Among the historians of ancient China, Sima Qian is certainly one of the most recognized and excellent historians, and his "Records of History" is also one of the most outstanding historical masterpieces recognized by everyone, and is praised by Mr. Lu Xun as "the best song of historians, the departure of rhymelessness". The historical value of the "Chronicle of History" and the credibility of the "Chronicle of History" are relatively high. However, not everything recorded in the Chronicle of History is true. Sima Qian was also an ordinary man with a mortal body like us, and he returned to the times when he made mistakes. Therefore, we need to analyze the things recorded in the "Chronicle of History" in detail.
Historical
Predecessors once criticized Sima Qian for being "curious", and he told many stories with a certain legendary color. These stories must not be absolutely true. For example, the previous generations of scholars have been examined, and the story of the "Orphan of Zhao", the story of Su Qin, etc., basically cannot be regarded as historical facts.
Portrait of Sima Qian
However, Sima Qian also recorded many things about the emperor's family in the "Records of History", especially the emperor's personal sexual habits, are these things credible? I think the credibility of these things is still relatively high. First of all, in ancient China, especially in the pre-Qin and Han dynasties, people's moral concepts were not as rigid as those of later generations, and there was no absolute rejection of Longyang's goodness. A lot of celebrities have this good. As early as the pre-Qin dynasty, there was a story of splitting peaches, which is the story between Wei Linggong and Mizi Flaw, saying that Mizi Flaw ate a peach very sweet and immediately gave it to Wei Linggong to taste. This illustrates the intimate feelings between them. The story between them is found in Qin and Han Dynasty documents such as "Han Feizi" and "Saying Yuan". And longyang is good, telling the story of the love between the King of Wei and the King of Longyang. It wasn't a big deal at the time.
Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty in film and television works
Secondly, the Western Han Dynasty royal family was also the same as the general public at that time, and did not completely reject Longyang's good. There was absolutely no need for Sima Qian to fabricate these stories to slander the emperor. Many of the emperor's stories were well known and semi-public at the time. For example, the story between Emperor Wen of Han and Deng Tong, Emperor Wen of Han himself did not shy away from it. Emperor Wen of Han once directly told The Chancellor Shen Tujia that Deng Tong was one of his "courtiers". Suppose, if there were no such things, would Sima Qian dare to record them? Slandering the emperor is a capital offense! Moreover, not only did Sima Qian record these basic love stories of the Western Han Dynasty, but later Ban Gu did not shy away from it when he was revising the Book of Han. These stories recorded by Sima Qian, Ban Gu basically preserved. Moreover, Ban Gu also recorded many absurd acts of the emperors of the middle and late Western Han Dynasty after Sima Qian's death. For example, the very famous broken sleeve tells the story of the Han Emperor and the handsome dong xian. When the two of them were lying together, the Han Emperor woke up first, the Han Emperor wanted to get up, the sleeve was pressed by Dong Xian, the Han Emperor did not want to alarm the handsome man, took the knife next to him and cut the sleeve. Not only the Han Emperor and Dong Xian, Ban Gu also recorded the story between Emperor Hancheng and Zhang Fang, Emperor Hancheng and Zhang Fang, who were in agreement and full of emotion. However, the empress dowager was very dissatisfied, the empress dowager was anxious to hold her grandson, and when would the two big men fool around and have children? The empress dowager ordered them to be forcibly dismantled, and Zhang Fang was expelled from the capital, and finally Zhang Fang died because he missed the emperor.
Emperor Wen of Han in film and television works
Third, not only in the Han Dynasty, but also in later generations, people also adopted a relatively open attitude towards male gays for a long time. There are also many records of this in later generations, such as during the Sixteen Kingdoms period, there was also a period of basic love between former Qin's emperor Jian Jian and the Xianbei nobleman Murong Chong. Later, Murong Chong raised an army against Murong Jian, who also wrote to Murong Chong, have you forgotten the feelings between us? Murong Chong replied: The feelings between me and you are a personal issue, and I have raised an army against you, which is a major national affair, and the two should not be confused.
Emperor Han and Dong Xian in film and television works
Even after the rise of Cheng Zhu Lixue, when the moral concepts of society generally tended to be conservative, people still did not completely exclude gay men, and gay men still existed on a large scale. Even in the Ming and Qing dynasties, male gays still existed very widely. For example, in the novel "Jin Ping Mei" produced in the Ming Dynasty, there are many male gay descriptions. In the Qing Dynasty, the same was true. In many literary masterpieces, there are male gay depictions, such as "Liaozhai Zhiyi" there are many stories of gay men. In the classical Chinese masterpiece "Dream of the Red Chamber", there is still a basic love story of Baoyu and Qin Zhong. In the Qing Dynasty, there was even a place such as "Xianggong Kiln" for men to sell their hue. The Qing Dynasty also had a novel dedicated to male homosexuals, "Pin Hua Bao Jian".
Probably after entering the Republic of China, with the increasing enlightenment of society, prostitution, child prostitution and other behaviors were gradually despised by society, and the gay trend gradually disappeared.