jurchen society has been relatively slow, and although there were surplus products by the end of the Liao Dynasty, people were still exchanging things for the sake of having nothing. Since Han Pu became the leader of the Jurchen Complete Yan Clan, the pace of social development began to accelerate. The degree of privatization of property was gradually increasing, exacerbating class antagonisms and social divisions, and tribal leaders were gradually becoming rulers. But until the beginning of the Jin Dynasty, the social status of rulers and ordinary members was generally equal, and they "bathed in the same river and touched each other's shoulders." Although the people kill chickens, they also invite them to eat with them."
He was an outstanding leader of the Jurchens, who adapted to the needs of the Jurchen social development and anti-Liao struggle and established the Jin Dynasty. The youth of Ah Kuanta was the period of transformation of the Jurchens from clan society to class society, and it was also the period of the initial formation of a unified Jurchen nation. There were 13 sons in total, and Ah Kuan was the second son. Ah Kuan's brother U Ya Shu (Kangzong), who died in December 1113, was given the throne of Du Bo Ji Lie (the title of the highest military and political governor in the early Jin Dynasty). Since childhood, Ah Kuan has been "powerful for several generations, good manners", "good bow and arrow", "good at shooting", and 23 years old "by short armor, free of arms, not to worry about horses, and to order the armies". Many of the major changes and regulations of the Shizu, Suzong, Muzong, and Kangzong periods came from the suggestions of Ah Kuanta.
After Ah Kuan attacked the throne as Du Bo Ji Lie, in order to resist and get rid of the Slavery of the Liao Dynasty and seek a way to develop, he began to try to establish state power. In 1113, Ah Kuan sent out soldiers to shoot the Liao general Yelü Xiesan. With the support of Wu Begmai and other Jurchen nobles, Ah Kuanta was proclaimed emperor on the New Year's Day of the Lunar New Year in 1115, and the name of the country was Dajin, and the yuan was changed to the yuan to collect the country, ushering in a new era of jurchen development.
Before and after the founding of the People's Republic of China, Akuta carried out a series of social reforms to meet the needs of the real society. In the center, he renamed the supreme military leader of the tribal alliance the emperor, establishing the emperor's highest dominance in the country. He developed duboyan, state minister, and bobei into the highest authority of central rule, the Bojili system, and transformed the old aristocratic deliberative body of the clan system into a new ruling body. At the local level, Ah Kuan changed the "Meng'an Muke" system into a local administrative organization. Originally a military organization, in the second year of the reign of Emperor Akuta, he ordered each tribe to take three hundred households as The Emperor and ten to set up officials to administer it. The reform of the centurion and centurion who led the army into the head of the feudal local territory and the head of the household was a major reform of the old clan system. In terms of social life, Ah Kuanta also changed the old customs of the Jurchen people and prohibited marriage by the same surname, which is the result of the development and domination of the Jurchen clan concept and the concept of human ethics, which can be regarded as a favorable measure for the development of the nationality, and also a heavy blow to the clan blood domination relationship. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, Ah Kuanta also ordered Huandu's son, Yan Xiyin, to create Jurchen scripts.
The Jurchen script is made from the Khitan characters that have been modified to spell the Jurchen language. Jurchen characters became the official script commonly used throughout the country. The first political purpose after the founding of the state was to get rid of the oppression of the Liao Dynasty. He preferred Huanglong Province (黄龙府, in modern Nong'an, Jilin) as his target. In September of that year, the Jin army occupied Huanglong Province with the momentum of breaking bamboo. Emperor Tianzuo of Liao personally led an army of 700,000 to fight against Ah Kuanta's 20,000 elite army, and the Jin army won a great victory. The rule of the Liao Dynasty was already in turmoil. In 1116, the Jin army captured Liaoyang Province (辽阳府, in modern Liaoyang, Liaoning). In the following years, they successively captured the Liao capital LinhuangFu (present-day Balin Zuoqi South, Inner Mongolia), Zhongjing Dadingfu (present-day Damingfu, Ningcheng, Inner Mongolia), and Xijing DatongFu (present-day Datong, Shanxi). By 1122, the Jin army had captured Nanjing's Jingjin Province (present-day Beijing). In 1123, Yan Akuta died, and his younger brother Wu Begmai succeeded him as Emperor Taizong of Jin. In 1125 (the seventh year of Emperor Xuanzong's reign), Emperor Tianzuo of Liao was captured by the Jin general Lou Fu in Yingzhou, and the once-mighty Liao Dynasty came to an end.
With the demise of the Liao, the contradictions between Jin and Song gradually rose. As early as 1111, when the Song Hui Sect sent Tong Guan on an envoy to the Liao Dynasty, Tong Guan brought back the Yan people Li Liangsi (formerly known as Ma Zhi, Tong Guan changed his name). This man claimed to have a good strategy for destroying the Liao, and was deeply pleased by Tong Guan, but this person's character was very poor. Li Liangsi suggested to Emperor Huizong of Song that Song and Jin jointly attack the powerful Liao state. The two sides signed the "Alliance of the Seas" in 1118 and joined forces to destroy the Liao. In this transaction, the Northern Song Dynasty did not gain much benefit, and the Jin Dynasty received a large number of booty, a large number of "year coins" and a large amount of land every year.
Jin grew stronger day by day, while the Northern Song Dynasty entered a period of decline. In the process of the joint attack on the Liao by the Song and Jin, the Jin people also saw the corruption and cowardice of the Song Dynasty. In November of the year of the destruction of the Liao, a large-scale attack on the Song Dynasty was launched. The Jin army went south in two ways, and the eastern route was led by Yan Zongwang, starting from Pingzhou, occupying Tanzhou, Jizhou and other places, and the defenders fell under the wind. The Jin people drove straight down, crossed the Yellow River, and approached Kaifeng. The Western Route Army, led by Yan Zonghan, set out from Yunzhong to attack Taiyuan, and at the same time sent people to meet Tong Guan in Taiyuan, demanding that the Song Dynasty cut off the hedong and Hebei regions, and that Song Jin take the Great River as the boundary. The Jin army on the Western Road was blocked under Taiyuan City. News of the Jin people's southward march reached Kaifeng, and chaos broke out in the Northern Song Dynasty. Emperor Huizong of Song quickly passed the throne to his son Zhao Huan (赵桓) for Emperor Qinzong of Song; the following year he changed his name to Yuan Jingkang. The Western Route Army led by Zong Han captured Taiyuan, and soon the whole army joined forces under the city of Tokyo and captured Kaifeng City. The Jin army plundered and plundered the city of Kaifeng, and Emperor Huizong of Song and Emperor Qinzong of Song were also taken prisoner. In the second year of Jing Kang (1127), the Jin people yuhui and qin erzong, as well as more than 3,000 concubines and clan ministers, and a large number of gold and silver treasures returned to the north. History calls it "the difficulty of Jingkang".
The rule of the world
After Jin Taizong destroyed the Northern Song Dynasty, he immediately began to cross the river and fight against the Southern Song Dynasty, but he had more than enough heart and insufficient strength, and the situation of confrontation between Song and Jin was basically formed. From the reign of Emperor Xizong and King Hailing to Emperor Sejong and Emperor Zhangzong, the Jin Dynasty was basically in a stage of upward development.
In 1135, Jin Taizong died, and was succeeded by Xizong, who was 16 years old. Emperor Xizong made many major reforms in the official system.
He abolished the old auxiliary political system such as Bo Jilie and adopted the Han official system of the Liao and Song dynasties. In 1138, the "New System of Heavenly Dependents" was also implemented, the main purpose of which was to fully implement the policy of "Sinicization" and promote the Han official system, such as the original various official positions were exchanged according to the new system; the Jurchen nobles were awarded different lords and feudal states according to merit; the power of the Phase was further strengthened; the ceremonies of the canon were formulated; and the palace was built in Huining Province, Shangjing. In 1141, the Jin and Song dynasties established the "Shaoxing Peace Agreement", with Huaishui and Dashanguan (present-day southern Baoji County, Shaanxi) as the dividing line between the Song and Jin, and the jin dynasty's rule was basically determined. In the later years of Emperor Xizong's life, the internal struggles of the ruling layer gradually became sharper and sharper, killing each other, and the people in Shandong revolted one after another. In 1149, Yan Liang killed Emperor Xizong and seized the throne as King hailing Hailing.
After King Hailing ascended the throne, he further strengthened the centralization of power to consolidate imperial power. In 1153, he moved the capital to Yanjing and built the capital as the capital of Zhongdu; the original Fenjing was changed to Nanjing (in 1161, Kaifeng was changed to the capital of Jin). In September 1161, Yan Liang attacked the Southern Song Dynasty and crossed the Huai River that month. However, the successive conquests of the Hailing King led to internal instability in the Jin army, the defection of soldiers, and the chaos of the army. The Jin army was defeated at Quarry Rock (矶, in modern Ma'anshan, Anhui), and King Hailing retreated to Yangzhou and Guazhou, where he was killed by his men.
In October 1161, Yan Yong ascended the throne as King Sejong. Jin Shizong had a good Han cultural attainment, paid attention to learning Confucian classics, absorbed the ruling experience of successive emperors, and advocated the way of benevolence and kingship. After ascending the throne, he took measures and soon stabilized his rule.
He appointed his vassals to the Hailing King, maintaining the relative stability of the political system; winning the support of the Jurchen nobility; successfully suppressing the uprisings of the Han and Khitan peoples; and recruiting Han, Khitan and other upper-class people of various ethnic groups to participate in the administration and discussion of politics. In terms of Song-Jin relations, in 1165, the two sides signed the "Longxing Peace Agreement", in exchange for a relatively stable situation for 40 years.
During the kim sejong period, he focused his main energy on the political and socio-economic development aspects of internal affairs. He made some additions and losses to the system of the previous generation, and the addition of two pingzhang political affairs to the prime minister further strengthened the imperial rule. Economically, Sejong actively resumed agricultural production, reduced the burden on peasants, recruited exiles, and reclaimed land. In order to restore and develop the social economy, he was frugal, not luxurious, strict with himself, and disciplined the princes and ministers. Wang Yun once mentioned such a thing: At that time, when some kings asked the imperial court to provide additional rewards, Sejong said to them: "How can you people be so greedy, don't you know that the property in the state treasury is the property of the people, I am just keeping it on behalf of the people, how dare I spend it in vain?" It is precisely because Kim Sejong can more correctly understand the relationship between the ruler and the common people, and does not use the treasury's assets casually, so during his reign, the tax revenue was not as good as tithe, "except for the two taxes, there is no excess." In less than a few years, the national treasury was enriched and the people were rich, "so that the peace of The Thirty Years of Dading" was achieved. When Sejong ascended the throne, there were more than 3 million households in the country, which increased to more than 6.7 million after 20 years. During the Dading period, the political situation was stable and the finances were sufficient, so Sejong enjoyed the title of "Xiao Yao Shun".
In 1189, Sejong completed Yan Yong's illness, and the emperor's grandson completed Yan and succeeded to the throne as Jin Zhangzong. During the reign of Emperor Zhangzong, he inherited Sejong's ruling policy, continued to implement the policy of Sinicization, advocated the study of Han culture, encouraged intermarriage between the Jurchen and Han ethnic groups, and promoted the integration of ethnic groups. The relative peace between the Song and Jin dynasties was also maintained, and the north gained a certain degree of development.
The sejong and Zhangzong periods were the prosperous period of the Jin Dynasty, which was known in history as the "reign of Dading Mingchang", which was glorified by people at that time and in later generations. Yuan Haoqing, a famous scholar of the Jin Dynasty, said, "(Mr. Nanhu) has been in Dading, Mingchang, and Taihe for fifty years." Zhao Bingwen, a famous artist of the Jin Dynasty, praised "the qingming of the imperial court in Dading and Mingchangjian and the world without incident.". Compared with the mourning at the end of the Jin Dynasty, the Ming Dynasty of Dading is indeed a peaceful and prosperous world.
Golden mistress
Although the Zhangzong period was said to be extremely prosperous, many problems had already emerged, and the prosperity and decline had already revealed signs. Prince Xiao of Zhang (i.e., The Father of Emperor Zhangzong) was brilliant and excellent at reading, and he wanted to emulate Emperor Xiaowen of the Northern Wei Dynasty, change the Yidi customs of the Jin people, and implement the ritual music of the Central Plains. However, heaven did not follow his wishes, and Prince ZhangXiao died prematurely before he could inherit the throne. Zhang Zong was intelligent and studious, had the style of his father, he liked literature and advocated Confucianism, so for a while celebrities appeared in an endless stream, most of the ruling ministers had literary ability and learning to be desirable, capable officials and gengzhi ministers were appointed, the politics were clear, the culture was brilliant, and the Jin Dynasty developed to the peak of its prosperity. Of course, behind the flowery words, it is not difficult to find that the purpose of teaching the art of practicing the Ming Dynasty is to "protect the country and the people" in an attempt to rule "the country for a long time." However, the society under Emperor Zhangzong's reign was full of negative factors. He was extremely extravagant and extravagant, building palaces everywhere, and foreign relatives and villains interfered in political affairs. The ministers could only flatter and flatter, for a moment of happiness, and did not dare to go against their liking. This is an important reason for the weakening of the Jin Dynasty during the Da'an and Zhen dynasties after Emperor Zhangzong.
During the time of Emperor Zhangzong, "foreign relatives and villains are more pre-government", referring to Li Yuanfei's family. Before Emperor Zhangzong ascended the throne, yuan and pu cha clan were already ill as twenty-three years before Dading. After ascending the throne, she was posthumously honored as Empress Qinhuai. After Emperor Zhang succeeded to the throne, he never had a concubine. After taking a fancy to Li Shi, Emperor Zhangzong wanted to make her empress. Li Shi was from a humble background, so the ministers unanimously opposed This decision of Emperor Zhangzong, and the inspectors Yushi Zongduanxiu, Right Shilu feng, Hanlin Xiuzhao Zhao Bingwen, and Yushi Zhongzhong Zhang Gongshu all lost their official posts. Although Li Shi was not made empress, and only made a concubine, her brothers Xi'er and Tidi relied on her power to interfere in the government, and the officials were extremely high-ranking, and even his family's private slaves were bullying, and the ministers dared to be angry and did not dare to speak. Inspector Yushi Zong Duanxiu, "Xi Ming Jie", jinshi origin, Li brothers interfered in the government, making him indignant, so he wrote a letter asking the emperor to be "far lesser". Emperor Zhangzong did not know who he was referring to, and specially ordered Xi'er to pass on the edict and ask him to say his name. Duan Xiu told Xi'er: "Little man, Li Renhui brother." "Renhui is the name given to Li Xi'er by Emperor Zhangzong. Duan Xiu bluntly reprimanded him as a "villain", and he did not dare to hide it, according to the truth, although Zhang Zong also blamed the Xi'er brothers, he still couldn't do without them. Supervising Yushi Zhang Gong's writings, he even pointed the spearhead directly at Li Yuanfei herself, who was not afraid of offending Zhangzong, and wrote that there were quite irritating words such as "concubines are arrogant and the wife is out of position." Foreign eunuchs have never been extinct in the Han imperial family since the Eastern Han Dynasty, and the Jin Dynasty, while learning from the advanced culture and system of the Central Plains Dynasty, was also infected with this vice.
Just as the Jin Dynasty was in decline, a new ethnic minority, the Mongols, arose in the northern steppes. The ancestors of the Mongols, known as the "Mongol Chambers" during the Tang Dynasty, lived in the Erguna River Valley. During the Liaojin period, they were widely distributed in the northern steppe, engaged in nomadic herding, hunting, and fierce sex. At the beginning of the Jin Dynasty, it was constantly attacked by the Mongols. In the thirteenth year of Tianhui (1135), a rebellion broke out within the Mongols, and the Jin lord Guanyan sent the Jin dynasty nobleman Song Wangzong to take the opportunity to attack, temporarily alleviating the pressure on the north. In April 1143, Guanyan tried to once again take advantage of the Mongol rebellion to send troops, but ended in failure, due to contradictions within the Ruling Clique of the Jin Dynasty. The Jin Dynasty nobleman Lu Wang, King Yanchang, had earlier been accused of his crimes, and his son Sahan Tulangjun led his father's men to defect to Mongolia, and the Mongols' power continued to grow stronger, directly taking more than 20 regiments of the Jin Dynasty, and the Jin people were defeated. Jin had to make peace with the Mongols instead, giving them large quantities of cattle, sheep, rice, beans, cotton, and silk every year in exchange for peace, but the effect of this was not obvious. In order to protect it from the Mongols, the Jin Dynasty continued to build border trenches and border forts in the north, and heavily defended them. Kim was only too poor to cope with Mongolia. During the Dading period, there was a folk song in the north: "Tatars come, Tatars go, and the officials do not go out", reflecting the helplessness of the Jin Dynasty.
In 1208, Emperor Zhangzong died and was succeeded by King Yongji of Wei (formerly known as Yunji, the seventh son of Emperor Sejong, and later renamed Yongji by Emperor Zhangzong's father, Yun Gong). Emperor Zhangzong arranged for Wei Weishao to succeed him and have his own wishful thinking. It turned out that king Ge, born to Concubine Li, had been worried about his succession since Taehwa died before he was one year old in May of the third year (1203), especially due to his deteriorating health. In 1208, Empress Dowager Jia and Fan became pregnant, but by this time Emperor Zhangzong was terminally ill. In November of that year, before his death, both the Jia and Fan clans had not yet given birth, so the Yuan Concubine Li and her brother Li Xinxi consulted with the chancellor Yan Kuang to establish Wei Shao Wang Yongji as the heir to the throne. Obviously, Zhang Zong lied Yongji, but only let him temporarily guard the throne, and in his will, he actually used the principle of "having a concubine and not establishing a concubine" in the Book of Rites to negate Jin Taizu's "meaning of teaching to the public". Once the Jia and Fan clans gave birth to the "Dragon Son", the throne still belonged to the Zhangzong lineage. However, Zhang Zong's wishful thinking soon fell short. Although King Wei Shao was mediocre in talent, after becoming emperor, like Zhangzong, he tried every means to pass the throne to his descendants. To this end, trying not to let the fetus in Jia and Fan's wombs be born became his top priority. Long before Zhangzong's death, King Wei Shao took advantage of the opportunity to choose two delusional people to "protect" Jia and Fan as Zhangzong's birth of the crown prince, and his Sima Zhao's heart was not known. Sure enough, he succeeded to the throne for just over two months, and in August of the first year of Da'an (1209), it was announced that both Jia and Fan's pregnancies were in trouble. Jia's delivery period has passed, and there is still no movement; Fan's tire gas is damaged, and after medication, the fetal shape has been lost. Fan shi had to express his willingness to cut his hair and become a nun. This was obviously a ghost that King Wei Shao had secretly tricked. In this incident, it was Emperor Zhangzong's concubine Li Shi who was sacrificed. When Emperor Zhangzong was dying, Yan Kuang was entrusted with Concubine Yuan to support King Wei Shao, but he wanted to make a special decision, so he began to plot to get rid of Li. He made up a lie that at the beginning, Jia's vomiting and there were lumps in his abdomen were actually sick, but Li said that it was a pregnancy reaction. Li Shi took the opportunity to discuss with his mother and brother, so that Jia Shi falsely claimed to be pregnant, so that when he was about to give birth, he would take Li Jia'er to impersonate him as an imperial heir. This lie is indeed too bizarre. In his later years, Emperor Zhangzong pinned all his hopes on the early birth of the prince, even if Li Shi wanted to steal liang and change pillars, how could Jia clan dare to cooperate with it and commit the crime of deceiving the king? However, King Wei Shao eventually killed the Li family and the Jia family. After eliminating the troubles of his confidants, King Wei Shao made his son King Yan Ke crown prince in August of the second year of Da'an (1210).
At a time when the Jin Dynasty was in turmoil, the Mongols were already full fledgling. In the sixth year of Kim Tae-ho (1206), Temujin unified the Mongol ministries and established the Great Mongol State, called Genghis Khan. Initially, Genghis Khan still paid tribute to Jin and met Yongji, the king of Weishao. After Jin Zhangzong's death, Genghis Khan heard that Yongji had succeeded to the throne, and he was extremely contemptuous, declaring: "I used to think that the emperor of the Central Plains was an emissary sent from heaven, but how can there be such a cowardly person?" "Genghis Khan's army is burning day by day, and the Jin Dynasty is in danger, wanting to fight back." In the spring of the third year of Da'an, the Mongols paid tribute, and after King Wei Shao sent heavy troops to divide tun shan, he wanted to attack and kill the Mongols when they entered the field.
However, some of Jin's "army" went to report to the Mongols, and the Mongols began to doubt the letter, but the messengers continued, and the Mongols sent people to spy on it, so they believed that this was true, so they could not advance. The "army" was the armed force of the Khitan and other tribes in the north, and although subject to the Jin Dynasty, it was alienated from the Jurchen rulers, and at this time it was more explicitly inclined to the emerging Mongol nobility. King Wei Shao's plan to harm Genghis Khan failed to materialize, and Genghis Khan not only stopped paying tribute to Jin, but also preemptively attacked Jin. In the face of the powerful attack of the Mongolian army, King Wei Shao was helpless, and only knew that he was crying relative to his subordinates. When the Mongol army approached Zhongdu, the Jin army could not withstand continuous attacks and had to beg for peace.
Just as the Mongol armies continued to attack the Jin, there was another coup d'état within the Jin Dynasty. In 1213, the Jin nobleman Hu Shahu killed King Wei Shao in a palace coup. Kim Sejong's grandson, Kim Jangjong's brother-in-law, Complete Yan, succeeded to the throne as Emperor Xuanzong of Jin.
The Jin Dynasty, which was already in a state of decline, could not lift its spirits even more after all this tossing and turning.
The wrong way is rushed
King Wei Shao was killed, and Tu Shan Yi suggested to Hu Shahu that he be made emperor, on the grounds that this person was the brother of Emperor Zhangzong and the eldest son of Yan Yonggong, and the people expected to belong, "the marshal decided to establish it, and the merits of the world were also done." Hu Shahu accepted this suggestion. At that time, Yan was still in Zhangde Province (present-day Anyang, Henan), and Hu Shahu sent people to welcome him to Zhongdu. In September of the first year of Ning (1213), it was located in the Da'an Hall. Although Hu Shahu had already committed crimes, Emperor Xuanzong remembered his meritorious deeds and still regarded him as a patron, and regarded him as a Taishi, Shang Shuling and Marshal of the Capital, and was made the King of Ze, and several of his sons also held important positions. Hu Shahu killed the king, and Xuanzong proceeded from an extremely narrow and selfish position, and instead of punishing this person, he protected him, and as a result, encouraged other careerists to take risks.
Soon after Emperor Xuanzong ascended the throne, the Mongol army advanced into ZijingGuan, a major area in western Beijing, only 200 miles from Yanjing. At this time of life and death, there was chaos within the Jin Army. Hu Shahu's subordinate, Gao Qi, was killed for fear of defeat, and preemptively led an army to surround Hu Shahu's official residence and break into the bedroom to kill him. Then retreat to heaven's gate to be sinned. Because Gao Qi had a heavy army, Xuanzong did not dare to blame him, but killed those who had followed Hu Shahu's rebellion, thus ending the crisis. Hu Shahu's original sin could not be condemned, and Xuanzong could not justify his crime, so there was another incident of Hu Shahu Gao Qi's unauthorized killing, which was actually a continuation of the Hu Shahu killing of King Wei Shao. In this regard, Xuanzong had no choice but to pardon Gao Qi in a confused way, which showed that he was no longer able to control the situation, but only changed from a puppet of Hu Shahu to a puppet of Gao Qi of Hushahu.
By the time the Mongol army had entered the country on a large scale in the last years of Emperor Zhangzong's reign, Jin had lost a large area of land north of the Yellow River. In the spring of the second year of Zhen (1214), the Mongols had broken through more than 90 counties in the Central Plains and reached the capital city. Emperor Xuanzong was afraid of the Mongols, and the monarchs and courtiers pinned all their hopes on making peace with the Mongols, and the generals also cowered and did not dare to go to war, under the pretext of "fear of bad peace" and things.
However, the more this happened, the more the Mongols refused to make peace with it. At that time, the chancellor Zhang Xingxin said to Xuanzong: "Since Chongqing, it is because the peace talks have delayed major events, and if we are willing to fight with the Mongols from time to time and can thwart the Mongols, then even the peace talks can be long-lasting." At this time, the officers of the Jin Dynasty were no longer the heroic and good warriors of the past, and Zhang Xingxin's expectations were completely out of touch with reality.
Jin Xuanzong feared the enemy like a tiger, and even hoped that a miracle would happen out of thin air, and when the Mongol army approached the city, he set up a "recruitment office" at donghua gate, and those who could meet his wishes were appointed in turn. As a result, some ignorant and ignorant people are racing to this institution to talk nonsense. There was a villager named Wang Shouxin, who dared to speak loudly, claiming that "Zhuge Liang is an unknown soldier." Shi Yu yan yu actually believed in this kind of wild talk, thinking that this person was really a military expert who had never existed in ancient and modern times, and hurriedly recommended it to the imperial court. So this deceitful villain was entrusted with the heavy responsibility of military unification, and he recruited some city thugs to serve as soldiers, teaching the techniques of entering, retreating, jumping, and throwing villages, which was nothing more than a child's play. Its method is called "ancient and modern opposite", and these four words are written on the flag. He also made 36 pieces of yellow cloth robes, 36 pieces of scarves, and 64 bull's head rings, claiming that these "magic objects" could scare away the enemy. After they left the city, they did not dare to confront the Mongols, but killed some innocent people to "catch" and asked the imperial court for merit. In fact, Wang Shouxin's "ancient and modern opposite" formation method is really absurd. However, the rulers of the Jin Dynasty were convinced, which showed that jin's rule was at the end of the road, and they had no choice but to take straw and give their fate to a rogue like Wang Shouxin. However, the deception was eventually exposed, and Jin Xuanzong had to send the chancellor Chenghui to beg for peace with Genghis Khan, and offered princess Qiguo, the daughter of King Wei Shao, and 500 virgins and 3,000 horses, and the two sides reached a temporary compromise. After the peace talks, Genghis Khan was escorted by Chenghui and withdrew from Juyongguan.
Although Genghis Khan withdrew from the outskirts of Zhongdu, most of the prefectures and counties in Shandong and Hebei were still under the occupation of the Mongol army, and many of the prefectures and counties in Hedong were destroyed by the war and were in ruins. At this time, Zhongdu had become an isolated city, with no food and no rescue outside.
Jin Xuanzong then issued an edict to the world, abandoning Zhongdu and moving south to Beijing to avoid the blows of the Mongol army. After Emperor Xuanzong moved south, he left the crown prince behind, and ordered Chenghui, the right chancellor and marshal of the capital, to stay in Zhongdu. In June, before Emperor Xuanzong could reach Nanjing, the army stationed south of Zhongdu mutinied and surrendered to the Mongols. The Mongol army once again moved south, and with the cooperation of the army, it stepped up its siege of Zhongdu.
Jin Xuanzong hurriedly took Crown Prince Shouzhong to Kaifeng. It was May of that year, and Zhongdu fell.
After moving south, the jin dynasty monarchs and courtiers drunkenly dreamed of death, and only prayed for Gou An. Whenever the Mongol army pressed down on the territory, the monarchs wept in the opposite direction, and sighed long and short above the main hall, and when the Mongol army retreated, they began to drink and enjoy themselves. When the prime ministers discussed current affairs, they were nothing more than a showmanship, and whenever they encountered a crucial problem, they announced that they would discuss it again next time, and every time they would follow the law. That's how they followed until the country perished. Xuanzong was no more concerned about the fate and future of the Jin Dynasty than his ministers, only how to continue his luxurious life. He once had someone secretly make him a big red half-body embroidered robe, and warned him not to let the outspoken Inspector Goshi Chenzhi know. When the embroidered clothes were made and sent to him, he asked Chen Zhi if he knew about it, and the people who came quickly explained that he did not dare to spread anything big or small in the palace, not to mention that the emperor had personally told him. When Xuanzong heard this, he was relieved and said, "If you want to let the old rules know, you will definitely advise me because of the luxury rules, and I am really afraid of his words." "At the critical juncture of death, the monarch is still painstakingly working on an embroidered garment, which is evident in his utter fainting.
In December of the third year of Xingding (1219), Emperor Xuanzong became angry with Gao Qi and killed him for this reason to vent his anger. However, the Jin Dynasty was already ill and blind, and there was no sign of returning to the light, and the demise of the Jin Dynasty was just around the corner.
However, at this time, the Jin Dynasty once again had a crisis of the throne. The favored noble concubine Pang's son, Guanyan Shouchun, and Crown Prince Shouxu, the adopted son of the Wang clan, who was later made empress, competed for the throne. In December of the second year of Yuan Guang (1223), Emperor Xuanzong fell ill. The night before his death, his courtiers had already left the palace, accompanied only by an elderly former imperial wife, Zheng Shi, who was about to die. Emperor Xuanzong knew that Zheng was reliable, so he entrusted her with the aftermath and asked her to "quickly summon the crown prince to the aftermath", and died in anger. The Zheng clan did not bear the heavy trust, calmly and witfully coped with Pang Guifei, who came to see Xuanzong, and Emperor Aizong of Jin was able to succeed to the throne smoothly after completing Yan Shouxu.
After Emperor Aizong succeeded to the throne, because Genghis Khan had not yet ended the war in the northwest, he had no time to take care of this, and the Jin Dynasty was given another chance to breathe. Under extremely difficult circumstances, Jin Mu supported the city for nine years, and was forced to flee to Guide (present-day Shangqiu, Henan) because of the Mongol siege of the city. In the early years of Zhengda, Emperor Aizong once had the performance of cheering up his spirit and exerting himself to govern, but he soon became as depressed and corrupt as his father, and the common people had completely lost confidence in the rule of the Jin Dynasty. One day in the first month of the first year of the Zhengda Dynasty, the wind in Kaifeng City was fierce, and the tiles on the upper floor of the Duanmen Gate were blown down by the wind, and there was a man dressed in linen and crying and laughing at the Chengtian Gate. Someone asked him why he was so crazy, and he replied, "I laugh, and laughter will be empty." I weep, cry that the Kingdom of Gold will perish. "The end of the Jin Dynasty is coming.
In July of the fourth year of Zhengda (1227), Genghis Khan fell ill and died on his way to the capital of Western Xia. At that time, the capital of Western Xia had been besieged for a long time, and the city ran out of food, and soon the king of Western Xia surrendered, and the Mongol war to destroy Xia was declared victorious. At this time, it is possible for them to go all out to launch a war to destroy gold. In 1229, Wokoutai was the Khan's seat. Two years later, the Yuan army launched a general attack on the Jin Dynasty. In early 1232, the Mongol army and the Jin army launched a major battle at the Three Peaks Mountain in Junzhou, and the Jin army was defeated. The monk Who had made many achievements in battle was also captured and became a ghost under the sword, and the main force of the Jin Army had been lost by now. In March, the Mongol army captured Luoyang, the capital of Zhongjing, and sent envoys to Beijing to urge Emperor Aizong to surrender. Emperor Aizong took the prince as a hostage to beg the Mongols for peace, but was refused. At this time, there was another epidemic in the capital city. Jin Aizong had no other way but to flee. In early December, Emperor Aizong fled from Beijing and crossed the river to prepare to take Wei Prefecture (衛州, in modern Weihui, Henan). Unable to conquer the attack, the Mongol army chased after it from Henan, and the Jin army was defeated. Finally, Emperor Aizong abandoned the Sixth Army at night, crossed the river and returned to Henan, fleeing to Guide with six or seven people around him.
In June of the second year of Tianxing (1233), Emperor Aizong set out from Guide to Caizhou, and on the way he encountered heavy rain and Tuotuo, and his followers trekked in the mud on foot, without food, they could only pick green dates to fill their hunger, and along the way they were hungry and prepared to taste hardships. Arrived in Bozhou the next day.
The monks and elders greeted him by the side of the road, only to see that the emperor's guards were only guided by two green and yellow flags, and after the yellow umbrella was embraced, there were only two or three hundred followers, and no more than 50 horses. Emperor Aizong stayed in Bozhou for one day, and the next day entered 60 miles south of Bozhou to shelter from the rain at Shuanggou Temple. Emperor Aizong looked around, only to see that the land was desolate and there were no more people, so he lamented, "All the living beings are gone." At the end of the month, Emperor Aizong arrived in Caizhou. At that time, due to the inconclusive negotiations between the Song and The Mongols to jointly attack Jin, the situation was relatively calm when Emperor Aizong arrived in Caizhou. There were merchants in the city again, and the people thought that the emperor would come and live a peaceful life again, so they took out all the good wine that had been stored for many years and drank it at once. Emperor Aizong also forgot that he was in the midst of a refugee, and had just settled down in Caizhou, so he built a large number of civil engineering and built a "seeing mountain pavilion" as a place of recreation. However, the harsh reality outside soon shattered the dream of these people in Caizhou City of "enjoying peace in peace". In August, the Song and Mongolian sides reached an agreement. Soon, the Song army and the Mongolian army coordinated and launched an attack in Tangzhou and Xizhou, completely breaking the dream of the Emperor of Sorrow to unite with the Song dynasty to resist Mongolia. By September, the food shortage in Caizhou was already extremely serious. In December, the Song and Mongol armies launched a fierce attack on the city of Caizhou. On the tenth day of the first lunar month of the third year of Tianxing (1234), Emperor Aizong saw that the city was about to be destroyed, so he issued an edict to the commander-in-chief Yan Chenglin, hoping that he would rush out and try to restore the Great Golden Emperor.
Chenglin immediately declared his throne. At this time, the Song and Mongol armies had already rushed into the city, Emperor Aizong hanged himself, and Chenglin Yu led his troops to fight in the street, and finally killed by the rebels. The Jin Dynasty eventually perished in a miserable situation.
Tracing the trajectory of the rise and fall of the Jin Dynasty, it is not difficult to find that it has experienced a path roughly similar to the rise and fall of the Liao Dynasty. The reason why they were able to fight against the Great Song regime at the beginning of their rise and repeatedly gained the upper hand was because of their extremely warlike military and political organizations. The Liao had the "Chu Lu Duo" and the clan army, and the Jin had the "Meng'an Mouke", and they all practiced the system of integrating soldiers and the people, and they could be invincible under the command of the emperor who worked hard to govern. However, after they achieved fame and established a traditional agricultural regime dominated by Han culture and imperial despotism, with the rapid changes in the original organizational form of power, the shortcomings of the system became increasingly prominent. This is first manifested in the innate inadequacy and inadaptability of its original system. The jin dynasty's Meng'an Mouke army continued to decline in combat effectiveness, and even the rulers could not stop it with generous salaries.
Secondly, it has not been possible to find a suitable path in dealing with the relationship between the Jurchens, who are the ruling class, that is, the ethnic minority, and the Han people, which is the ruled class, that is, the dominant ethnic group. After controlling the vast traditional Han settlements north of Jianghuai and Dasanguan, the Jin Dynasty, in order to rule the Central Plains, relocated more than one million Jurchens to a densely populated area in the lower reaches of the Yellow River, at the expense of the Interests of the Han Chinese. However, this move did not solve the problem of the increasing poverty of the Jurchens in the form of agrarian economy, but led to the bitter hatred of the Han people. They not only seized the richest arable land of the Han chinese, but also increased the enslavement of the Han people in order to increase the increasing living and military expenditures. The contradiction between the Jurchens and the Han is exactly as the historical records say: "Thieves are full of wilderness, and those who rely on the prestige of the country are heavy, and people regard them as blood and bone resentment, and they will repay them."
Third, the river plague was also an important reason for the demise of the Jin Dynasty. When Jin controlled the north of Jianghuai, the river flooded and continued for many years. Even more unfortunately, the Yellow River also seems to be opposed to the Jurchens, and since the Jin room moved south, the Yellow River has changed its course and no longer flows north, but flows southeast. The scope of the river is very extensive. The river plague further exacerbated the contradictions between the ruling class and the Han people, and the anger of resistance in various places never stopped.
The Jin Dynasty immediately won the world, but when it governed the world, it encountered internal and external contradictions. The Jin Dynasty has always been constrained by the Northern Song, Southern Song, Western Xia, Mongol, and Goryeo regimes, and the slightest mistake will be subverted; internally, on the issue of resettling the Jurchens and handling the relations between the Han nationality, new ethnic and class contradictions have arisen, which have always existed and have not been well resolved. And the bloody power struggle within the ruling class is corrupting the edifice of power, and in the face of a strong Mongol whirlwind, its demise seems to be understandable.