During the Taikang period of the Western Jin Dynasty (280-289 AD), a strange thing happened in the area of Ji County (present-day Weihui, Henan): first the tomb robbers dug up an ancient tomb more than 500 years ago, and within a few days the official government also heard about it and came to explore the treasure. The treasure in the eyes of the government is not the same as that in the eyes of the common people: the government is not looking for gold and silver jewelry buried with the owner of the tomb, but a bundle of bamboo jane. People from the government moved out of the tomb filled with dozens of carts of bamboo jane. Emperor Sima Yan of the Jin Dynasty ordered the book supervisors Xun Xun, Zhongshu Ling, and Yu to sort out this batch of bamboo janes. It is not easy to interpret these ancient scripts from hundreds of years ago, and some of the bamboo janes have been damaged after hundreds of years, so the finishing work is not going well.
After years of collation, people finally sorted out about 10 kinds of pre-Qin ancient books from these bamboo fragments, totaling 75 articles. The most important of these are the Wei chronicles Bamboo Book Chronicles and the Biography of Mu Tianzi: the former makes a lot of subversive additions to the contents of the Records of History; the latter describes the image of King Mu of Zhou who travels willfully, drinks and sings with the Queen Mother of the West, and enjoys and never returns. In fact, the "Biography of Mu Tianzi" is plainly the travel log of King Mu of Zhou, so its original name when it was edited was "Parade of the King of Zhou".
Ancients in Chinese history who are famous for their tourism are not uncommon: Xie Lingyun, who invented hiking boots in the Two Jin Dynasties, Xu Xiake, who wrote a 600,000-word travelogue in the 30th year of the Ming Dynasty...
However, King Mu of Zhou could be called
The first person to travel by car in China more than 3,000 years ago. The story of King Zhou Mu is legendary: legend has it that King Zhou Mu did not inherit the throne until he was 50 years old, but he lived for 105 years after reigning for fifty-five years. After King Mu of Zhou succeeded to the throne, he mainly did two things in internal affairs: one was to reuse talents; the other was to clarify the law and discipline. King Mu of Zhou appointed Bo Zhen as a servant to lead the group of officials. King Mu of Zhou warned him to supervise the king's moral cultivation, carefully select virtuous and upright officials, and not appoint flattering people. In addition, King Mu of Zhou also reused the sacrifice of gongmou father, Lü Hou and other sages to stabilize the domestic government. King Mu of Zhou made Lü Hou the commander of Sikou in charge of domestic punishment. Lü Hou formulated the legal provisions that were extremely detailed at that time, "Lü Punishment".
The "Lü Punishment" has formulated five kinds of criminal laws, including ink, sword, stomach, palace, and dapu, and as many as 3,000 detailed rules. The Lü Punishment is the first legal code in Chinese history that has been clearly recorded in historical records. The formulation of the Lü Punishment actually marked the transformation of the Zhou Dynasty's ruling model: before that, the Zhou Dynasty ruled the country more through liturgical morality, and the promulgation of the Lü Punishment actually marked the transformation from "ruling the country with virtue" to "ruling the country by rule of law". Of course, this does not mean that there was no rule of law before the promulgation of the Lü Punishment, nor does it mean that after the promulgation of the Lü Punishment, there was no rule of virtue. The Lü Punishment is the first written code in Chinese history that has been clearly recorded in historical records, but this code is actually a compilation of previous sporadic customary laws into systematic written laws.
Before the promulgation of the Lü Punishment, the Zhou Dynasty also had the rule of law, but at that time, more emphasis was placed on educating the people through etiquette and morality. After the promulgation of the Lü Punishment, the Zhou Dynasty did not completely abandon the liturgical music system, but began to use the mandatory criminal law to combine the liturgical music system. After King Mu of Zhou stabilized the domestic order through the indoctrination effect of lile and the deterrent effect of the criminal law, he began to organize armies to carry out many crusades against the disobedient tribes around him. In addition to conquering the four directions, King Mu of Zhou also drove eight chariots across 30,000 miles to kunlun mountains for nearly two years to date the Queen Mother of the West. King Mu of Zhou can be said to be the first person in China to travel by car, and his travel experience has also left a magnificent legend for Chinese civilization.
According to the Biography of Mu Tianzi, the first destination that King Mu of Zhou went to with a large number of people, horses and gifts was the hezong clan, in present-day Hetao, Inner Mongolia. The route of King Mu of Zhou's trip should have been verified by scholars as follows: starting from Chengzhou (present-day Luoyang, Henan) and crossing the Yellow River along the west side of taihang Mountain, crossing the rocks (present-day Pingding, Shanxi), and then traveling west along the north bank of the Tuotuo River. In the process, King Mu of Zhou led an army to fight a battle with the Inuyasha tribe, and then through the area of the present Yanmen Pass to reach the place where the Hezong tribe lived. King Mu of Zhou and his party were warmly received in the local area: the locals presented them with 12 horses and 10 leopard skins. King Mu of Zhou rested here for a few days and then went on the road again with gifts.
King Mu of Zhou began a magical western parade under the guidance of Bo Yao, the leader of the Hezong clan. Along the way, he dealt with many tribes that had never been heard of before, and saw all kinds of plants, animals, and wonders that he had never seen before. After gathering various gifts such as horses, cattle and sheep, cheese, jade and so on, King Mu of Zhou finally came to the state of the Western Queen Mother, which was more than 10,000 miles away from the Central Plains. According to legend, King Mu of Zhou and Queen Mother of The West feasted and sang on top of yaochi: The Queen Mother of the West first expressed her gratitude to King Mu of Zhou for coming to visit friendly countries despite the long distance, and also expressed the hope that King Mu of Zhou would come to see him often in the future; King Mu of Zhou promised to visit again in three years. After separating from the Queen Mother of the West, King Mu of Zhou continued to march towards the northwest wilderness.
King Mu of Zhou collected countless treasures such as animal skins, bird feathers, shell belt cinnabar, and colored gemstones along the way. The "Biography of Mu Tianzi" says that King Mu of Zhou traveled a total of 35,000 miles during this trip.
35,000 miles is about 15,000 kilometers according to the current one mile. If King Mu of Zhou had gone so far, he would have probably reached Europe as far as the steppes of northwest China to Central Asia. The question is whether the national strength and transportation conditions of the Western Zhou Dynasty could support the zhou mu king's brigade to run so far? Therefore, a later view emerged: the Zhou Mu King said that the Li was the "Xiao Li" of the Zhou Dynasty (one Mile is equal to about 77 meters). In this way, the 35,000 miles traveled by King Zhou Mu was converted into the current mileage of about 2,700 kilometers, so he drove a lap around Gansu.
In any case, it can be determined that King Mu of Zhou's itinerary was the person who traveled the farthest under the traffic conditions at that time. According to the "Biography of Mu Tianzi", King Mu of Zhou almost died of thirst when he returned to cross the desert because he did not have water to drink. Fortunately, one of the entourage stabbed the horse in the neck and took some horse blood to drink for King Mu of Zhou to drink before saving his life.
King Mu of Zhou has many advantages in the records of the history books: full of wisdom, bad women, deterrence... The only criticism of him in later generations is that he likes to leave the minister and take the horse and luxury car to play self-driving tours around the country. In the "Liezi" and "Zuo Biao", this point is gently criticized. King Mu of Zhou, a tourist, does not go to a rich and prosperous place to play, but specially goes to grasslands, deserts, and forests to play self-driving tours.
From the records of the Biography of Mu Tianzi, it can be seen that king Mu of Zhou's travels sometimes required risking his life. So what exactly drove King Mu of Zhou to persist? In fact, King Zhou Mu's travel not only met his own needs to appreciate the great scenery, but in fact, his travels have always been matched with various military and diplomatic activities. King Mu of Zhou had several confrontations with the Inuyasha clans that threatened the northwest frontier of the Zhou Dynasty before his long journey. King Mu of Zhou's intention was to take the opportunity to eliminate the threat of Inuyasha, but in the end he only got four white wolves and four white deer in the war with Inuyasha. Laborers fought a war but did not achieve the established strategic intentions, so later generations held a negative evaluation of King Mu of Zhou's war against Inuyasha.
Due to the failure to achieve the established strategic intention of completely eliminating the hidden dangers of Inuyasha, King Mu of Zhou simply marched to the front line to fight against the Inuyasha. But Inuyasha is a nomadic people who come and go without a trace, so King Zhou Mu can only constantly look for traces of inuyasha in the vast grasslands and deserts. In the process of searching for the Inuyasha people, King Mu of Zhou encountered some tribes that had never dealt with them before, so he had the idea of going out to see this vast world. King Mu of Zhou's long journey was not just a simple play, in fact, he wanted to expand the "international influence" of the Zhou Dynasty. King Mu of Zhou hoped to discover more tribes that the Zhou Dynasty did not know about during his travels.
It would be best if these tribes could be their allies against the Inuyashas. Even if these tribes were reluctant to join forces with themselves against inuyasha, it would at least be able to make the prestige of the Zhou Dynasty influence these tribes. This was actually the same motivation as later Emperor Wu of Han sending Zhang Qiantong to the Western Regions. It's just that Emperor Wu of Han sent Zhang Qian on an envoy, and King Mu of Zhou seemed to be more keen on playing self-driving. King Mu of Zhou found many tribes that he had not known about before on his way westward. King Mu of Zhou fought with some of these tribes, but more often than not, they exchanged friendly exchanges through trade, diplomacy and other means. King Mu of Zhou ate, drank, and listened to music with many tribal leaders.
King Mu of Zhou actually completed the diplomatic activities of expanding the "international influence" of the Zhou Dynasty through these entertainment activities. Some tribes even invited King Mu of Zhou to visit more in the future, and King Mu of Zhou promised to visit again in a few years. In the past, our traditional history books traced the exchanges between the Central Plains and the Xinjiang region and even Central Asia, West Asia, and Europe west of Xinjiang to Zhang Qian's envoys to the Western Regions, but with the deepening of the study of the Biography of Mu Tianzi and the archaeological discoveries in recent years, it is very likely that King Mu of Zhou reached present-day Xinjiang and Central Asia.
This journey of King Mu of Zhou left a great space for posterity to imagine. Countless literati in later generations have written, painted, and imagined this legendary journey of King Mu of Zhou.
Travel is only a hobby of King Zhou Mu, not a dream pursued by King Zhou Mu all his life. King Mu of Zhou's goal was not just to explore the world, but to spread the prestige of the Zhou Dynasty to a previously unknown world. During his journey to the west, King Mu of Zhou not only collected various rare treasures, but more importantly, established good neighborly and friendly relations with many tribes in the West. Just as King Mu of Zhou was about to further explore the wider unknown world in the West, a change in the eastern part of the Zhou Dynasty forced him to end his journey to the west: the State of Xu, located in the southeast of the Zhou Dynasty, rebelled just as King Mu of Zhou was exploring the unknown world in the West. King Mu of Zhou's chauffeur, Zuo Father, quickly drove a BMW that traveled thousands of miles a day to take King Mu of Zhou back to put down the rebellion.
At this time, the ruler of the State of Xu, King Xu Yan, was said to be a descendant of Boyi, a hero who assisted Dayu in ruling the water. According to the Jin Dynasty Zhang Hua's "Naturalist Chronicle" quoted in the "Xu Yan Wang Zhi", Xu Yan Wang's birth mother was originally a palace girl of Xu Guo. One day the maid gave birth to an egg. At that time, Xu Guojun thought it was unlucky and ordered someone to throw the egg to the river, but was picked up by a sacred dog named "Hu Cang". The owner of the "Crane" is a widowed old woman. The egg hatched a baby boy under the care of the old woman. Later, when the monarch heard of this strange story, he took the little boy into the palace for adoption. When the child grew up, he became the monarch of the Xu state, and later the small princely states around Jianghuai submitted to the monarch of the Xu state.
As Xu Guo's strength grew stronger, he also began to learn to be king like the Zhou royal family. The rumors of King Xu Yan's origins may seem nonsense, but this myth of egg birth is widely spread among the Dongyi people. This is mainly because at that time, the Oriental peoples generally worshipped the sacred bird as a totem. Xu Guo, who was active in the southeast of Ludong as early as the founding of the Western Zhou Dynasty, was the backbone of the Xingbing anti-Zhou and the main force of the Dongyi clique. After the Zhou Gong's Eastern Expedition, Xu Guo rebelled and often clashed with the State of Lu. After several battles with the State of Lu, Xu Guo migrated south to settle on the banks of the Huai River in present-day northeastern Anhui and northwestern Jiangsu. During the reign of King Xu Yan, he united with the surrounding princely states to launch a powerful attack on the Zhou Dynasty.
At that time, King Xu Yan fought from the Huai River to the Yellow River, thus posing a threat to the Eastern Capital of Luoyi in the Zhou Dynasty. Several bronze inscriptions record the fierce confrontation between the two sides at that time. The campaign of King Mu of Zhou lasted three years: in addition to using the troops directly under the royal family, King Mu of Zhou also recruited troops from various princely states to the front. In a battle in present-day Ye County, Henan, the Zhou captured 100 enemy people at a time, captured 135 weapons, and rescued 114 Zhou Dynasty civilians captured by Xu Guo. The war ended with the victory of the Zhou Dynasty and the defeat of King Xu Yan. After this battle, the four directions of the Zhou Dynasty in the east, west, south and north were generally stabilized. King Mu of Zhou followed the example of the former sages in the Tushan Assembly to assert the authority of the Zhou Tianzi.