Today, we talk about the famous period of great division in the history of our country: the Southern and Northern Dynasties.
This is not only a period of very frequent regime changes, but also an important period of integration of various ethnic groups in the history of our country. Although such an era is full of war and smoke, it is precisely an era of talents.
We all know that in the Taiping Dynasty, it is not easy for people from humble backgrounds to get ahead, after all, 80% of the resources in the official arena are firmly in the hands of those family nobles. On the one hand, war and chaos will greatly damage the strength of the family clan and make them feel unable to take care of themselves; on the other hand, the more chaotic the world, the more talented they are. Therefore, under the influence of this objective factor, rulers are often more willing to abandon the view of the door and truly accept those who have insight.
Although, the old saying has clouds: "Heroes do not ask for provenance." "But under the influence of China's thousand-year hierarchy, how many people can really put aside the view of the door without any doubts? In the author's opinion, if the situation had not developed to the point of endangering the vital interests of those in power, it would have been impossible for them to recruit talents without asking about their origins. Therefore, a life is really important at the right time, if you are born in the wrong era, then, even if you are full of stomachs to learn, you may end up with no way to serve the country, and the dismal end of depression.
Today, the protagonist We want to discuss, Chen Baxian, is undoubtedly lucky, because he was born in this era when heroes do not ask about provenance. If he had not been born at the right time, with this person's origin, he would have been difficult to achieve in this life.
In fact, in the author's opinion, Chen Baxian, like Cao Mengde, has an innate temperament. Perhaps, this will make many people scornful, after all, there are not many people in the world who can be compared with Cao Gong.
Next, let's take a look at this person's life experience, and maybe you will have a different view of this. According to historical records, this person was born in the late days, and at the beginning, he served as a priest at the recommendation of his neighbors, equivalent to today's village chief. From this point of view, it is not difficult for us to see that the starting point of this person's entry into the official arena is a bit beyond our imagination.
But people have such a skill, once you give him a chance, he can do his best to climb up. After that, he served as a small official in Nanjing who was specially responsible for managing the oil depot, although he was only an insignificant petty official, but it was a high promotion compared with the previous Lisi. He entered the bureaucracy from the lowest level, but his achievements were far more than that, and after the hardships of his youth, he began to operate.
In 534, he met the first nobleman of his life, Xinyu Hou Xiaoying. Xiao Ying, who came from a royal family, was very appreciative of him, and first recommended him to serve as Wuxing Taishou, and then appointed him to join the army as a direct soldier in Guangzhou. Soon after, at the strong recommendation of this person, he served as the governor of Xijiang and the high-ranking Taishou.
Sometimes once people come to run, the good luck really can't stop it.
In August 556, he met xiao Fangzhi, the second nobleman in his life. With the help of Chen Baxian, Xiao Fangzhi successfully obtained the throne, and Xiao Fangzhi gave Anji and Wukang as his fiefdoms in order to repay the favor, with more than 5,000 households under his jurisdiction. For a civilian-born man, being able to obtain a fief with a population of up to 5,000 people is already a step up to the heavens.
However, the prosperity of the Great Liang Dynasty did not last long. Soon after, Hou An began to march into Wuchang, driving Wang Lin's general Fan Meng out of Wuchang City. As an old courtier who was deeply favored by Emperor Yuan, Wang Lin did not approve of Xiao Fangzhi, who had obtained the throne through illegal means. In his eyes, these two people were nothing more than unscrupulous thieves who were plotting to usurp the throne.
What's more, the coffins of Emperor Yuan of Liang and the families of the captured generals in Northern Zhou at that time were all returned to Wang Lin. With these two trump cards in hand, he even thought that even God was on his side. Therefore, under the banner of "supporting the right path and correcting the chaos", he led the army to attack Jiankang, which is the area around Nanjing, Jiangsu Province today. Of course, Chen Baxian and Emperor Liang Jingdi would not sit idly by in this regard.
After receiving news that Wang Lin was leading troops to attack Jiankang, they sent Hou Yan to lead an army from Wuhu and follow them all the way. In the end, the two armies met in a narrow way, and a big war was inevitable.
Originally, Wang Lin wanted to burn the other party's ships with fire, but the sky did not go according to people's wishes, and as soon as the fire was ignited, the wind direction changed, resulting in heavy casualties to the army. After that, Hou Yan ordered his soldiers to fly his own ships through large ships and small boats, and tried to attack Wang Lin's fleet. In the end, the molten molten iron was spilled on the other side's ship, and under the strange moves frequently released by Hou Yao, Wang Lin had no power to fight back.
In the end, the battle ended with a crushing defeat for Wang Lin's army. After this battle, Wang Lin's army suffered countless casualties, which can be described as a major injury. Defeating Wang Lin was equivalent to cutting off one of Wang Monk's powerful arms. It didn't take long for this person to be completely eliminated by Chen Baxian. At this point, Chen Baxian officially embarked on the road of a generation of powerful courtiers. However, in such an era of political turmoil, the ruling ministers were not as relaxed as they thought.
Soon after, unrest broke out in Wuxing, Yixing, and Wu County, with the aim of attacking him. At that time, these three places covered almost the entire Jiangnan region southeast of Jingkou, and the uprising united by the three places not only echoed each other militarily, but also had a very large momentum. Suddenly, the situation was very grim, not to mention, Wuxing in the three places was still chen Baxian's ancestral home.
You know, the ancients attached great importance to their birthplace, so when they heard that there was turmoil in their hometown, Chen Baxian immediately sent his nephew Chen Xuan to lead an army to defend his hometown.
However, Chen Xuan had less than 1,000 soldiers and horses under his command, while the rebels had more than 5,000 men. Faced with this extremely disparity in strength between the two sides, Chen Baxian had to send the general Zhou Wenyu to lead an army on the eastern crusade. However, the expeditionary troops sent out could never get close to Wu Xing. In desperation, Chen Baxian had to leave Hou An to guard Jiankang and personally lead the army to suppress the rebellion.
What he did not expect was that he had just left Jiankang, and Xu Sihui, the assassin of Qin and Qin, had actually joined forces with the Southern Yu Prefecture Assassin Shi Renei to collude with Northern Qi. With the combination of the two sides, Northern Qi quickly sent troops to capture Jiankang. Seeing that the old nest was occupied by others, Chen Baxian had to lead an army to retake Jiankang first. However, with the other party fully prepared, how can it be easy to retake Jiankang.
However, no matter how hard the war was, they wanted to retake Jiankang. It was under the encouragement of this morale that they began to storm Stone City, and eventually, the Northern Qi defender Liu Damo had to open the city to seek peace. After the two sides negotiated peace, the Northern Qi army withdrew from Stone City and returned home. This attack on the Liang Dynasty failed, and Northern Qi not only did not take the slightest advantage, but also lost a large amount of grain and grass and war horses, which can really be said to have lost its wife and folded its troops.
Although, under the leadership of Chen Baxian, Nanliang fought a beautiful turnaround battle. However, Northern Qi remained immortal, and in March 556, Northern Qi again sent troops to attack Jiankang. And Chen Baxian was not a vegetarian, looking at the other side's menacing army, he did not feel afraid at all, but instead sent troops to sneak attack the other side's grain channel, which greatly damaged the morale of the enemy.
Unfortunately, his good fortune didn't last long. In June of the same year, the Qi army marched into Jiankang from the southwest and successfully besieged Jiankang using the tactics of roundabout encirclement. Seeing that the grain transportation channel in Jiankang was completely blocked, many people thought that the Liang army was afraid of defeat in this battle. At this time, things suddenly took a turn for the better, and this turn came from the weather in the south.
It turned out that the south where Jiankang was located at that time was the rainy season, and qi jun, who had lived in the north for a long time, could not adapt to such a dark and wet weather. In this way, it inadvertently brought a breathing opportunity for Liang Jun. You know, fighting on the battlefield has always paid attention to the time and location. At this time, the heavens were tantamount to siding with liang jun, and Jiankang, as their base camp, occupied the home field advantage.
Therefore, Liang Jun was already prepared for a battle of the backwaters, and once the weather turned clear, it would launch a counterattack. Just at this moment, Chen Xuan sent thousands of rice and thousands of ducks, which was nothing more than a heavenly arrival for the Liang army that had been besieged for a long time. Obviously, Chen Baxian understood the psychology of the generals very well, so he did not hesitate to decide to reward the whole army.
He ordered the rice to be boiled, and when it was cooked, the rice and duck meat were wrapped in lotus leaves and distributed to all the soldiers. After the soldiers had a full meal, he began to lead the army to break through. Because he was familiar with the local terrain, he led a part of the army to find the enemy's back and formed a siege with the remaining army. Under their two-sided attack, the Qi army, which was already affected by the rainstorm, was beaten to no avail.
In the end, the Qi army could only break up and flee.
After this battle, Chen Baxian's prestige within the Liang Dynasty reached an unprecedented height.
After that, he was first given the title of Taifu (太傅), and then he was given the title of Governor of the Xiangguo Dynasty. For a moment, he was in the limelight. But how could such an ambitious and capable person be at peace? Therefore, as an extremely popular subject, he also wants to go further and become the emperor of a dynasty. In fact, as we expected, it didn't take long for him to force emperor To ascend to the throne.
In fact, if a person is only in power, then he may attract the envy of others, but he will not lead to the disaster of killing himself. However, he did such a thing that risked the world, and his title of emperor instantly broke the rare balance of the Liang Dynasty. Suddenly, not only were the forces in various places restless, but even Northern Qi was once again attacking.
This time, however, the Liang Dynasty was not so lucky, and soon, a large area under its jurisdiction was taken away by Northern Qi, making it the smallest country in the Southern Dynasty. If Chen Baxian did not usurp the throne for his own selfish purposes, with his talents, he would certainly be able to lead the Liang Dynasty to create some glory. But all this was ruined by him, by his ambitions.
Resources:
["Chen Shu, Benji No. 1, Gao Zushang", "Nanqi Shu Xiao Yingchuan", "Zizhi Tongjian Vol. 158 Liang Ji XIV", "Chen Shu, Vol. 9, Liechuan III"]