With the continuous innovation of Ming Dynasty-themed film and television dramas, the classic image of Ming Dynasty Jinyiwei has been constantly refreshed. They are highly skilled in martial arts, cruel in their means, obedient to eunuchs, and are a secret service that endangers the people without evil. Embroidered spring knives and flying fish suits were their standards, down to the people of dawn, up to the officials of the imperial court, they were all afraid to see this uniform. But this is not the case with the real Jinyi guards in history.
The origin of the Kinnikuman
To say the source of the Jinyi guard, it is necessary to talk about Zhu Yuanzhang, since Zhu Yuanzhang abolished the Prime Minister, the imperial power was greatly expanded by Zhu Yuanzhang, and the Jinyi wei was established on this basis, in the early Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang established a military system of "Wei, So", each Guard has about 5,000 regular soldiers, and its subordinate offices are divided into thousand households and hundred households, and the Janissaries in the capital are forty-eight.
In the fifteenth year of Hongwu, Zhu Yuanzhang reformed the Janissaries and established twelve pro-military guards, the most important of which was the "Jinyi Guards". The predecessor of Jinyiwei was Yiluansi, and Hongwu was changed to Jinyiwei by Zhu Yuanzhang in the fifteenth year, and Ming Shi called it "'in charge of guards, arrests, and prisons'".
In fact, the meaning is very clear, the Jinyi guard is responsible for the bodyguards, as well as the arrest and punishment of such work, belongs to the emperor's direct jurisdiction of the yamen nature of the department, is not responsible for any department, directly obey the emperor.
Jinyiwei specific work
The duties of the Jinyi Guard can be roughly divided into three parts.
One is to be responsible for the daily safety of the emperor and the security of some internal activities of the court, and the Ming Shi Gongguan V has a saying: ''(Jinyi Wei) All the dynasties and patrols are equipped with halogen honor guards, leading the Han generals (a total of 1,570 members) and other attendants to carry out the line. Su Wei went straight. Asahi, sunset moon, ploughing, and animals are dressed in flying fish suits, embroidered spring knives, and served left and right. Such as sacrifices, pilgrimages, feasts, examinations in the imperial palace, etc., these occasions are generally indispensable to the industrious figure of the Jinyi guard.
Second, supervise hundreds of officials. As the emperor's intelligence secret service agency in the capital, Jinyiwei is directly under the jurisdiction of the emperor, no matter in what sense, it can be regarded as the emperor's eyes and ears, but in the capital, where there are all kinds of wind and grass, the behavior of officials in various departments is abnormal, Jinyiwei will be directly reported to the emperor. Therefore, Jinyiwei still played a considerable role in controlling the corruption of officials.
Third, public security management and criminal punishment. As an important pawn in weakening the power of the minister, Jinyiwei has its own judicial power, but also has the power to interfere in the judiciary, the scope of Jinyiwei's investigation is very wide, and all kinds of large and small affairs Jinyiwei have the power to arrest and interrogate. Jinyi Wei Zhen Fusi's famous "Zhao Prison"" is a kind of intimidation on the mother's kangtou that can stop children from crying at night.
However, jinyi guards are not all responsible for this kind of important things, they are also responsible for the streets and cityscape of the capital, such as repairing streets, cleaning ditches, city prevention and control, and so on. It is equivalent to the Beijing Chengguan Brigade.
In addition, the Kinyi Guard also has an elephant training house, which is responsible for feeding the elephants and acting as royal animal keepers, and these elephants are indispensable members of the royal ceremonial ceremony.
At the same time, I would like to add here that although we see jinyiwei and eunuchs fighting fiercely in tv dramas, in fact, although the factory guards often call each other, but the two are two different departments that restrict each other and supervise each other, in theory, jinyi guards can not bird eunuchs, but in real history, because the eunuchs of the east and west factories are too strong, so the jinyi guards often let them have a few points.
In fact, throughout the history of the Ming Dynasty, the official in charge of the Jinyi Guard did not have a single eunuch.
Seeing this, everyone should know what role the Jinyi guard played in the stability of the imperial court.
First, the Jinyi Guard was a tentacle of the imperial power to the outside world, which played a certain role in preventing the excessive power of the ministers and preventing the occurrence of similar incidents of deception.
Second, Jinyiwei had the power to report directly to the emperor, and at the same time supervised hundreds of officials, which played a positive role in restraining the words and deeds of hundreds of officials, preventing the occurrence of greed, and putting an end to the formation of parties for personal gain.
Third, there are indeed many people with high martial skills in the Jinyi guard team, who have played a certain positive role in maintaining the safety and order of various activities.
Jinyi Wei is strong in martial arts? Just give a negative example. After the change of the earth, the eunuch Wang Zhen, who had died, was questioned by the hundred officials in Beijing, and his henchman Jinyiwei commander Ma Shun initially tried to excuse the old king, incidentally helping the acting emperor to rebuke the courtiers and stabilize the order of the court. Several courtiers who had no power to tie the chicken rushed up and went forward to beat them to death on the spot.
Lawlessness? Don't even think about it! Zhao Prison is a spooky horror of folklore, in fact, there is no "driving post" issued by the emperor himself, which probably means equivalent to an arrest warrant, you can not arrest anyone, approve you a post, you can only arrest one person at a time, and one more person also belongs to the level. If the Punishment Department refuses to give the approval to the incident, you still can't catch this person.
In short, the role of Jinyiwei in history is still relatively positive, even if it is the "zhao prison" system that is widely criticized by the wenchen, in most of the Ming Dynasty, a group of impartial law enforcement and conscientious helmsmen have emerged.