"When Gao Zuwei was young, his wife was his daughter, that is, Princess Pingyang." - The Old Book of Tang and the Biography of Chai Shaolie
In the seventeenth year of Zhenguan, it had been 26 years since the late Sui Dynasty and the Jinyang army was raised. Time flew by in a trance, and Tang Taizong, who was already 44 years old, suddenly thought of those old ministers who had made great contributions to the establishment and prosperity of Li Tang, and he could not help but feel some emotions in his heart. Some, such as Wei Zheng and Yin Kaishan, have passed away, and some, such as Li Jing and Fang Xuanling, are also dying of old age. Sadly, he ordered the construction of the Ling Yan Pavilion in the imperial palace, and ordered Yan Liben to paint twenty-four portraits of heroes. This is what posterity called "the twenty-four heroes of Ling Yan Pavilion".
The fourteenth of the twenty-four heroes of Ling Yan Pavilion was Ma Chaishao, the Tang Dynasty. In the "Sui and Tang Dynasties", Chai Shao is not outstanding. From the description point of view, he is more like a useless student, in addition to running errands and carrying a word, at most it is to assist the Princess of Pingyang's army to fight from the side. Such an image, it is inevitable to teach people to wonder, such a character can really marry the Princess of the Tang Dynasty? Or even into the Ling Yan Pavilion?
In fact, the historical Chai Shao deserves the title of wisdom and courage, and his life is even more legendary and wonderful.
Chai Shao
Many people's cognition of Chai Shao is probably from some pictures of film and television works, but Chai Shao appears in film and television works as supporting characters or villains, so the cognition of Chai Shao is probably somewhat biased. In fact, Chai Shao is not only resourceful, but even made great achievements.
Chai Shao, who came from a family of generals, was famous for suppressing the strong and helping the weak at a young age, and he was even the qianniu of the Prince of Yuande (the eldest son of the Sui Emperor). In all respects, Chai Shao was an impeccable young man. In today's terms, this man is a proper rich and handsome man.
At that time, Li Yuan, who had been fighting outside for many years and was known as Yi Zhi, suddenly took a fancy to Chai Shao when he recruited a son-in-law for his third daughter. In this way, Chai Shao and Princess Pingyang married. Many people may wonder, what ability does Chai Shao have to enter Li Yuan's eyes? Later, it turned out that Li Yuan's vision was not wrong.
In April of the thirteenth year of Daye (617), Li Yuan raised an army at Jinyang and began to rebel against Sui. At that time, he also secretly sent someone to inform Chai Shao and his wife who were far away in Chang'an. After deliberating, the two decided that Chai Shao would leave Chang'an alone for Jinyang, while Princess Pingyang would stay behind to find her own way out.
Both husband and wife were extraordinary people, and Chai Shao was attached to Li Yuan's account, and was awarded the official position of the right leader of the capital Governor Shi, and began a career of fighting horses with Li Yuan in the southern conquest of the northern war. And the Princess Pingyang who stayed in Chang'an was not simple, recruiting troops all the way, and even in just a few months, she had already established a certain influence. By the time Li Yuan led her troops to the Yellow River, she already had 100,000 troops.
Legendary experience
Chai Shao acted under Li Yuan's account and soon came to prominence. Starting from the commander of the Ma Army, he personally charged all the way and attacked the city. With Xiao Yong's posture of good war, Chai Shao repeatedly made military achievements, and by the time Li Yuan established the Li Tang regime as emperor in Chang'an, Chai Shao had already been promoted to the rank of General of Zuo Yiyu.
Of course, at this point, Chai Shao's legendary experience had just begun. Soon after, Chai Shao followed Li Shimin, the King of Qin, in the Unification War. In the Battle of Shallow Water Plains, Xue Ju's father and son were eliminated in one fell swoop, and song Jingang, Wang Shichong and others were defeated, and even Dou Jiande was captured. As for the later battles of Luoyang and Tiger Prison, Chai Shao also made great achievements. Because of this, Chai Shao was even named the Duke of Huoguo.
Judging from Chai Shao's series of outstanding battle achievements, his experience is almost no different from that of a brave and good general. Therefore, it is obviously inappropriate to conclude from the image in some film and television works that he is just a white-faced student with no ability.
In real history, Chai Shao cannot be treated as a supporting role or a villain. In fact, if you comb through Chai Shao's life experience, you will find that he is simply the protagonist of the story. Especially in the war experience with Tuguhun in the sixth year of Wu De (623), its legendary color is even bizarre, and the film does not dare to make it like this.
So what was so special about that war?
Count through the Tuguhun
After Li Yuan established the Li Tang regime, the world still did not completely settle down, and everyone knows this. In April of the sixth year of Wu De, Tuguhun invaded Fangzhou (芳州, in modern Diebu, Gansu), but as the assassin of Li Tangfang Prefecture, Fang Dangshu fled to Songzhou (松州, in modern Songpan, Sichuan).
Subsequently, Tuguhun made waves in various places. It was in this context that Chai Shao received orders to support various localities and fight against Tuguhun. Therefore, Chai Shao led his army to Tuguhun. On June 29, Chai Shao led his army and Tuguhun's short army to exchange, but they were besieged in a valley.
At that time, the Tuguhun army was condescending to shoot at Chai Shao's army, and the arrows were shot down like a torrential rain, leaving Chai Shao's army in an extremely critical situation. In this case, no matter how Chai Shao looked at it, there was only one way to perish. However, when the other soldiers were stunned, Chai Shao was not afraid of danger.
Not only that, but he also sat quietly and let people play the huqin, which made the two beauties dance. This approach is almost the same as Zhuge Liang's plan to make the empty city in front of Sima Yi in the "Romance of the Three Kingdoms". As a result, the Tuguhun people felt very strange after seeing it, and they all put down their bows and arrows to watch.
Seeing that the time had come, Chai Shao sent people to quietly detour from the side road to the back of Tuguhun's army, and then launched a surprise attack, causing chaos in Tuguhun's army. Subsequently, more than five hundred people were killed and routed. After another month, Tuguhun finally surrendered to Li Tang.
The use of such a strategy is almost unique in history. Of course, this experience of Chai Shao has added a lot of legendary colors to his wonderful life. It is often said that reality is more bizarre than fiction, but in fact, Chai Shao's experience is really bizarre enough that even the movie does not dare to make it this way.
epilogue:
In the seventeenth year of Zhenguan (643), five years after Chai Shao's death, Emperor Taizong of Tang, Li Shimin, commemorated the old courtiers who had made great military achievements. Yan Liben painted twenty-four portraits of heroes in Ling Yan Pavilion. The portrait is the same size as a life-size and lifelike. Then the inscription was written by the great calligrapher Chu Suiliang, and Li Shimin personally praised it to commemorate and praise.
Reference: Old Book of Tang
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