What is history: it is the echo of the past to the future, the reflection of the future on the past. - Hugo
Eunuch, first of all, explain the origin of the word, the name of the constellation "eunuch", the four stars of the eunuch are in the west of the imperial constellation, because it is used as the name of the emperor's close luck. In fact, in the pre-Qin and Western Han Dynasties, many eunuchs were normal people who had not undergone "purification" surgery, and from the Eastern Han Dynasty onwards, all eunuchs switched to eunuchs.
To say which dynasty eunuch chaos is the most serious, many people first think of the Ming Dynasty, but although the Ming Dynasty has many castrations, none of them dare to override the imperial power, even the famous nine-thousand-year-old Wei Zhongxian in front of the Emperor of the Apocalypse is also a promise, when Liu Jinquan fell to the opposition, the Zhengde Emperor took it down with a small note, and the power castration was only the emperor's slave, and the emperor wanted to kill it was a word. But another dynasty where the eunuchs were seriously chaotic was different, the Tang Dynasty, the middle and late Tang Dynasty, the eunuch leaders directly despised the existence of imperial power, not only dared to depose the emperor, but even dared to kill the emperor, and today we want to talk about the story of a sad emperor in the late Tang Dynasty, to see how the Ninth Five-Year Emperor of the Hall became a prisoner and lived a life without dignity at the hands of rebel generals and eunuchs.
In 888, in the first year of Tang Wende, Emperor Li of Tang died, and under the control of the eunuch Yang Fugong, Li Jie, the king of Shou at the time, was made the emperor's brother-in-law and entered the palace to inherit the throne. After Li Jie ascended the throne, he changed his name to Ye, that is, Tang Zhaozong, the nineteenth emperor of the Tang Dynasty (except Wu Zetian).
Tang Zhaozong
Zhaozong was only twenty-one years old when he ascended the throne, according to records, he was physically pure, heroic, and also privately celebrated, Zhaozong and his brother Emperor Zhaozong, he witnessed the turmoil of the Tang Dynasty during the reign of Emperor Zhaozong, the decline of national strength, and the young man had always hidden a dream in his heart, one day to revitalize the Super Gang and create a prosperous tang dynasty. However, without him, even though Emperor Zhaozong had talent, the Tang Dynasty was already in the twilight of the Western Mountains, and it was impossible to have a chance to turn things around.
After Emperor Zhaozong ascended the throne, he realized that the dictatorship of eunuchs was the first problem facing him, and the eunuch Yang Fugong who welcomed him to the throne fell to the opposition and had a strong desire for control, although Emperor Zhaozong was emperor but had no real power, but Emperor Zhaozong still used the power of the town to jointly make Li Maozhen and Wang Xingyu defeat the army controlled by Yang Fugong and escort Yang Fugong, the grand eunuch, to the capital to be executed.
Although Emperor Zhaozong leveled Yang Fugong, although it was his victory, but on the side caused The power of Li Maozhen and other emissaries to further expand, they originally did not put the emperor in their eyes, and helped the emperor deal with Yang Fugong purely for the sake of obtaining greater benefits, after Yang Fugong's death, the relationship between Zhaozong and Fanzhen immediately became tense, because Zhaozong wanted to take back the imperial power that originally belonged to the emperor, and Fanzhen was a huge obstacle, and soon, a contradiction broke out between Zhaozong and Li Keyong, and finally at the instigation of the courtiers, Emperor Zhaozong issued an edict against Li Keyong, and as a result, Wang Shi was defeated by Li Keyong, and the imperial court was disgraced from then on, and completely lost its prestige in front of the fanzhen.
In July of the second year of Jingfu (893 AD), Li Maozhen directly wrote a letter mocking Zhaozong's weakness and incompetence, and Zhaozong's self-esteem was greatly impacted, and he disregarded the opposition of his courtiers and raised troops to attack Li Maozhen, and the result was the same as the crusade against Li Keyong, Wang Shi was defeated again, and Li Maozhen directly led troops into Beijing to question Zhaozong.
One-Eyed Dragon Li Ke used
This time the military advice made Zhaozong panic greatly, and the group of ministers were at a loss, and finally the prime minister Du Rangneng stood up, claiming that this matter was his single-handed claim and had nothing to do with Zhaozong, and Du Rangneng was able to apologize for his death and defused the crisis for Zhaozong. Li Maozhen swung around the palace, and Zhaozong's body trembled but he had no choice. After this incident, the ministers of the DPRK also alienated Zhaozong, and Zhaozong became a lonely man.
Later, the days were even more difficult, Li Maozhen colluded with eunuchs to cut off the upright ministers of the DPRK one by one, and in the second year of Qianning, he killed the chancellor Cui Shaowei and once again waved at Chang'an, Zhaozong was forced to flee, asked Li Keyong for help, and on the way was chased by Li Maozhen's pursuers, and held hostage to Huazhou, where he was quiet for three years.
In the fifth year of Qianning, Zhaozong was finally released back to Chang'an, but at this time the Tang Dynasty had already died in name only, and the eunuchs in Chang'an looked at the emperor in a bad state, and once again had a big dream of controlling the power of the state, under the leadership of the eunuch leader Liu Jishu, a lieutenant of the Shen ce army, the eunuchs took advantage of Zhaozong's sleep, led more than a thousand janissaries, launched a palace coup, and honored the little prince to inherit the throne. The Divine Counsel Army blockaded the court and forced the ministers to agree to the prince's supervision of the country, and the ministers had to agree against their will under the threat of the sword.
Poor Emperor Zhaozong and the empress were imprisoned by eunuchs in ShaoyangYuan. In order to prevent Tang Zhaozong from sending a message to the outside, Liu Jishu ordered that not a pen or a piece of paper should be sent in. In order to prevent accidents, any gold tools, such as weapons, needles, knives, etc., were not allowed to be sent in, and the daily food and drink of Emperor Zhaozong and the empress was stuffed by eunuchs through the holes in the wall, and the king of a country fell here, which was really sad.
Tang Palace imagination map
However, at that time, it was not only eunuchs like Liu Jishu who were thinking about the power of the government, but also eunuchs who saw Liu Jishu openly controlling the state, and everyone was red-eyed, Li Maozhen and Zhu Wen and others all wanted to blackmail Tianzi to order the princes, and later the chancellor Cui Yin and Zhu Wen joined forces with Zhu Wen to send troops into the capital to kill Liu Jishu and help Emperor Zhaozong restore the throne.
Although Zhaozong returned to the dragon chair, he was completely reduced to Zhu Wen's puppet, and Zhaozong was trapped in the deep palace every day, even traveling to ask Zhu Wen for advice, trembling and living a life. But Zhu Wen did not intend to let him go, after all, he was also a person who wanted to be emperor, on August 11, 904, Zhu Wen instructed his subordinates Jiang Xuanhui and Shi Tai to lead more than a hundred people to the palace late at night and killed Zhaozong in the palace. A generation of kings was reduced to a sword-wielding ghost, and Emperor Zhaozong was only thirty-seven years old at the time.
Throughout Zhaozong's life, although he had great ambitions, he was born in a turbulent era, and the noble nine-five-year-old was successively manipulated by ministers and eunuchs, it can be said that Zhaozong can be regarded as one of the most thoroughly trampled emperors in history whose dignity has been trampled, so it is better to be a clothed people in this life.