"If there is no water temple dragon boat matter, Gongyu theory of merit is not taught much", this is from the poet Pi Rixiu's "Bian River Huaigu", the main comment is Yang Guang's repair of the canal, in his eyes this matter can be comparable to the Great Yu Zhishui. So as a famous tyrant in history, why did Yang Guang build a canal despite the world's infamy?
Yang Guang was born in 569, at this time the Sui Dynasty had not yet unified the world, he was graceful and graceful at a young age, excellent appearance and very intelligent, So Yang Jian admired him very much. And Yang Guang was very good at disguise, in 581 was crowned queen of Jin, pretending not to love worldly things, put dusty broken strings at home, Yang Jian was really confused by him, every time he praised him, and at that time he was even called RenXiao.
At that time, the crown prince was Yang Yong, that is, Yang Guang's brother, and the two of them had very different personalities, Yang Yong was very good at singing poetry and songs, and had a gentle personality, and he did not like to cheat like Yang Guang. However, he embroidered lines on his clothes, but was scolded by Yang Jian, who believed that this would help to increase the extravagance. At that time, Yang Yong was particularly fond of concubines, which caused the dissatisfaction of the Dugu Empress, so Yang Guang paid more attention to these two points, and finally was changed to crown prince in 600.
Yang Guang's ascension from the crown prince to the emperor did not use the right plan, and some people in history suspected that he forced his father to die, because Yang Jian wanted to change the crown prince again at this time. After ascending to the throne, he revealed his true nature, not only executing his brothers, but also requiring the people to worship virgins every year, and the Grand Canal, which was both criticized by the people of the time and praised by posterity, was also built at this time.
Before the Sui Dynasty Emperor, there were already man-made canals, Xuxi and Hangou in the Spring and Autumn Period, lingqu in the Qin Dynasty, and later trough canals, Baigou, Quanzhou, etc., all of which already had names. As a famous canal builder in history, the Sui Dynasty Emperor was mainly because of the huge amount of engineering, which caused the consequences of laboring and hurting the people.
So what exactly did the Sui Emperor open the canal for, did he just want to make it easier for him to go out and play? Nature is not so simple, and now experts have discovered the ultimate reason why the Sui Emperor wanted to build a canal through research.
The Sui Dynasty Emperor used natural lakes and lakes that had been built by predecessors to excavate some local canals, and these canals could actually be connected. The Yangtze River, the Yellow River and the Huai River are all strung together, and the northernmost part of the canal has reached today's Beijing, which was not developed at that time, and it was still a poor mountainous area. If the Sui Emperor had just been playing, it would have been impossible to repair it so far.
This route proves that the Sui Emperor actually had his own purpose, which was to conquer Goguryeo, a rapidly growing state that reached its peak in the 6th century BC and even attacked the Sui Dynasty several times between 612 and 614, plundering the supplies of the Sui army. The Sui Emperor hated them so much that he was naturally unwilling to let them go, so he built this canal to satisfy his many wishes, not only to enjoy the mountains and rivers, but also to better manage the Jiangnan region, and to attack the arrogant Goguryeo, which can be described as killing three birds with one stone.
The Sui Emperor was indeed a tyrant, but he could not deny his merits in its entirety. Regardless of the purpose for which he built the canal, the canal eventually brought convenience to people, especially for modern people, and it greatly facilitated the south-to-north water diversion project. Like the Great Wall in history, it was built with public anger, but after its completion, it also contributed to the peace of future generations.