In the year of Zhuge Liang's death, Liu Chan killed three important ministers in a row, and even the che riding general was killed.

Liu Yan's wife stayed in the palace for a month, and Liu Yan's wife was killed; Li Mi wrote a letter slandering Zhuge Liang and was killed; Yang Yikou complained and committed suicide after going to prison.

Liu Chan, as the king of a country, why in this special period, kill several ministers in a row, in fact, has a deep meaning, which is related to the transition of the supreme power of Shu Han, let's first look at what identity these people are, and what forces they represent, and how Liu Chan, the emperor, really controls the supreme power of Shu Han by killing people.

Emperor Liu Bei sat on the throne - Liu Yan

In fact, Liu Yan was not killed by Liu Chan, Liu Yan's wife went to the palace on the first month, "the menstrual month is out", probably came out after a month, and at this time Zhuge Liang was still in Chengdu, and soon after began the last Northern Expedition, from the time and actual situation analysis, he should be Zhuge Liang killed, but the significance is almost the same, depending on our slow analysis.

Liu Yan, one of the founders of the Shu Han Dynasty, was a native of Yuzhou and also a member of the Han Dynasty.

When Liu Bei was in Yuzhou, he was poor and white, and many people did not recognize Liu Bei's clan status, and there happened to be a clan relative with extraordinary appearance and moderate conversation who came to surrender, so Liu Bei introduced him as a guest.

Liu Yan's own ability is actually not too prominent, but his identity is extraordinary, plus he can be said to be an image representative of Liu Bei to the outside world, so he is also considered to be an extraordinary status.

In the third year of Zhang Wu (223 AD), Liu Bei died, leaving Zhuge Liang and Li Yan as auxiliary ministers. After the crown prince Liu Chan succeeded to the throne, Liu Yan was given the title of Marquis of Duxiang as a meritorious elder, and concurrently served as a wei lieutenant, a division of the Chinese army, and a rear general, second only to Li Yan, and soon after was promoted to the rank of general of cheqi.

In the Eastern and Western Han Dynasties, the Che Rider General was second only to the Great General and the Hun Rider General, and above the Wei General and the Front and Rear Left and Right Generals.

Although Liu Yan, a heavy general, did not have military power, but only a virtual position, his status was noble and extraordinary.

People familiar with the Three Kingdoms know that Liu Yan's reputation in the Shu Han Zhengying is not obvious, indicating that there are no outstanding achievements, so how can he steal such a high position?

Mainly to balance Li Yan.

As we all know, before Liu Bei's death, he left two auxiliary ministers, in addition to Zhuge Liang, and Li Yan, who "controlled the internal and external military".

That is to say, Zhuge Liang was originally only appointed to take charge of the government, and the military was in charge of Li Yan, but when After Liu Bei's death, Zhuge Liang wanted to go north, he could not fail to collect military power.

Of course, the struggle for power is a fact, but it is not that Zhuge Liang is greedy for power, but because the Shu state is weak, wants to survive in the chaotic world, and wants to go further, all the forces must be held together in order to exert the greatest effect, which is also the fundamental reason for the acquiescence of other ministers and emperors of shu Han.

In order to grasp military power, before Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition, He first appointed Li Yan, who had the will of the former emperor who "controlled the internal and external military forces", as a "General of the Hussars", and then set up a puppet "General of the HorseMen", which greatly reduced Li Yan's status.

On the surface, he was promoted, but in fact, he was reduced to a symbolic Liu Yan, which shows the meaning of the rise and fall of the light.

In the ninth year of Jianxing (231 AD), Zhuge Liang's Fourth Northern Expedition failed, Li Yan, who was in charge of grain and grass transportation, cheated, Liu Yan and Zhuge Liang and others jointly petitioned to depose Li Yan, and among the impeachment of the ministers, the che general Liu Yan ranked first.

Liu Yan, the titular "general of the cheri", not only balanced Li Yan, but also wei Yan, the general who had remained in Hanzhong for nearly 10 years and was actually a feudal governor of Zhenbei.

In the tenth year of Jianxing (232 AD), Liu Yan quarreled with Wei Yan and was reprimanded by Zhuge Liang and sent back to Chengdu, but the official position remained unchanged.

Of course, because of their loyalty to Shu Han, these people did not have much obstacle to Zhuge Liang's right to unify, so Liu Yan's false position may not have worked.

It was also these considerations that, in the end, Liu Yan, a nobleman who had never mastered the soldiers and horses, but was barely considered a clan, became the second big man in the military.

So, was Liu Yan, who was killed in the same year as Zhuge Liang, "unloaded and killed donkeys"?

In the first month of the twelfth year of Jianxing (234 AD), Liu Yan's wife Hu Shi entered the palace to congratulate the empress dowager on the New Year, and it took a month to come out.

At that time, the Shu Han Dynasty had such a tradition that the wife of the minister would enter the palace to pay homage to the empress dowager of the mother's world.

Hu Shi was very beautiful and lived in the palace for more than a month, and there was a rich and powerful man in the palace, so Liu Yan could not help but wonder if Hu Shi had something to do with Liu Chan.

When Hu Shi returned home, Liu Yan let his subordinates slap her, and personally stepped on her face with the soles of his shoes, and took her leave and drove her back to her mother's house.

If it feels relatively normal to say this, the next plot will surprise people, Hu Shi actually went to the relevant departments to sue Liu Yan, Liu Yan was arrested, and even directly killed.

In the first month of the twelfth year, Yan's wife Hu Shi entered the Empress Dowager, and the Empress Dowager Ordered the Hu Clan to stay in the Hu clan and come out through the month. The Hu clan has a beautiful color, and Yan suspects that he has an affair with the Lord, calling out five hundred Lao Hu, to fight with his face, and then abandoning it. Hu Gu told Yan yan, and Yan sat down in prison. There is a discussion: "He who is not a wife is not a place of honor." "Yan abandoned the city. Since he was the minister's wife and mother, he was extinct. - "Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Biography of Liu Yan"

Why is this "a big surprise"?

First of all, the identities of Hu and Liu Yan are not comparable at all.

Liu Yan is an old minister in The Liu Bei period, and the Hu family "has beauty", indicating that she is not Liu Yan's original wife, the high probability is to continue the string, to such a bad old man to do the continuation of the string, presumably not from too big a family, dare to sue such a big guy?

Second, even if it is a real complaint, who dares to try it, and who dares to put it to death?

I don't think Liu Chan would do this, because doing so would not only be suspected of "wanting to cover up", but would also make more old ministers chill.

Looking at the time again, this year Zhuge Liang last went out on the Northern Expedition, in February, and died of illness in Wuzhangyuan in August. Combined with the Hu clan coming out of the palace in February, then there was this farce.

The biggest possibility is that Zhuge Liang had already killed Liu Yan before he set out on the expedition to avoid instability in the rear, and after executing Liu Yan, he also canceled the custom of ministers paying tribute to the empress dowager in the New Year.

Zhuge Liang's reason for doing this is also very simple:

Why the first lord treated Liu Yan with courtesy was nothing more than looking at the identity of the clan with the same surname, looking for witnesses for himself "after the King of Zhongshan Jing".

The reason why Liu Chan gave him a high position was to consolidate his power by virtue of his status as an old courtier of the former emperor and the clan.

But what did Liu Yan do?

Suspecting that Liu Chan had an affair with his wife, whether it was true or not, left Liu Chan with an unwashable stigma, so that you are worthy of treating your two emperors kindly?

In addition, the Hussar General Li Yan had been demoted to a civilian, and the status of the Hussar General was too high, and it was really inappropriate to hand it over to such a frivolous person.

Finally, the great war is imminent, how can such a thing as tarnishing the emperor's reputation appear in the country, and it is necessary to kill chickens and scare monkeys!

Yang Yi, who is cocooned and self-bound

Regarding the contradiction between Yang Yi and Wei Yan, we will not repeat it, we will talk about Yang Yi's death path.

When Zhuge Liang died, Yang Yi, in his capacity as the governor of the XiangFu Prefecture, led the troops to retreat together with Fei Yi and others.

And the history of the governor of the chancellor's mansion does not sound remarkable, but we must know that at that time, Zhuge Liang was in charge of all the military and political affairs of the country as a chancellor, so the supreme commander of the front line, there was no great general, there was no general on the horse, only the minister.

Even the Hanzhong Taishou and Zhenbei general Wei Yan, who had been in the works for nearly 10 years, were all given the title of Sima Xiang (丞相司馬), which could order him to send troops.

Therefore, after Zhuge Liang's death, the nominal highest position at that time was the history of The Minister of State, which was the basis for Yang Yi and Wei Yan to compete.

It is precisely because of this identity that Yang Yi thought that he was the successor of The Chancellor, and after falling out with Wei Yan, regardless of Wei Yan's status as an old minister, he actually ordered Ma Dai to cut off his head, not to mention, and also destroyed his three clans, which can be described as arrogant to the extreme!

But what he never expected was that before Cheng Xiang died, he had already recommended Jiang Huan to Liu Chan, because Zhuge Liang also felt that Yang Yi was impatient and narrow-minded and overwhelmed by heavy responsibilities.

Who is Jiang Huan? It is also the long history of the XiangFu, but he is not a long history of joining the army, but a long history of the governor of the province, and has been staying in Chengdu, so Yang Yi still does not know that the position he is determined to win is actually a mirror flower and water moon.

When Yang Yi returned to Chengdu, he found that everything was different from what he expected, not only did he not have the ability to "succeed him as chancellor", but even Jiang Huan, who had already been named "Shang Shu Ling", was inferior and had lost his right to speak.

Therefore, he complained to Fei Yi, who thought he had suffered hardships, saying that if he had led his troops to cao Wei after the death of Xiang Xiang, how could he have mixed up with the current tragic situation!

Who knows, Fei Yi didn't have as good a relationship with him as he thought, and he was denounced and relegated to civilian status.

After being degraded, Yang Yi was still dissatisfied, continued to write to express her anger, and finally was imprisoned, so she committed suicide.

Yang Yi's death was actually above his own arrogance, as soon as Zhuge Liang died, he dared to kill Wei Yan, a heavy minister who had been guarding Hanzhong for more than ten years in Shu Han Town, and what else did he dare not do? Once such a person is in a high position, I am afraid that he will be even more brutal than Dong Zhuo!

Therefore, whether Zhuge Liang really wrote a secret letter to Liu Chan and let Jiang Huan succeed him, or whether he was angry, with Wei Yan's precedent, the imperial court or Liu Chan could not let Yang Yi occupy a high position, which was a time bomb.

Li Mi with an unobstructed mouth

Pei Songzhi commented on Li Mi's loose and straightforward personality, and his death was also because of his personality.

Li Mi was originally a native of Yizhou, Liu Bei was invited by Liu Zhang, and later rebelled against guests, and Li Mi was also appointed to Yizhou, which was also considered to be in a high position.

However, Li Mi did not buy it, and when he was celebrating the New Year, he publicly condemned Liu Bei: "General Zhenwei (Liu Zhang) originally thought that he was the heart of the same clan as you, so he invited him, but he did not expect that in the end the enemy failed to fight, and General Zhenwei himself was destroyed!" I think your move, General, is very inappropriate! ”

Li Mi saw that he was going to be pulled down by the guards and beheaded, or Zhuge Liang interceded, which saved him from death.

In the sixth year of Jianxing, the first Northern Expedition failed, Ma Mo lost the street pavilion, Zhuge Liang wanted to kill Ma Mo to boost the military might, but Li Mi did not want to kill, disagreed with Zhuge Liang, was repatriated by him, and was never reused.

After Zhuge Liang's death, the hou lord Liu Chan wore white clothes to hold a 3-day mourning ceremony for Zhuge Liang, but he did not expect Li Mi to write a letter to advise the hou lord, saying that Zhuge Liang's powerful ministers died well, and that he could only stabilize the country when he died, and the monarch was united, and the people also celebrated because of this.

Li Mi thought that he had figured out the upper intention, and felt that Liu Chan, who had been suppressed by Zhuge Liang for a long time, should be very happy to hear such words, who knows, Liu Chan directly cut him off!

Li Mi's death, in fact, is not necessarily because of his frankness, I think his mouth is unobstructed, more like self-righteousness.

First of all, when he condemned Liu Bei, he was in front of all the officials in Yizhou, and it was the joy of the New Year, Liu Bei had just won Yizhou, and the possibility of killing himself was very small, more like an invitation.

Secondly, for the matter of Ma Mo, he was even more persuaded for the sake of persuasion, and he did not know that Zhuge Liang killed Ma Mo, but not only because of a defeat, but the failure of the entire Northern Expedition needed a bearer, and also in order to continue the Northern Expedition next time, the voices of those who opposed it were cut off.

In the end, he thought that he had seen through the class contradiction between the powerful and the emperor, but in fact, he was just living in the belly of a gentleman with the heart of a villain!

Although Zhuge Liang was powerful, he was not greedy for power, and he bowed down all his life and died, just to repay the favor of the former emperor, and the reason why Liu Chan acquiesced to Zhuge Liang's power was because he knew Zhuge Liang, and he was definitely not Huo Guang and Dong Zhuo.

After Zhuge Liang's death, Shu Han no longer had a chancellor, and the power was firmly in the hands of Emperor Liu Chan, even after surrendering, he could still "enjoy shu without thinking about Shu" and enjoy the rest of his life in Luoyang.

The deaths of these three Shu Han ministers are actually just a microcosm of the transfer of power in shu Han before and after Zhuge Liang's death.