The author | our author Zhang Lan
"Asahisha" (formerly "We Love History") is the headline number signed group media
Word count: 2862, Reading time: 8 minutes
History asks questions
In ancient times, there were no banks, and tens of thousands of officials were spread all over the country, so how did the imperial court send Feng Lu to the officials?
Answer: In the eighth year (1172) of the Southern Song Dynasty," Lu You, the great poet who wrote the most poems in ancient China and was about to step down as the judge of Kuizhou Prefecture, used his full talent to write a "letter of affectionate confession" to Yu Yunwen, the current chancellor of the dynasty: In addition to describing the embarrassment of his family at the age of 48 at the time, and the embarrassment of his son who had no money to marry when he was over thirty years old, he also lamented that the whole family "will not be able to do anything if you do not continue for a day." That is to say, if his own Feng Lu can't "arrive at the account on time", this old Lu family will not even be able to open the pot.
Although when it comes to ancient officials, our first reaction is often "high-ranking official Houlu", in the Southern Song Dynasty, which is known as "preferential treatment of civilian officials", it is also a fat difference such as general judgment (in charge of local water conservancy, farmland, and grain transportation), and the financial situation of the land tour can be embarrassed to this point, which shows that for most officials in ancient times, whether or not Feng Lu can arrive on time is indeed a major matter related to supporting the family.
The problem, then, is that the dynasties of ancient China had a vast territory, with thousands of officials at all levels, from the central to the local level. For example, in the Southern Song Dynasty where Lu You was located, don't look at the remaining mountains and water, but the number of officials is as many as 40,000. With such a large number of officials, everyone must receive their salaries on time, and a rough list of accounts can make people see the head. And in ancient times, there was no silver card, and there was no such operation as "transfer". The matter of "Fa Lu" is a matter that is simple and troublesome, and a slight mistake may cause "officials not to talk about life" big things. However, under the conditions of ancient economy and science and technology, how to ensure that this major event is "on time"?
To clarify this problem, we must first look at what was the usual hair of ancient officials.
Precious metals were scarce in ancient China, and silver has been legal tender for more than four hundred years. Therefore, in the feudal society of more than two thousand years, the contents of the officials of the past generations were usually various: the Western Han Dynasty only sent money at the beginning, and later also distributed grain, and the Eastern Han Dynasty established a system of "half money and half grain". In addition to sending money and grain, the Jin Dynasty also distributed rice, silk, cotton and other items. The Tang, Song and Yuan dynasties were more complex, with hard currency such as money, rice, and silk, as well as tea, wine, and even feed. The Ming Dynasty initially issued Lu rice, and later used Lu rice to "fold money" and "fold silk", and finally changed to "fold silver", and then until the end of the Qing Dynasty, mainly silver was issued.
How can so many "Feng Lu" with so many names be distributed to officials on time? One way of continuing multiple dynasties is the "vocational field system". That is, officials allocate farmland according to their grades, have the right to use the farmland, and part of the tax income of farmland is used as a lulu to the officials. Even during the Northern and Southern Dynasties and the Northern Wei Dynasty, the Northern Wei Dynasty once had no other Qilu at all, and officials distributed "vocational fields" according to their grades, county orders could be divided into 6 hectares, thorn history could be divided into 15 hectares, and officials with "occupational fields" had to pay land to the state every year.
During the Tang and Song dynasties, the "career field" income of officials also seemed to be very generous. Especially in the Song Dynasty, local officials of the five grades could enjoy ten acres of occupation. But for more grassroots officials, the benefit is a mirror. In the Song Dynasty, local officials of such a level as Lu You could only enjoy more than two hectares of vocational land, and once they became officials in remote areas, they were limited to the level of agricultural production, and the income from vocational land was even more pitiful, sometimes almost equal to none, so Lu You would lament in his letters. After the Ming Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang established the Ming Dynasty, the "vocational field" was also completely abolished.
In addition to the occupation field, the ancient officials' feng lu also included items such as "official feng" and "year lu", and the distribution methods were also different. In the Han Dynasty, the "official salaries" had "money" and "rice", all of which were distributed on a monthly basis. The Sui Dynasty's "official salaries" included money, rice, silk and other items, and were paid in two quarters every year. In the Tang Dynasty, the "old man" in the "official salary" was grain, which was distributed on an annual basis, and the "monthly salary" was money, which was distributed monthly. In addition to the "basic salary", the "monthly salary" of the Song Dynasty also had various subsidies such as "job money", "material money" and "tea money", which looked particularly attractive. All these "fenglu" are collected by officials from the central or local treasury on time.
Here we want to talk about the Song Dynasty, which looks "alluring", if you look at the high-ranking official Feng Lu alone, it is really tempting, such as Yu Yunwen, the Southern Song Dynasty minister who was "affectionately confessed" by Lu You, who was more than one hundred yuan per month, and there were 400 yuan of "material money", plus various subsidies. However, the county order at the grass-roots level only has ten yuan per month, and it should be known that the price of a crab is more than ten yuan for the imperial meal in the Imperial Palace of the Song Dynasty. The Southern Song Dynasty was particularly miserable: copper money in the Southern Song Dynasty was scarce, the copper money on the market was only one-tenth of that of the Northern Song Dynasty, the others were all paper money, and the salaries of low-level officials did not rise much, and the days were difficult. Typical such as land travel, basic moonlight family.
Therefore, as a civil official in the Song Dynasty, it was not uncommon for poverty and illness to be combined. Shi Jie, a scholar who was directly taught by the Northern Song Dynasty official to the Guozijian, died in a family of disciples, and his wife and children relied on the financial support of Fu Bi and other friends to make a living. Pan Lianggui, who had been an official in the Southern Song Dynasty, was also a "great Song dynasty luxurious civilian official" who "lived only to shelter from the wind and rain" and was fascinated by "historical fans", but only a few people. Such as "The Song Dynasty was an era of happiness for civilian officials", although some "most cattle history teachers" often say, if you cross over to the "iron-blooded Song Dynasty" to say this, you will be 100% punched in the face.
As for the Ming Dynasty, which was often complained about "low salaries for officials"? Its salary payment method is the same as that of the Tang, Song and Yuan Dynasties, and it is also paid on a monthly basis. A small incident by Zhou Chen, a famous minister of the Ming Dynasty, also illustrates the method of "receiving salaries" for Ming officials: in the early Ming Dynasty, officials in Jiangnan often took the stickers to Nanjing to receive Lu rice, and then exchanged it for silver. In this way, not only is the journey hard, but also affected by the fluctuation of rice prices, the money in hand is often shrunk. Later, Inspector Zhou Chen reformed the system, ordering the tenants of the official land to fold the silver and pay the rent, and then directly exchange it with the officials, which was "the people's output is very small and the officials are often enough."
As for the "salary in hand" of Ming officials? At the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, Lu rice was distributed in units of "stone", and 60 stones could be obtained from Jiupin officials every year, which was equivalent to the annual income of a middle-class family in Jiangnan at that time. If you really have all the rice, it is actually not low at the beginning of the Ming Dynasty. However, the Ming Dynasty had a system of "folding money", and officials' Lu rice was often partially "folded" into paper notes, sumu, pepper and other items, and the income was also solid and discounted. In the middle and late Ming Dynasty, the official Feng Lu should be paid with silver, and the "folded silver money" obtained from the official of Yipin was only 227 taels per year. Looking at this alone, it is indeed low. Later, the Qing Dynasty also followed this "wage system".
However, although Ming officials were notoriously low in salary, they had many "preferential" benefits that were difficult to achieve in the dynasty, that is, they could reduce a large amount of tax and servitude. With this "exemption" privilege, they could encroach on and expand land. Therefore, many Ming Dynasty officials who ostensibly received "low wages" unconsciously formed good fields in their homes. For example, Dong Qichang, a great painter at the end of the Ming Dynasty, as a retired official, only used a quarter of the price to get 100,000 mu of good land, which is only the ordinary level of Ming officials. It was precisely this deformed state of high concentration of land that triggered the great peasant uprising at the end of the Ming Dynasty that wanted to destroy the Ming Dynasty.
The Qing Dynasty's Feng Lu system basically followed the late Ming Dynasty, and the distribution method was similar. In the Qing Dynasty's "legal Feng Lu", even if the Erpin Grand Officer, the annual Feng Lu is only 150 taels of silver. During the Yongzheng period, in order to "raise honesty", he also distributed silver to raise honesty. However, the development of the feudal system in the Qing Dynasty has been seriously rigid and bloated, and there are many ways for officials to make money, so after the founding of the Qing Dynasty for more than a century, there are ugly rules and regulations up and down. As far as the "illegal income" of officials is concerned, during the Jiaqing period, a scrivener directly under the Department of Political Affairs collected an additional 280,000 taels of silver just by making a fake seal, all of which were divided up by a few small officials in the yamen...
In the official field of the Qing Dynasty, this is still just a common operation: according to the "Records of the Observations and Stories of the Daoxian Eunuch Sea", only one Grain Road in Shaanxi, only once a year, "floating harvest", can collect an extra 60,000 taels of silver from the hands of the common people, almost all of which are packed into private pockets. The life of local officials is also particularly "happy": only in Shaanxi Grain Road, every year to give General Xi'an a "three festivals and two birthday gifts", each time more than 800 silver, in addition to the New Year's Festival, all levels of yamen have "filial piety". The drinking feast of the grain road yamen is even more "big feast" every month, there are small social gatherings every day, the meal "bird's nest barbecue dishes", basically lying down has money to take, sitting has rice to eat, of course, do not eat in vain, every year into beijing activities, up and down to play more than seventeen thousand two ...
Compared with this, the "salary level of officials" mentioned earlier is simply not money.
Such a scene is also a portrayal of the ecology of the Qing officialdom before the Opium War, and the so-called official salaries are not a matter of putting a piece. The entire Qing official field can be said to have entered the happiest era, and then, it will fall into the helplessness of being backward and beaten - just looking at this scene of "happiness" knows that the beating of the Great Qing is really not a matter of guns.
An ancient question of how many sentient beings were involved in the question of how many officials "received their salaries".
References: "People Living in the Qing Dynasty", "A Brief Analysis of the Ming Dynasty's Civil Officials", "Studies on Ancient Chinese Officials"
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