Song Zhiwen was a famous literary scholar of the Tang Dynasty and one of the founders of Gelug poetry, and he once wrote a "Ming River Chapter", which contained these sentences, which are very worth playing:
The degree of firefly on the mandarin duck, a goose flying by the Black Que Bridge... The Ming River is untouchable, and I wish to take advantage of the chalk to ask for help...
The background of the poem is very interesting, at that time, Song Zhiqing was friendly with Zhang Yizhi and Zhang Changzong, and he was also a member of the Control Crane Mansion, but he never got the opportunity to "feast" with Wu Zetian, and complained through this poem.
The reason why Wu Zetian did not let him participate was mainly because he "suffered from dental disease and often stinked", but because of his affection, it was inappropriate to speak so bluntly, so she let Cui Rong pass on:
I don't know that the question has talent, but it has a mouth.
Bad breath can be smelled, which shows how close Wu Zetian is with the members of the Crane Control House.
Regarding the predecessor of the Control Crane House------ the Control Crane Supervisor, Di Renjie also once went up to the top, bluntly saying that you want to create the great cause of Qianqiu, and the two Zhang waiters around, is this not affecting your fame? Wouldn't it be a pity to leave this stain?
From the above two examples, thinking of the members of the Control Crane Mansion "beautiful young people for the left and right to worship chen", people have reason to suspect that the Control Crane House has become an institution where Wu Zetian gathers male concubines and enjoys extravagance, Zhang Yizhi and Zhang Changzong "inherit the favor of the Yang", and later generations even wrote a novel on this theme------ "The Secret Record of the Control Crane Supervisor".
So, what happened to the historical Crane Control House?
First, Wu Zetian's carrier for prolonging life
The crane is an elegant animal with a long life, and it carries two good wishes: longevity and feathering into a fairy.
If you comb through the trajectory of Wu Zetian's pro-dynasty system, you will find a very interesting phenomenon: she likes to change her name, and most of them are related to "cranes".
In the first year of the Guangzhai Dynasty (684), Wu Zetian was called the imperial system, luoyang was no longer called the eastern capital, but became the "divine capital", and the various yamen were also renamed. Zhongshu Province was renamed Fengge, and Menxia Province was renamed Yingtai, and correspondingly, the name of the official position also changed, such as tongzhongshu menxia sanpin correspondingly changed to tongfengge yingtai sanpin.
Not only that, but many palaces have also been associated with cranes. Wu Zetian usually lived in the Jixian Hall of the Yingxian Palace, but after the change of the Divine Dragon, she was driven to the Shangyang Palace and renamed the palace the Xianju Hall.
The name of the era name of the emperors of the past generally changed the yuan when encountering "Xiangrui" or disasters such as infighting and mutinies under his rule, but looking at wu Zetian's era name is very unusual.
692 is the first year of longevity, because wu Zetian was reborn because of the fall of his teeth before, amnesty for the world, and then changed the yuan. Since then, the year numbers that symbolize longevity have followed, such as the later extensions, long live The Heavenly Strategy, Long Live the Ascension, Long Live the Heavens, Holy Calendar, and Long Sight.
From the names of these years, we can clearly feel the longevity wish of this old man who has entered the twilight of his twilight.
Wu Zetian was not satisfied with this, and in the first year of the extension, she did something that seemed uncanny today.
In 694, in the divine capital Luoyang, the 71-year-old Wu Zetianzhao met three "great gods".
The first is an old nun from Hanoi, who lives in Luoyang Lintou Temple and says that he can foresee the future; the second is called Wei Shifang, who claims to have been born in the eastern Wu Dynasty during Sun Quan and is now 456 years old; the third is a Hu man, five hundred years old.
Of the three, Wu Zetian especially took a look at Wei Shifang and gave him the surname Wu because he could make "elixirs of life", and in the autumn of that year, Wu Zetian appointed him as the Grand Master of the Zhengyi Dynasty, and soon rose to the same style of Luantai Pingzhangshi and became the prime minister of the Tang Dynasty.
However, later, because Shen Nanxuan often went in and out of the palace, the jealous Xue Huaiyi burned the Ming Hall in anger, and Wu Zetian scolded Lao Ni for not "foreseeing" this matter, and sent her and Hu Ren to prison. Wei Shifang, who had returned from collecting medicine from Lingnan, was terrified and committed suicide when he learned of this.
Although he was deceived, Wu Zetian only ate and did not have long wisdom. In 697, after Princess Taiping introduced Zhang Changzong, who was good at blowing pipes, to Wu Zetian, Zhang Changzong recommended his brother Zhang Yizhi to Wu Zetian, on the grounds that "the instrument of the minister Yizhi used the instrument of the minister, and the work was combined", which shows the extent to which Wu Zetian was obsessed with "elixirs".
Wu Zetian's pursuit of longevity has long been seen by many courtiers, and many courtiers have begun to flatter, and Zhu Qianxuan and Wu Sansi are among the best.
Zhu Qianxuan wrote, "His Majesty the Dream of Chenmeng has lived eight hundred years", and then he was promoted to a scavenger; after tasting the sweetness, he continued to concoct the same method, "His Majesty the Dream is white and then Xuan, and his teeth are more alive", and moved to Langzhong; "Long live the Wenyi Mountain", Wu Zetian did not give him a promotion this time, but only rewarded him with a red cloth bag and let him put it on the official robe. Although she is old, she is not confused, and then she is promoted to five products, this kind of sneaky horse-shooting people mixed in, so that those who do practical things can not afford it?
In this regard, it is Wu Sansi who plays with pure fire.
Legend has it that Prince Ji Jin (i.e., Prince Qiao) of Zhou Ling was good at blowing the flute as a phoenix, and later followed the Fuqiu Gongyu into an immortal, and later rode a white crane to appear on mount Miao, and Wu Sansi said that the beauty of Liu Lang was all mortal? He must be the reincarnation of Prince Joe.
This sentence spoke to Wu Zetian's heart, when she was ill and sealed the Zen Song Mountain, yu Jianshan lishengxian Prince Temple, that is, from that time on, Zhang Changzong wore a feather robe and rode on a wooden crane to blow the whistle, to imitate the appearance of Prince Qiao Feitian.
Many literati began to present poems, the most famous of which was Cui Rong's "He Liang Wang (Wu Sansi) Zhongchuan Zhang Guanglu (Changzong) is the Prince's Descendant", in which he explicitly praised Zhang Changzong:
Smell of the sky, the emperor under the clouds... Zhonglang talent is, pillar history name is not... Towards the Crane of the Chao Clan, it flew towards Los Angeles.
Obviously, in Wu Zetian's view, Erzhang was her "guide" to the immortal.
In this case, the Crane Control Supervisor was established, and its mission was to seek longevity and feathering into immortals.
Second, control the grip of the court
In 699, it was changed to Control Crane Prefecture, and in 700 it was changed to Fengchen Province.
If the original intention of the Establishment of the Crane Control Supervisor was to prolong life, then when it was renamed the Crane Control House or even the Fengchen Province, its duties also underwent a major change.
On the issue of Lizi or Nephew, the courtiers of the DPRK kept advising Wu Zetian, the more famous of which were Di Renjie and Li Zhaode, who said basically the same thing, a hundred years later, only your descendants, not your nephews, can build a temple for you, and there is no nephew in history who built a temple for your aunt.
Ji Hao was a confidant of Wu Zetian, and he also insisted on returning the Li clan. Regarding the situation of Zhang Yizhi and Zhang Changzong's brothers, he bluntly said that "the public family is fortunate to advance, unless it has made great contributions to the world, it is bound to be dangerous", and Erzhang knew this and sincerely asked him what to do. Ji Hao said:
The world thinks of Tang Jiuyi! Lu Ling rebuked the outside, and xiang wang was claustrophobic. Shang Chunqiu Gao, the king of Wu, is not the intention of the sea. Gong Yao calmly asked Xiang Wang and Lu Ling to look at the deputy people.
The Erzhang brothers did mention the matter to Wu Zetian.
Perhaps it was the persuasion of the people that played a role, and Wu Zetian finally made up his mind, and in the year before the establishment of the Crane Prefecture, that is, in the first year of the Holy Calendar, Wu Zetian took Li Xian's family back to the capital, but it was secretly taken back, which showed that Wu Zetian was still somewhat helpless in his heart.
In August of that year, Wu Chengsi, the leader of the Wu clan, died, and in September, Li Xian was made crown prince.
It seems that the Li clan's power is gradually increasing, but after a few months, the Control Crane Mansion is established. From Wu Zetian's actions, it can be known that she adopts the Imperial Balance Technique, and it is best for the Li Wu clans to maintain a state of equal strength, so that the authority in her hands is the safest. In order to control the Li and Wu clans, Wu Zetian needed a grip, and the Control Crane Mansion took on this responsibility.
Most of the members of the Control Crane House were "talented and literary scholars", "it was to introduce Li Zhao, Yan Chaoyin, Xu Yanbo, Zhang Shu, Song Zhiqing, Cui Xiang, Fu Jiamu and other twenty-six people", on the surface, the Control Crane House became a place of poetry. In fact, this is really not the place to paint poetry.
Fang Xuanling, Du Ruyi, Yu Shinan, Su Shichang, Lu Deming, Kong Yingda, Yan Xiangshi, Li Shousu... These familiar names, known as the "Eighteen Bachelors" in the early Tang Dynasty, all came from the Literary Museum of Li Shimin, the King of Qin, which was actually Li Shimin's advisers and decision-making places, and in today's parlance, they are think tanks.
Fang Rong, Cui Shenqing, Cui Rong, Li Zhao, Song Zhiqing, Du Zhenyan, Shen Jianqi, Yan Chaoyin... These were important ministers of the Wu Zhou Dynasty, and they were also members of the Crane Control Province, and judging from the list, they were not simply gatherings at two ends for three days for "feasting" or fighting poetry. Obviously, the Crane Supervisor was Wu Zetian's think tank.
After the change of the Divine Dragon, the fact that the above-mentioned people were degraded can also be used as evidence. However, because of his talent for governing the country, he was soon transferred back to the imperial court, and in the second year of Jinglong, Emperor Zhongzong of Tang set up the XiuwenGuan, with Li Yu as a university scholar, and Song Zhiqing, Shen Jianqi, Du Zhenyan, and Yan Chaoyin as zhi scholars. Even Wei Sili and Wei Chengqing, who had a good relationship with Erzhang at that time, were recalled.
epilogue
Forty-five years after the Divine Dragon Revolution, in 750, Zhang Changqi's daughter , with the help of Yang Guozhong , wrote to Fu Que requesting that Zhang Yizhi and Zhang Changzong be rehabilitated and that Tang Xuanzong be rehabilitated.
Judging from the development process of the Control Crane Mansion, its initial function is very simple, that is, the sustenance of Wu Zetian's longevity, all of which, with Wu Zetian's decision to return to Li Tang, carried the function of balancing the two clans of Li wu, and it became a small imperial court within the palace ban. Only when Li Wu's two families were evenly matched, Wu Zetian's position became more and more secure, which was also the fundamental purpose of Wu Zetian's establishment of the Control Crane Mansion.