Hou Jing was a "famous" rebel general during the Southern and Northern Dynasties and reached the highest realm of a traitor; the "Hou Jing Rebellion" he created made the already fragmented society at that time even more smoky and miasma; for a time the soldiers were in chaos and the people were miserable; however, Hou Jing's rebellion also had an important accomplice, he expanded the negative effects of the rebellion by an unknown number of times; and brought deep disasters to the whole society; what was going on? Let's take a look!
Hou Jing's hometown was the town of Huaishuo of Northern Wei, and he was an assimilated xianbei of the Xianbei people; after the Northern Wei split into Eastern Wei and Western Wei, Hou Jing was attached to The Eastern Wei vassal Gao Huan, who was the official Shangshu, Situ, and Sikong, who had 100,000 troops in henan and was Gao Huan's right-hand man; at this time, China was roughly divided into three forces: Eastern Wei, Western Wei, and Southern Chaoliang; after Gao Huan's death, Hou Jing's ambitions were exposed, and he began to run his own life with military power.
Hou Jing betrayed Eastern Wei, and then flattered on both sides to see which side could get more benefits; first he surrendered to Western Wei with the land of the Thirteen Prefectures of Henan, and then in the first year of Emperor Wu of Liang's reign (547), he led his troops to surrender to Southern Liang; for such people, all rulers were ashamed, but Emperor Wu of Liang of the Southern Dynasty had his own thoughts, he coveted the northern territory for a long time, and dreamed of unifying the Central Plains; although he despised Hou Jing as a villain, he wanted to use his power; so Emperor Liangwu of the Southern Dynasty accepted Hou Jing.
At this time, there was a Battle of Hanshan between Eastern Wei and Southern Liang, and the battle ended with the defeat of Southern Liang, and Emperor Liangwu's nephew was also captured; Emperor Liangwu realized the difference in the combat effectiveness of Liang's army, and he was also a flower intestine, so he secretly communicated with Eastern Wei behind hou jing's back and left a way back for himself; Hou Jing was very refined, he sensed something strange, forged a letter from Eastern Wei, and asked Hou Jing to be exchanged for Emperor Liangwu's nephew; Emperor Liangwu immediately agreed after reading it: "As soon as my nephew returns, Hou Jing will send you over immediately!" ”
"Oh well! I knew the old man wasn't well! So Hou Jing began to plot a rebellion; at that time, Emperor Wu of Liang made Hou Jing the pastor of Southern Yu Prefecture and ordered his town to guard Shouyang (寿阳, in modern Shou County, Anhui); Hou Jing recruited troops and horses here to expand his power; and Emperor Wu of Liang was arrogant and arrogant, believing that he had nowhere else to go, so he relaxed his vigilance against his actions.
A few months later, in August of the second year of the Taiqing Dynasty (548), Hou Jing raised an army at Shouyang and led his troops directly to the Yangtze River; along the road, Hou Jing crossed the Yangtze River, and two days later, Hou Jing crossed the Yangtze River, and two days later, he marched to the south bank of the Qinhuai River, marched into Jiankang City (present-day Nanjing), attacked the imperial palace of Southern Liang, Taicheng, and starved Emperor Liangwu to death; then Hou Jing went crazy and caused destruction and committed crimes in Jiankang City.
That's messy enough, right? At this time, Hou Jing's accomplices appeared, and Jiankang City instantly turned into a hell on earth; the city began to spread a pandemic, spreading extremely fast, and the number of dead people was countless; at a glance, only dead bodies were everywhere; according to the "History of the South", at that time, "the corpses were full of corpses, no one buried them, the smell was smoked for miles, and the juice was full of ditches"; the result of a great epidemic caused "too half of the dead" in the city, and suffered heavy casualties; at this time, it was not only the people who were infected with the disease, but also the soldiers of Hou Jing's troops; what was Hou Jing doing at this time? He set up his headquarters at the Puerta del Sol, but the headquarters did not care about military and political affairs, and held banquets and drinks all day long; the generals had meritorious service, did not praise, and the epidemic became more and more serious every day, and did not care; the soldiers under him were dissatisfied and angry; coupled with the widespread spread of the epidemic in Hou Jing's army, it had a greater impact on the combat effectiveness of the troops.
Hou Jing was inhumane, and he ordered the critically ill and the corpses to be piled up and set on fire; for a time the crying was mournful and miserable, and the patients "turned into fire, and they were extinguished for a long time"; the smell of the burned corpses could be smelled more than ten miles away, and the situation was chilling.
Jiankang City was originally a very prosperous city with a population of more than one million, it was the most advanced place in the world at that time; Hou Jing was a madman, who created chaos and brought plague, turning such a cultural capital into a hell on earth; and bringing deep disasters to the people.
[References: History of the South, Book of Liang, Rebellion of Hou Jing]