After maintaining stability for more than a hundred years, the Eastern Han Dynasty eventually went into decline and division. The scene of warlords dividing up various places at the end of the Han Dynasty was also a turbulent period of time. From a general point of view, the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty eventually went into decline, mainly in the following aspects:
From the perspective of the root cause, the decaying political system of the Eastern Han Dynasty was the primary reason. Under such circumstances, the "chaotic government of foreign eunuchs" handed down from the Western Han Dynasty set off several turbulences in the imperial situation, and also directly aggravated the decline and fall of the Eastern Han Dynasty. In addition, during the reign of Emperor Huan of Han and Emperor Ling of the late Eastern Han Dynasty, they were faint and extravagant, and they also became the fuse for the decline of the Eastern Han Dynasty.
Considering the direct cause, there are three other fuses. First, years of famine, plague and rebellion, so that many people no longer began to rise up to resist; second, warlords in various places divided one side and began to fight everywhere, and no longer obeyed the orders of the imperial court; third, the Yellow Turban Army's nine-month-long disaster in the Central Plains, so that the Eastern Han Dynasty completely existed in name only.
Speaking of this second article, some people may wonder how the situation of warlord division was formed. And from which princes did it start? Looking back at history, during the reign of Emperor Hanling, a royal relative who ranked first among the nine secretaries (Taichang), seeing that the people of the world were not happy, proposed to Emperor Hanling that he should go to the border to guard the side of the country. Unexpectedly, this person failed to stick to his heart, and eventually became the first warlord at the end of the Han Dynasty to divide one side, thus opening the prelude to the great chaos in the world. This person was also the later Yizhou Mu Liu Yan (i.e., Liu Zhang's father).
Liu Yan (劉焉), courtesy name Junlang (Chinese: 劉焉), was born in Jingling, Jiangxia, and was a descendant of Liu Yu, the Prince of Lugong of the Western Han Dynasty, and a descendant of Emperor Jing of Han. Because Liu Yan was a relative of the Han Dynasty, he was easily recommended as a Zhonglang. During his tenure, he was able to use the wise men for the use of the imperial court, so the officials became bigger and bigger. In this way, Liu Yan successively served as the Assassin of Jizhou, Nanyang Taishou, Zongzheng and other positions, all of which had good political achievements. Just when Liu Yan entered the center and achieved Taichang (the head of the Nine Qings), he made an abnormal decision.
Liu Yan planned to give up his position as a high-ranking official in the center and voluntarily guard the frontier for the state town. So why did he have this plan? According to the Chronicle of the Three Kingdoms, Liu Ermu, "Witnessing the political decline of the Ling Emperor and the many deaths of the royal family... Yan Nei begged for help, and wanted to take refuge from the world. The explanation given by the "Later Han Shu Liu Yan Biography" is: "When the Ling Emperor was in decline and weak, the four soldiers, Yan thought that the assassination of Shi Wei was light, could not be banned, and the use of non-people, increased chaos, but suggested that mu Bo be replaced, Zhen An Fangxia, and Qing elected heavy subjects to occupy his duties." That is to say, Liu Yan felt that the world was in chaos, so that the people's resentment was rife because the local governors did not do their duty. Under these circumstances, Liu Yan believes that the traditional local assassination history has too little power in its hands to effectively restrain the local taishou.
Under these circumstances, Liu Yan proposed to Emperor Ling of Han the intention of re-establishing the state pastor. According to the Chronicle of the Three Kingdoms, Liu Ermu's biography: "Assassin Shi, Taishou, goods bribed officials, cut off the people, and rebelled. Many people feel that from this time on, Liu Yan has developed the ambition to divide one side. However, in the author's opinion, Liu Yan's starting point is indeed considering the Eastern Han Dynasty.
Let's start by understanding the evolution of the functions of state pastor, assassin history, and taishou. Since the time of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, the assassin history has nominally represented the central government and served at the local level to play the role of supervising hundreds of officials. However, although the status of the assassin history is transcendent, the right to govern at the local level is still inferior to that of Taishou. Speaking of Zhou Mu, Liu Yan was not the first to propose this system, and the first to do so was actually Wang Mang. After usurping the throne as emperor, he redivided the thirteen states of the world into nine states. In order to give the local governor the ability to suppress rebellions in various places, Wang Mang changed the name of shi to state pastor and gave him the post of general, allowing them to expand their power, thus completing the purpose of countering violence with violence. Later, after Liu Xiu succeeded to the throne, in order to strengthen the centralization of power, he changed the prefecture to the history of thorns.
It is not difficult to find that Liu Yan proposed to the imperial court to set up a state pastor, not out of his own selfish intentions, but hoped that emperor Han Ling could follow Wang Mang's initiative and use local armed forces to achieve the means of "countering violence with violence". Moreover, the candidates proposed by Liu Yan are all some well-known people in the sea. Moreover, the place that Liu Yan himself wanted to go was not Yizhou, which was rich in Guangminfeng, but Jiaozhou, where the conditions were not very good.
However, at first, emperor Han Ling did not agree to Liu Yan's plan. However, as the local forces became more and more chaotic: "Huiyi Prefecture Assassin Shi Jianjian was troubled, rumors were far away, and he killed Shi ZhangYi, Liangzhou killed Shi Geng, and Yan Plotted to give." The imperial court finally decided to set up state pastors at the local level and let them suppress the opposition forces on their own.
Unfortunately, Liu Yan's original intention has changed after all. According to the Chronicle of the Three Kingdoms and the Biography of Liu Ermu, "Dong Fu of the Guanghan Dynasty in the Shizhong Dynasty said privately: 'The capital division will be chaotic, and the Yizhou division will have the heavenly son of heaven. 'Yan Wen Fu Yan means more in Yizhou. The change in Liu Yan's state of mind was most likely after the imperial court rejected his proposal. Emperor Han Ling's fainting, coupled with the instigation of his advisers, made Liu Yan's heart eventually breed a trace of ambition.
After Liu Yan entered Shu, he appointed Zhang Lu, who had a popular base in the local area, and ordered him to take control of Hanzhong. According to the Later Han Shu Liu Yan Biography, "Sui Ren Lu thought that Sima Yi was the governor, and together with Sima Zhang of the other departments, he killed The Taishou Sugu of Hanzhong, cut off the valley, and killed the emissaries. Lu gained Hanzhong, so he killed Zhang Huan and joined his people. Zhang Lu cut off the exchanges between the imperial court and Yizhou in Hanzhong, and at the same time Liu Yan wrote to him that "the rice thief (Zhang Lu) broke the road and could not be restored." Under Liu Yan's self-directed and self-acting, he eventually became the veritable "Earth Emperor" of Yizhou. Since then, Liu Yan has set off the chaos of the warlord division at the end of the Han Dynasty.
Reference Books: Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Book of the Later Han Dynasty