The story of Yang Jiajian has been recorded in many novels and operas. If compared with other historical stories, the yang family's story is well known to the people, which can be said to be second only to the story of the Three Kingdoms and the Water Margin. The story of the Yang family is even more deeply rooted in the hearts of the people than the story of Yue Fei.
When we talk about the story of the Three Kingdoms, we must talk about the literary masterpiece "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", and when it comes to the heroes of the Water Margin, of course, it is indispensable to mention the "Water Margin". Comparatively speaking, there are many stories of the Yang family, there are many novels describing the Yang family, and the plots recorded in different novels, the relationship between the characters, etc. are different, so we can't find a Novel that can be used as an authoritative version of the Yang Family General. Is the story of the Yang family general, which has been passed down through the generations by storytellers, the truth of history or the fiction of art? How big is the gap between the Yang family general recorded in the history books and the folklore?
The story of Yang Jiajian takes place in the Northern Song Dynasty, and during the Southern Song Dynasty, some storytellers began to use the Yang family as the theme and created many commentaries. During the Ming Dynasty, various novels were popular, and stories about the Yang family also appeared in works such as "The Evolution of Yang Family House" and "The Chronicles of the Northern Song Dynasty". These two novels earlier synthesized the stories of the Yang family that had been circulating for a long time into a book, and the later Yang family mostly used these two books as the model for novels. During the Jiajing period of the Ming Dynasty, there was also a book called "Yang Jia General Yanyi" (or simply "Yang Jia Jiang"), which was basically the same as the above two books, but the description was more detailed, the plot arrangement and character portrayal were more outstanding, and gradually became the basis for the stories of various Yang family generals. Since then, people have continuously expanded and compiled new works on the basis of these books, making the legend of the Yang family more and more rich and touching.
But after all, the legend is a legend, and there is definitely a gap with the historical record. Among the Yang family generals, the first person who needs to be said is of course the old Linggong Yang Jiye. Yang Jiye has a prototype in history, that is, yang ye, a famous general in the early Song Dynasty. Yang Ye's real name was Yang Chonggui, a native of Taiyuan, Shanxi, who was originally a general of the Northern Han Dynasty who fought against the Khitan for many years and achieved great military achievements. The Northern Han Emperor Liu Qi valued Yang Chonggui very much, accepted him as an adopted grandson, and gave him the surname Liu. According to the rank of Liu Qi's grandson, the middle of the name should be the word "ji", and Yang Chonggui changed his name to Liu Jiye.
In 979, the Northern Han Dynasty was destroyed by the Song Dynasty, and Liu Jiye surrendered to the Song Dynasty and changed back to his original surname. It turned out that the identity of the adopted grandson of the Northern Han Emperor no longer existed, and the word "succession" in the name was of course meaningless. History books generally refer to him as Yang Ye.
Yang Ye was famous for defending against the Khitan during the Northern Han Dynasty, and after returning to the Song Dynasty, as a border general, he defeated the invasion of the Liao state several times, so that the Khitan army often withdrew as soon as it saw Yang Ye's banner.
Later, the Liao state underwent a change of throne, the young lord took the throne, and Empress Xiao took charge of the imperial government. Emperor Taizong of Song, Zhao Guangyi, thought that this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to attack the Liao state" So in 986, he sent a three-way army north to retake Youyun Sixteen Prefectures. The three route army were: the Eastern Route Army led by Cao Bin, the Middle Route Army led by Tian Chongjin, and the Western Route Army led by Pan Mei. Yang Ye also participated in the military operation and was the deputy general of the Western Route Army.
The three-way army attacked and began to progress smoothly, recovering some land. However, the Song army obviously underestimated the strength of the Liao army; first the Eastern Route Army could not advance due to poor grain and grass, and then the Middle Route Army suffered heavy losses; the Western Route Army went deep alone and had no chance of winning, so Song Taizong had to order the whole army to withdraw.
However, when retreating, Song Taizong issued another order, asking the Western Route Army to escort the people of the recovered land back together. Faced with this tricky task, Yang Ye suggested to the main general Pan Mei to pretend to attack with a part of his troops to attract the main force of the Liao army, while the elite troops ambushed at various key points to cover the retreat of the people.
This was originally a very safe method, but Wang Nong, the overseer of the army, believed that his own troops were numerous and should march along the main road, go north from Yanmen Pass, and confront the Liao army head-on. Yang Ye argues with him. But he was ridiculed as cowardly and cowardly. Yang Ye had no choice but to ask him to lead the army to take the lead. Before Yang Yelin set out, he explained to the main general Pan Mei: "I am afraid that I will lose the battle when I go, please let the general arrange troops to ambush in Chen Jia Valley; so that when the enemy army pursues, there is still a chance to turn defeat into victory." ”
Yang Ye led his army to attack, but was outnumbered and defeated by the Liao army. Yang Ye led his army to defeat and went to Chen Jiagu, but there was no ambush to respond. The Liao army besieged Yang Ye on all sides, and Yang Ye was unable to fight and was captured. Yang Ye and the Liao people also fought most of their lives, and they were also acquaintances with each other, and the Liao people persuaded Yang Ye to surrender, but Yang Ye refused to agree, and finally went on hunger strike and died.
Although Yang Ye has no culture, he is very strategic. He treated the soldiers well, shared the happiness and hardships with the soldiers, and was deeply loved by the soldiers. When the news of Yang Ye's death reached China, people wept bitterly for him. Because the overseer Wang Injury and the main general Pan Mei were directly responsible for Yang Ye's death, both of them were also punished by the emperor. Pan Mei was demoted to the third rank, and Wang Nong was dismissed from his post.
How much responsibility should the historical Pan Mei bear for Yang Ye's death? Judging from the cause of the incident, Wang Nong, the overseer of the army, did not listen to Yang Ye's advice, but instead ridiculed Yang Ye with timidity and cowardice, making Yang Ye unacceptable. Moreover, according to historical records, Wang Nong's words were excessive, and he even described Yang Ye's suggestion as an ulterior motive. In order to show his loyalty, Yang Ye could only ask for battle and serve as a forward. Pan Mei originally arranged an ambush in Chen Jiagu, but while waiting for Yang Ye, Wang Nong speculated that Yang Ye had already won, so he suggested that Pan Mei quickly send troops and Yang Ye to grab the credit. So Pan Mei withdrew her ambush and prepared to move north. But then the news of Yang Ye's defeat came back, and Pan Mei and others did not rescue Yang Ye and withdrew their troops and fled.
Sending Yang Ye to attack was not Pan Mei's original intention. Later, Pan Mei did arrange an ambush in Chen Jiagu, but withdrew again. It can be seen from this that Pan Mei, in this expedition, looked ahead and hesitated, was swayed by the supervision army Wang Nong and others, misarrayed, lost the generals, and could not escape the blame. But to be fair, he subjectively had no intention of killing Yang Ye.
How could a meritorious and important minister like Pan Mei be swayed by a small overseer, and would Pan Mei still be afraid of Wang Nong? In the environment at that time, I am afraid that Pan Mei was really afraid of Wang Nong. During the Northern Song Dynasty, the emperor was always uneasy about the military generals who fought outside. According to historical records, Song Taizong not only liked to send people to monitor the military generals, but also before the military generals set out, they also granted the battle map, requiring the military generals to fight in strict accordance with the arrangement on the formation map. The Song Dynasty's prevention and suppression of military generals was simply suffocating. In such a big environment, although Pan Mei was senior and high-status, she still did not dare to disobey the overseers sent by the emperor. Historically, during the period of Song Taizu and Song Taizong, many famous generals had the experience of being suspected of being dismissed, and some of these people were older than Pan Mei's seniority and higher status. The lessons of the past are still there, and I am afraid that Pan Mei cannot be careless.
From another point of view, although Pan Mei has achieved outstanding battles, in general, his ability is not particularly outstanding, and most of his victories are natural. The reason why Pan Mei and Cao Bin became the most trusted generals of the emperor at that time was more honest and obedient. From this point of view, we can also understand why a supervising army Wang Nong can influence Pan Mei's actions.
Yang Ye died on the battlefield, and Pan Mei and Wang Nong could not be separated from each other, but it could not be said that someone was deliberately trying to frame Yang Ye. The so-called feud between the Pan and Yang families is more of a fiction of posterity. Song Taizong was not a confused emperor either, and after Yang Ye's death, he quickly found out the responsibility for the defeat and punished Pan Mei and Wang Nong for this. After Song Taizong learned about what had happened, he also knew that the main responsibility for Yang Ye's death was not Pan Mei, so he only gave Pan Mei the punishment of demotion to the third level. Wang Nong, the overseer of the army, was demoted to the post of a civilian and swept to the end.
Of course, even if Wang Nong, the overseer of the army, we can only say that he does not understand the situation and commands blindly, and we cannot say that he is deliberately calculating Yang Ye.
In ancient historical novels, if there is no prominent negative character, it will not attract the reader's attention. There is Cao Cao in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, and there are several traitors in the Water Margin, which has almost become a fixed pattern. To describe the tragedy of the Yang family, it is necessary to have a traitor to set off. It just so happened that Pan Mei was Yang Ye's main general, so this "glorious hat" fell on his head. The history books record that Pan Mei died of illness the year after the liao attack, and after his death, he was entitled to the Temple of Emperor Taizong of Song and was extremely favored. At least in the eyes of the Song Emperor, Pan Mei was not a traitor.
Even though we know that it is common for opera novels to distort historical figures, Pan Mei is indeed distorted too much. It is said that in some places in modern times, there is still the custom of Pan and Yang not getting married, and the Yang family will treat it as a vendetta when they meet the Pan family, which is really unnecessary. The pan and Yang families in history did not have such a big enmity, so why should we artificially create a gap because of some novels and operas?