In the novel "Water Margin", Fang La is an anti-thief, and like the good man of Liangshan, he belongs to the thief Kou. After Song Jiang and other good men of Liangshan were recruited by the imperial court, they were used by the traitorous ministers Gao Li and Cai Jing. Gao Li, Cai Jing, and others suggested to the emperor that the good han of Liangshan should attack Fang La, and the emperor fainted and listened to their advice. On the one hand, Song Jiang was willing to serve the imperial court loyally, and on the other hand, he also wanted to make his brothers famous through the conquest of Fang La, so he was summoned to take the Liangshan people to conquest Fang La. The good men of Liangshan were righteous, and although they were reluctant, they still went out with their song jiang brothers.
In the battle of Liang Shang's good Han conquest of Fang La, Liangshan's generals suffered heavy casualties, Wu Song lost his left arm in the battle, and 59 generals including Qin Ming, Dong Ping, Zhang Qing, Xu Ning, Lei Heng, and Shi Xiu were killed in liangshan's list of 108 good men. Lin Chong, Yang Zhi, Zhang Heng, Mu Hong and 10 others died of illness during the expedition. In addition, Gongsun Sheng became a monk, and Yan Qing, Li Jun, Tong Wei, and Tong Meng left unwilling to serve the imperial court. In the end, Song Jiang and Lu Junyi were poisoned by the imperial court, Li Kui was poisoned by Song Jiang, and Wu Yong and Hua Rong committed suicide. At its peak, there were only more than 30 good men left in Liangshan 108. Fang La's side was also dead and injured.
Two peasant rebel armies that were once unaccustomed to the imperial court and were extremely effective were killed by the imperial court, which made people feel sad. This is also one of the most fascinating places about the novel. So what kind of figure was Fang La in history?
Fang La, also known as Fang Thirteen, a native of Wannian Township, Qingxi County, Muzhou, Northern Song Dynasty, was a famous leader of the peasant rebel army in the last years of the Northern Song Dynasty. During the Northern Song Dynasty, the enlistment was heavy, and the peasants were exploited by officials. Fang La, who was born into a poor peasant and deeply felt the suffering of the people at the bottom, decided to lead a peasant uprising. With strong organizational skills, coupled with the difficult life that made people already have the heart to resist, Fang La used Manichaeism to organize the masses and quickly organized an uprising army. Fang La has a bold personality and is deeply loved by the rebel generals.
On the ninth day of October in Song Xuanhe's second year, Fang La killed the Chang family in Wannian Township and officially blew the trumpet of righteousness. Subsequently, Fang La gathered millions of people and successively captured the sixty-two counties of liuzhou, covering the entire territory of present-day Zhejiang and the vast areas of Anhui, Jiangxi, and Jiangsu. As the strength of the uprising grew, Fang La established himself as "Yongle" and proclaimed himself "Sheng Gong" and established his own political power.
Emperor Huizong of Song saw that Fang La's power was growing, so he sent Tong Guan to lead 150,000 elite soldiers south to suppress the rebel army. In April of the third year of Xuanhe, the rebel army was attacked by the Song army to break through the last stronghold, and Fang La's father and son and other generals of the rebel army were captured, and the uprising was declared a failure. Although Fang La's uprising failed, it fundamentally shook the rule of the Song court, and Fang La was regarded as a hero by later generations. In order to commemorate Fang La, many prescription La Caves and Fang La Temples were also built in later generations.