From a mischievous teenager to a national hero: the evolution of the big fat man Gao Yanzong

From a mischievous teenager to a national hero: the evolution of the big fat man Gao Yanzong

Gao Yanzong, the fifth son of Gao Cheng, a powerful minister of Eastern Wei, and the nephew of Gao Yang, the founding emperor of Northern Qi. Gao Cheng died early, Gao Yanzong was adopted by Gao Yang from an early age, Gao Yang was a beast emperor who was "indulgent in alcohol, extremely rampant, evil and cruel, and had never been seen in recent times", Gao Yanzong followed him, good things did not learn, naughty is good, Gao Yanzong was twelve years old, he also peed in Gao Yang's navel eyes. In this regard, Gao Yang was not angry, but hugged him and said, unfortunately I only grew a navel eye, if I grow a few more, with you tossing, it can be seen that Gao Yang's excessive doting on Gao Yanzong. Gao Yang wanted to make Gao Yanzong king, so he asked the chancellor Yang Yanzong, who was worried that Gao Yanzong would be restless in the future, so he said, "May you make An Yude" (see Book of Northern Qi), proposing to make Gao Yanzong the King of Ande.

When he became the King of Ande, Gao Yanzong, far from being "Anyude", became more and more stubborn. When serving as the Assassin of Dingzhou, Gao Yanzong pulled poop upstairs and made people open their mouths downstairs; he used steamed pig food with human excrement to eat for the left and right attendants, and if anyone was afraid of dirty and smelly, and had a bad face, he would be flogged. These bad deeds of Gao Yanzong are not fabricated, but clearly recorded in the canonical history: "Emperor Yanzong of Ande ... For the sake of Dingzhou's assassination history, he defecated upstairs and made people confess it in the next mouth. Steamed pork grits and human dung are fed left and right, and those who have difficult colors are whipped" (see Book of Northern Qi). When the sixth uncle, Emperor Xiaozhao, heard of such a thing, he sent emissaries to beat Gao Yanzong with a hundred staffs, and Gao Yanzong complained while being beaten, so he was hit with an extra thirty rods.

This one hundred and thirty rods did not have the effect of education, Gao Yanzong went his own way, from mischief to killing, "and then tested the knife with the prisoner, tested its sharpness and bluntness", took the prisoners in the prison to test the knife, in order to test the sharpness of the knife. For a time, many prisoners who should not have been killed died under Gao Yanzong's sword. Gao Yanzong's "arrogant and lawless" behavior had a very bad impact, and even Gao Zhan, the Ninth Uncle Wucheng Emperor who was good at mutilating the clan, indulging in beauty, favoring villains, and not thinking about state affairs, could not look at it any longer, and sent people to "tart it and kill nearly nine of his nicknames", and from then on, Gao Yanzong "deeply repented" (see the Book of Northern Qi) and completely changed his personality. After the later lord Gao Wei ascended the throne, he wantonly slaughtered the clan room, and Gao Yanzong had to taoguang to raise obscurity, and slowly raised a fat body.

Gao Yanzong's bloated body attracted ridicule from the people, but he also escaped Gao Wei's suspicions. Gao Wei's "beauty instrument" (see Book of Northern Qi) is very different from Gao Yanzong. In Gao Wei's view, although Gao Yanzong had some brute force and some wisdom, his image was too dirty to become a big thing, let alone threaten the imperial power. Unexpectedly, obesity became Gao Yanzong's talisman. After that, Gao Yanzong enjoyed his years in peace, successively serving as Situ and Taiwei, and became more and more generous and fat. If it were not for the suffering of the country, Gao Yanzong should not have been a problem in the ordinary and dignified, and his life should not be a problem; however, when the Northern Zhou Iron Horse came to kill, Gao Yanzong's life trajectory also followed in the wind and rain, ups and downs, in mediocrity, composed a chapter that can be sung and wept.

In October of the seventh year of Northern Qi's Wuping (576 CE), Emperor Wu of Zhou led a large army to attack Northern Qi, first descending jinzhou (present-day Linfen, Shanxi) and pointing directly at Pingyang (present-day southwest of Linfen, Shanxi). Faced with a strong enemy, Gao Wei rushed to Jinyang (present-day Taiyuan, Shanxi) and prepared to flee north again. The ministers jointly urged Gao Wei to stay, suppress his position, boost morale, and save the defeat. Gao Wei was bent on fleeing for his life, so he appointed Gao Yanzong as xiangguo and the governor of Shanxi, and entrusted Gao Yanzong with "taking his own brother and son to go now", which means that if I leave, Shanxi will be handed over to your cousin. Emperor Gao Yanzong urged Gao Wei to "move for the sake of the community" (see Book of Northern Qi) so as not to affect the hearts and minds of the army, but Gao Wei could take care of this and fled to Yecheng (邺城, in modern Anyang, Henan) overnight.

At a time of national crisis, Gao Wei ignored the country and left behind his soldiers and people. This typical escapism seriously deviated from the hearts of the people, and the generals pleaded with Gao Yanzong one after another, "If the king does not become the son of heaven, all people really cannot exert their mortal strength", and if King Ender is not the emperor, everyone really cannot sell their lives. Over the years, Gao Yanzong trembled, did not think, nor did he dare to want to be an emperor, although Gao Wei fled, but after all, he was still an emperor, Gao Yanzong did not want to risk the world. However, when the country was in trouble, the generals threatened him softly, and Gao Yanzong, who was expected by all, had to stand up and take the throne as emperor on the afternoon of The Fifth Dynasty (December 14), changing his name to Yuan Dechang. In this way, in the last years of Northern Qi, the two emperors, Gao Wei and Gao Yanzong, once coexisted, and Gao Yanzong was the emperor in people's minds.

Since he became emperor, he should fight side by side with his generals and fight against the enemy in unison. To this end, Emperor Gao Yanzong rewarded the three armies in addition to "overthrowing the beauties of the palace and the harem, in order to give the soldiers, and there were more than a thousand homes in the interior"; "when he saw the soldiers, they all held hands in person, chen ci called himself by name, and drooled and whimpered" (see the Book of Northern Qi), and he also "rebelled against the Qi king Xian in the north of the city" (see "Zizhi Tongjian"), and was a pioneer. These "three fires" were burned, and the driving force of the military and the people to defend the homeland was quickly activated, "everyone fought for death, and the children and women also took advantage of the house to throw bricks and stones to the Imperial Zhou Army", the people heard that the new emperor was pragmatic and low-key, and came to help the war, "those who did not summon, before and after", even the "fat and powerful" Shang Shu Ling Shi Fengshan, at this moment also "grabbed the long knife and walked from it, killing and injuring a lot" (see the Book of Northern Qi).

Gao Yanzong and Shi Fengshan, who were responsible for guarding the north gate of Jinyang, these two big fat men, one holding a "Fenda Hammer" and the other "catching a long knife", the two of them walked on the battlefield and worked closely together, staged an unprecedented scene of the emperor and the minister killing the enemy. At this time, Gao Yanzong, who bravely killed the enemy, and The King of Ande, who let people eat and take people's lives, sentenced two people. This huge contrast can't help but remind people of the idiom "look at each other". At the time of the life and death of the country and the nation, Gao Yanzong did not need to be persuaded or taught, and the patriotic passion and enthusiasm for serving the country in his bones were instinctively condensed and sublimated.

When the Northern Qi generals saw that the emperor personally faced the battle, their morale was high, and their military morale was greatly encouraged, and when the East Gate was once attacked, they actually turned defeat into victory, and played a climax that made Yuwen Yong almost die. According to the Zizhi Tongjian, "Gengshen (16th) ,...... Zhou attacked the East Gate, and when he was unconscious, he entered it and burned the Buddhist temple. Emperor Yanzong and Jingxian entered from the door and attacked it. Zhou Shi was in chaos, fighting for the door, filling in the pressure, and blocking the road and not entering. The Qi people stabbed from behind, and more than 2,000 people died. The Zhou Lord was slightly exhausted left and right, and there was no way to extricate himself. The imperial sergeant Zhang Shou led the horse's head, and Heba Fuen whipped it with a whip, and the rugged came out. Qi people fight hard, a few hits." From gao Yanzong's erroneous belief that "the lord of Zhou was killed by the rebels", it can be seen that the battle was fierce at that time. It wasn't until the fourth day that Zhou Jun barely escaped.

Seeing that the Zhou army was defeated and fled, the soldiers and civilians of Jinyang were both tired and excited, and without precautions, they celebrated the victory one after another, "entering the house to drink and lying drunk." Although Yuwen Yong was defeated, after "The Horn of The Horn collected the troops, Russia was revived", and soon regained its combat effectiveness; at this moment, the Jinyang defenders were still drunk, and Gao Yanzong could not reorganize his team to resist the enemy for a while. As soon as the sky was bright, Yuwen Yong seized the perfect opportunity of "emptiness in the city" and captured Jinyang in one fell swoop, "Xin You (seventeenth day), Dan, also attacked the East Gate, Kezhi" (see Zizhi Tongjian). Gao Yanzong led several soldiers who were not drunk to resist, and finally because they were outnumbered, they were exhausted and captured by the Zhou army. From Wu Wu to Xin You, Gao Yanzong's reign was only four days, and it was only two days to cut off his head and tail.

Gao Yanzong was ordered to rise up in danger, and although he was unable to return to heaven, he completed the mission of the last warrior of Northern Qi. Gao Yanzong's feats have always been sympathized with and praised by historians, and his contemporaries Yan Zhitui praised Gao Yanzong for "fighting a battle of Zhuang'ande, inviting Wen Wu yufu, the corpse wolf through its recklessness, the blood and yellow to become a valley, the mandate of heaven can not come again, Yu Xian died in the temple and wept" (see "Guan I Am Born"), saying that although Gao Yanzong was powerless to return to heaven, he was defeated and honored. Li Baiyao, the author of the Book of Northern Qi, commented that Gao Yanzong "used the difficult times to be dark, hid taoguang, and the battle of Pingyang, fought for his loyalty and courage, covered the dangers of the face of difficulties, and righteously deepened the country", and greatly appreciated Gao Yanzong's spirit of loyalty and courage for the country.

After Gao Yanzong was captured, Yuwen Yong "threw himself off his horse and took his hand" and "doubled his clothes and hats, and saluted" to show his admiration for the fat emperor. In the first month of the first year of the Northern Qi Dynasty (577 AD), Gao Wei and Gao Heng were captured alive by the Zhou army. In April, Yuwen Yong set up a banquet to entertain the Northern Qi monarchs and let Gao Wei dance to help entertain. Everyone was numb, and Dugao Yanzong saw that the old lord was insulted by this, "sorrow is not self-sustaining, and he repeatedly wants to rely on medicine to cut himself", and was later dissuaded by the maid. In the first year of Chengguang (577), Northern Zhou destroyed Northern Qi, and Gao Wei surrendered to Northern Zhou. Yuwen Yong drank with northern Qi junchen and ordered Gao Wei to stand up and dance, and Gao Yanzong saw that he could not sustain himself in grief. Many times he tried to commit suicide by taking poison, but he stopped because of the bitter persuasion of the maid who served him. In October of the same year, Yuwen Yong framed Gao Wei and Gao Yanzong and others, and plotted against the Yizhou assassin Shi Mutiba, so he ordered them all to be killed. They all cried out and pleaded for their lives, but Gao Yanzong "wept without saying anything" and then "died with a pepper plug" (see Book of Northern Qi), and all the Northern Qi monarchs were killed. Rather than stand and die, rather than kneel to survive, Gao Yanzong was very skeletal and righteous, which once again made people look at him. The following year, his wife Li Shi collected his body for burial

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