Speaking of Ming Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang, his experience can be regarded as a model of "turning over serfs and singing". As one of the few grassroots emperors in the history of China's feudal dynasty, he was born in a poor peasant family since childhood, and had been working in the fields in his youth, and could not read a single character until he later entered the army, and only slightly taught himself some culture.
In 1386, Zhu Yuanzhang declared himself empress dowager and established the Ming Dynasty. He made remarkable achievements in his life, paid attention to the development of the agricultural economy, strengthened the centralization of power, and in the early years of the Ming Dynasty, there was a prosperous scene of hongwu rule. But this grassroots emperor did make many jokes because of his birth, and he would bring folk customs to the imperial palace, and in the imperial stele forest there was a sentence from the "Five Dynasties Tablets" that "every time the students listened", it came from Zhu Yuanzhang's mouth.
However, it is precisely because of Zhu Yuanzhang's distinctive birth that he, the founding emperor, understands the people's livelihood and is more sympathetic to the people. Among the emperors of previous generations, there are many emperors who love the people, but there are very few who can really love the people like Zhu Yuanzhang. He not only exempted the peasants from all kinds of heavy taxes, but also ordered the establishment of a drum of grievances outside the noon gate to personally accept the unjust cases of petitioners, and the support for the elderly and vulnerable groups was unmatched by all dynasties and generations.
However, the emperor, who loved the people so much, once did something shocking to everyone, that is, he ordered that a family with the surname of Pu be reduced to a lowly person, so that the descendants of the Pu family were not allowed to change their surnames for generations, and the male generations were slaves, and the female generations were prostitutes. What deep hatred did Zhu Yuanzhang have with this family? It all has to start with one person.
This person's name was Pu Shou Geng, he was a southern Song Dynasty, according to the "History of Song", he was born in the last year of the Southern Song Dynasty, and his family was mainly engaged in business. It is reasonable to say that there is a gap of more than 100 years between the Southern Song Dynasty and the Ming Dynasty, and it should not anger Zhu Yuanzhang. However, Pu ShouGeng was a more distinctive person, he was a big merchant in the Southern Song Dynasty who was rich and invincible.
Also because of his great achievements in business, he was later re-appointed by the imperial court to the post of Quanzhou Shipping Division. However, although Pu ShouGeng was an official and held the imperial court's feng lu, he did not have the spiritual quality of caring for the country and being loyal at all. At the end of the Southern Song Dynasty, when the country was in turmoil, as a famous official and businessman, Pu Shougeng not only did not help the country, but also beat a rake.
In 1276, after the Mongols went south to occupy the city of Lin'an, they captured Gongzong, who was only 5 years old. The imperial family fled to Quanzhou in order to survive, but Pu ShouGeng did not see him, and finally because the lone minister Zhang Shijie and others "plundered two thousand pu ships and had no cargo", Pu Shou Geng mutilated 3,000 people in the Southern Song Dynasty.
Later, when the Yuan army arrived in Quanzhou, he took the initiative to surrender, so after the unification of the Yuan Dynasty, he received the weight of Yuan Shizu. Because of his treason and surrender to the Yuan, the descendants of the Pu family also had a beautiful scenery in the Yuan Dynasty at that time. Unfortunately, decades later, because of the struggle with the Yuan Ting, Pu's family was tragically destroyed and fled.
Zhu Yuanzhang, as a hated official, was this kind of disloyal official, so it can be said that he hated Pu Shougeng's betrayal of the Han people to the bone, so even if Pu Shougeng was dead, the descendants of the Pu family were also implicated and became prostitutes for generations. The surname "Pu" was the surname that Zhu Yuanzhang hated the most.
However, there is a saying in China that it is not as bad as his wife and children, and we can understand Zhu Yuanzhang's disgust for Pu Shougeng, but his faults should not be borne by future generations. It was only in ancient times, it was the imperial family, and it was inevitable that they would be particularly angry in the face of this kind of thing, and Zhu Yuanzhang's behavior seemed to warn the officials of the current dynasty to be loyal to Daming.