When it comes to the founder of the Great Song Dynasty, Song Taizu Zhao Kuangyin, people will always think of a word, that is, yellow robe plus body, from this word we can see that Zhao Kuangyin's imperial throne seems to have been forced to him by others, and his emperorship seems to have come quite dramatically. But is this really the case? What happened on the night of Zhao Kuangyin's yellow robe?
Song Taizu Zhao Kuangyin
Let's first look at what the history books say. It is said that on the first day of the first lunar month in the seventh year of Zhou Xiande (960 AD) five generations later, the Manchu Dynasty Wenwu was celebrating the New Year, and the Later Zhou court suddenly received an urgent military report from Zhenzhou and Ding'erzhou, zhenzhou in today's Zhengding County, Hebei Province, and Dingzhou in today's Dingzhou City, Hebei Province, and the military newspaper said that the Northern Han and Khitan formed a joint army and launched a large-scale southern invasion of Northern Zhou, the situation was very critical, and the Northern Zhou Dynasty was in danger. At this time, the emperor of Northern Zhou was Emperor Gong of Zhou, who was only seven years old at the time, and the major affairs of the dynasty and China were decided by the empress, but the empress dowager of Northern Zhou was too young and had no ability to govern at all, so he brought the two prime ministers at that time, Fan Qian and Wang Pu, and after discussion, they decided to send a large army to go out on the expedition, and as for the commander of the big army, Zhao Kuangyin, who was then the inspector and the inspector in front of the palace, was the supreme commander of the emperor's forbidden army, in charge of the most elite troops in a country. After Zhao Kuangyin received the order, he immediately mobilized troops to march north.
On the third day of the first lunar month, the army came to Chen Qiaoyi, which was forty miles away from Kaifeng, and suddenly someone jumped out, saying that the current emperor is weak, and we spell out our old lives to resist the enemy, and who knows, it is better to set up a lieutenant as the son of heaven now, and then it is not too late to march north. Therefore, several generals came to Zhao Kuangyin's younger brother Zhao Kuangyi to serve the officials (there are historical records that Zhao Kuangyi may not have been at the scene of Chen Qiaoyi at that time, but later Zhao Kuangyi became emperor in order to improve his prestige and prove that he was also one of the founders of the Great Song Dynasty, and when recording history, he insisted on joining himself in the Chen Qiao Mutiny to show that he also participated in the important event of the founding of the Song Dynasty) and after consulting with zhao Pu, the secretary in charge, Zhao Kuangyi immediately said that his brother was a loyal person and would not agree to such a betrayal of the lord At the same time, Zhao Pu also believed that now that the enemy is at present, the whole army should go all out to resist the enemy and discuss this matter until the enemy has retreated. The generals, on the other hand, insisted that if the lieutenants did not accede to their request, they would not be willing to advance.
A mutiny is on the verge of erupting.
Chen Qiaoyi
However, what was Zhao Kuangyin, the protagonist of the mutiny, doing at this time? Zhao Kuangyin was now drunk and unconscious because he had drunk alcohol before.
The generals also had no way, so they stood guard around Zhao Kuangyin and waited for the dawn.
At dawn, Zhao Kuangyin woke up drunk, and when Zhao Kuangyi and Zhao Pu had just begun to report to him on the situation last night, the generals rushed into Zhao Kuangyin's tent and made sure to make Zhao Kuangyin the emperor, and before Zhao Kuangyin could react, he had already been carried by the generals to the council chamber, and then someone took the emperor's dragon robe up and put it on for Zhao Kuangyin, and everyone knelt down and shouted long live. When Zhao Kuangyin saw this scene, he immediately resigned and did not want to be the emperor, but the people did not listen, and they forced Zhao Kuangyin to the horse, the whole army no longer marched north, the army turned around and marched south, Zhao Kuangyin sat on the horse and did not know what to do, so he said, You people for your own glory and wealth, let me be the emperor, if so, then you must listen to my orders, otherwise, this emperor I will never do. The generals immediately expressed their position that they must obey their orders.
So Zhao Kuangyin gave everyone a "three chapters of the law of covenants".
Zhao Kuangyin said, For the little emperor and the empress, we have all been their courtiers, the princes and ministers of the DPRK are our colleagues, you must not be deceived, in addition, in modern times, all the troops entering Beijing will plunder and rob the treasury, this has become a vice, you are not allowed to do this, as long as you do it according to these requirements, then you must be a generous reward, otherwise you will be exterminated. Everyone agreed. Therefore, the whole army made a military order, and after entering Beijing, it will not commit any crimes.
Zhao Kuangyin's yellow robe was added
Zhao Kuangyin led a large army back to Kaifeng City, and at this time the gate of Kaifeng was already in the hands of Zhao Kuangyin's righteous brother Shi Shouxin, so Zhao Kuangyin's soldiers entered Kaifeng City without bloodshed.
There is an episode here where the deputy commander Han Tong learns of Zhao Kuangyin's mutiny and wants to gather an army to attack Zhao Kuangyin, but before he can do so, he is killed by Wang Yansheng, the former si of the palace. Han Tong's family became the only people killed in the mutiny.
The news reached the prime minister Fan Qian, Wang Pu, and the empress dowager, and the empress dowager had no choice but to blame the two prime ministers, and it was not good for so many generals in the DPRK to send zhao Kuangyin to resist the enemy. After the two of them withdrew, Fan Qian shook Wang Pu's hand and said, "Sending generals between hastes, leading to a mutiny now, this is all our fault, how to be good now?" Wang Pu was stunned there, not knowing how to answer, suddenly Wang Pu let out a painful moan, it turned out that Fan Qian held his hand, because of too much force, he had already pinched his fingernails into his wrist, almost bleeding.
For this sudden change, the two prime ministers were powerless.
On the fifth day of the first month of the first month, Zhao Kuangyin summoned a hundred officials of wen and wu to prepare to officially ascend the throne as emperor, and suddenly found that there was no Emperor Gong of Zhou's edict on the throne, how is this good, at this time, a Hanlin scholar Tao Gu immediately took out the edict that had been drafted long ago, which completed the Zen ceremony, and then Zhao Kuangyin replaced Hou Zhou and established the Great Song Dynasty.
Judging from these historical records, Zhao Kuangyin became the emperor completely "forced" by his subordinates, and was forced to put a dragon chair under his ass by others, and Zhao Kuangyin had to sit, but was this really the case?
Zhao Kuangyin liked to practice martial arts since he was a child, and at the age of 22, he came to the Later Han Privy Council to serve under Guo Wei, because of his outstanding military achievements, he was deeply appreciated by Guo Wei, and at a young age, the 30-year-old Zhao Kuangyin was promoted to the position of commander of the palace. Zhao Kuangyin was a good friend on weekdays, especially liked to worship people, and at that time he made a lot of friends in the army, especially several iron brothers known as the "Ten Brothers of the Righteous Society" (Zhao Kuangyin, Yang Guangyi, Shi Shouxin, Li Jixun, Wang Xianqi, Liu Qingyi, Liu Shouzhong, Liu Tingrang, Han Chongyun, and Wang Zhengzhong), and slowly gathered a group of senior generals who supported him around Zhao Kuangyin. Of course, not all the generals bought Zhao Kuangyin's account, for example, the deputy commander of the Ma Infantry Army, Han Tong, was not Zhao Kuangyin's gang, so when the news of Zhao Kuangyin's mutiny came, he also wanted to organize the army to resist.
Regarding this coup, before this, there were rumors that there would be a coup d'état at the time of the Northern Expedition of the Great Army, and some astronomical enthusiasts found that there was a sun under the sun, which was considered to be a signal to change the dynasty. I think this is related to the inertia of people's thinking during the Five Dynasties period, the change of dynasties in the Five Dynasties period is like a horse and a flower, most of the military generals took power and then deposed the original emperor and established himself as an emperor, so once there is a war, the people have this kind of speculation.
Let's go back to the night of the Chen Qiao mutiny, look at the details, when the subordinate generals wantEd Zhao Kuangyin to be emperor, Zhao Kuangyin was drunk at this critical moment, which made people have a feeling of wanting to avoid suspicion, I Zhao Kuangyin was not the emperor I wanted to be, it was my men who insisted on me being, because I was already drunk, I didn't know what happened at that time, but Zhao Kuangyin already understood in his heart, all things Zhao Kuangyi and Zhao Pu would help him get it done, and the two of them immediately sent people to Kaifeng quickly. He informed the palace that shi Shouxin and Wang Zhenqi, the marquis of Yu, were ready to receive him, so later Zhao Kuangyin was able to enter Kaifeng City as easily as if he were returning to his own home. What is even more suspicious is that when the army goes out to fight, why would someone carry a dragon robe with them, is this matter premeditated in advance!
Let's take a look at Zhao Kuangyin's old wife's reaction when she learned that Zhao Kuangyin mutinied and became empress. This old lady said after learning that her son Huang Paojia said, My son has always had great ambitions, and today it is true, and then talk and laugh freely, without a little surprise, is it that the old lady has already known in advance about Zhao Kuangyin's desire to become emperor?!
What is even more puzzling is that Zhao Kuangyin only led the army to go out because the combined forces of the Northern Han and the Khitan attacked southward, and now that he has only walked forty miles and returned, will the enemy troops in the north not care? Afterwards, we also know that there does not seem to be any enemy situation in the north, is it that the Northern Han Khitan coalition army learned that the Song Dynasty has established a country, and the lord of the country is old, so it withdrew, or Zhen and Ding erzhou are lying about military information, is this also arranged by Zhao Kuangyin in advance? Could it be that the generals of Zhen and Ding'er prefectures were also Zhao Kuangyin's people? However, judging from the performance of the generals of Zhen and Dingzhou when they learned that Zhao Kuangyin was called empress, it seems that they were not Zhao Kuangyin's people, and the Zhenzhou general Guo Chong, after learning of this, shed tears, and the general Sun Xingyou of Dingzhou was later stripped of his official title by Zhao Kuangyin.
Therefore, Zhao Kuangyin's yellow robe is added, and there are many places worth studying carefully, perhaps this is the charm of history!