The birth of the Song Dynasty was particularly extraordinary, because a farce-like yellow robe was added to the body, avoiding the confrontation of swords and guns and the destruction of life. Therefore, the existence of the Song Dynasty has been favored by historians. Even the imperial succession, which is full of strangeness, danger, and infinite variables, came to be so bland in the Great Song Dynasty, without the charm of a twisted story.
Chen Qiao mutinied, the yellow robe was added, although there was an element of performance in it, but it could not be ruled out that it was full of a certain amount of public opinion. In fact, the ascension of the second emperor of the Song Dynasty is also another form of yellow robe, but this time the yellow robe of Zhao Guangyi, the person involved, took the initiative to wear it.
Song Taizong Zhao Guangyi
In the early morning of October 20, 976, the founding emperor of the Song Dynasty, Zhao Kuangyin, collapsed violently, without any warning, and suddenly died, which was not only the grief of relatives for the royal family in the emperor's position, but also related to the stability of the country. Therefore, in a hurry, empress Dowager Song sent the eunuch Wang Ji'en to quickly summon Zhao Kuangyin's fourth son, Zhao Defang. Why the fourth son, Zhao Defang? Because he is currently the most reliable of Emperor Taizu's adult sons. But somehow, Wang Ji'en was not the first to recruit Zhao Defang, but Zhao Guangyi, the younger brother of the ancestor Zhao Kuangyin. Suddenly seeing Zhao Guangyi, the twenty-four-year-old Empress Song said in her sadness and helplessness, "The fate of my mother and son is entrusted to the official family", and Zhao Guangyi cried back and replied, "Protect the rich and noble together, and have no worries."
The next day, his younger brother Zhao Guangyi ascended the throne as emperor, and according to historical records, Zhao Guangyi did not have a solemn and majestic enthronement ceremony. This is the road to the throne of the second emperor of the Great Song Dynasty, although it came suddenly and urgently, but everything seemed to be in reason, the backwater was slight, and there was no drastic change that should happen under the norm. Just like the yellow robe of Emperor Taizu in those years, Zhao Guangyi took the initiative to put on the yellow robe and became the second torchbearer of the Song Dynasty.
History does not refuse to be bland, there is no fierce competition for the throne inheritance is also the inheritance, as long as the country is in, who sits on the dragon throne, the people have to dress and eat, how those people around the emperor beat their own little nine-nine, who to be the emperor must have their own different calculations, in the end if not satisfactory, it is in your fate.
Zhao Guangyi was also born with an aura. Song Shi records that when he was a child, he was the child king, everyone played together, children of the same age were afraid of him, he often dared to shoot in addition to having the courage of others, and many children were afraid to hide. When Chen Qiao mutinied, he was only twenty-one years old, and he could collude with a group of veterans to add his brother's yellow robe, which showed his courage and boldness not to be afraid of things and dared to cause trouble.
Zhao Guangyi, who had just ascended to the throne, wanted to do something, which could be reflected in his words in evaluating his brother Zhao Kuangyin: "The former emperor fixed the world with diligence, and all the military and state aircraft maintenance and border defense were controlled. But to abide by the old rules, it must not be easy. He wanted to be unconventional and do something new, so as soon as he took the throne, he changed the name of the country to "Taiping Xingguo".
He did what his brother did with the widows and widows of Later Zhou, and arranged important positions for his brother's sons, and his daughters were given the status of princesses, and the old ministers were promoted to knighthoods and amnesty to the world. He must first let the world be at peace, and then let go of his own cronies and cultivate his own power. He also broadened the path of the imperial examination and doubled the number of places for admission to the imperial examination.
Through these measures, Zhao Guangyi basically stabilized his throne. Next, the Song court also subjugated the two separatist regimes in Fujian and Zhejiang, especially Zhao Guangyi, who appointed Pan Mei as a general and suppressed the Northern Han regime. At this point, the Song Dynasty completed the formal national unification.
Yongxi Northern Expedition
In any case, Liao was a political opponent that Zhao Guangyi could not avoid. In the fourth year of the Taiping Revival (979) and the third year of Yongxi (986), Zhao Guangyi launched two Northern Expeditions, but both were defeated. In particular, during the Yongxi Northern Expedition, the Song army attacked north in three ways, but due to a command error, the Song army collapsed, and the famous Yang family general Yang Ye was captured and died on hunger strike for three days. Zhao Guangyi's weakness and submission sowed the seeds of humiliation for the Song-Liao dispute, and for more than two hundred years, the disputes between the Great Song Dynasty and the Liao, Western Xia, Jin, and later Mongol Empires in the north were repeatedly in a passive situation.
Zhao Guangyi, who came from the military, could not use soldiers and could not fight wars, which was difficult for future generations to understand, and even many of his cronies were mediocre people, whether it was the two Northern Expeditions or the battle to recover the address (Vietnam), they were all defeated. Looking through the history of the Song Dynasty, we can't find Zhao Guangyi's victory in using soldiers, in fact, he reigned for more than twenty years and did not open up an inch of land for the Song Dynasty.
Taiping Guangji is the first documentary novel
Zhao Guangyi, who also came from the military, has a special love for culture. He was very fond of calligraphy and poetry, and his personal achievements in calligraphy were very deep, and he also organized the staff to compile the extensive "Taiping Guangji", which created a precedent for documentary novels. He also loved to read, and compiled many ancient books collected by Wenchen into volumes, read a little every day, and read more than a thousand volumes in a year to form the Taiping Imperial Records. It was this accumulation of his day-to-day that gave birth to the idiom "open the book is beneficial" that has been passed down to future generations.
In the high position of the emperor, Zhao Guangyi still harbored compassion. One year, there was heavy snow in Kaifeng and the weather was very cold. Zhao Guangyi hurriedly summoned The Governor of Kaifeng, and he instructed that when it was cold today, our officials and family members were dressed in thick official robes and roasted on a charcoal fire, and they still felt that the cold could not be supported. The poor people in Beijing lack clothing and food, and they are even more difficult to survive, so you immediately arrange special personnel to comfort the elderly and poor people in Beijing one by one instead of me, and each person will send a thousand dollars, a piece of rice, and a piece of charcoal. In this way, Song Taizong Zhao Guangyi contributed an idiom "sending charcoal in the snow" to future generations, which has been passed down for thousands of years.
There are many historical controversies that have occurred to Zhao Guangyi.
One is the mystery of the incumbent. His brother Song Taizu died suddenly, and the next day Zhao Guangyi took the throne in a hurry, which eventually became an unsolved mystery for future generations. One view is that Zhao Guangyi murdered his brother and usurped the throne on the grounds that Song Taizu did not leave a will, and the night before Taizu's violent death, he happened to drink with his younger brother Zhao Guangyi, and it was Zhao Guangyi who did it. And the day after Taizu died, he was hastily ascended to the throne, obviously afraid of the long night and dreams. The opponents' views are that Zhao Guangyi was recruited afterwards, he was not in the palace without the objective conditions of "killing his brother", and Empress Song first received the news of Taizu's violent death, and did not feel that Taizu's body had abnormal conditions, if it was murdered or murdered, the signs of the scene would inevitably cause fear to Empress Song. The truth of this matter remains to be explored in the future.
The first is the "Golden Alliance". There is no exact record in the main history, but in the wild history, it is very divine: Taizu's mother, Empress Du, instructed The Song Taizu Zhao Kuangyin that after a hundred years, you should pass the throne to your younger brother, and your brother will pass it on to your son later, so that our Song Dynasty will not have a situation where young children will succeed to the throne, and others will not be able to seize the Great Song Dynasty. It is said that this agreement was hidden in the Empress Dowager's Golden Dagger, so it was called the "Alliance of the Golden Kuai". In the end, whether there is a "golden alliance" is actually not very important, Zhao Guangyi's ascension to the throne is actually his own.
Southern Tang Dynasty Li Hou main poem
There is also a hotly discussed issue, that is, Zhao Guangyi was fortunate to have Xiao Zhou, that is, the Xiao Zhou Empress Li Yu, the lord of the Southern Tang Dynasty. After Li Yu was captured, because his empress was absolutely beautiful, he was repeatedly blessed by Emperor Taizong of Song and Zhao Guangyi, and was also recorded by painters. However, these canonical histories such as the "History of song" and the "Continued Zizhi Tongjian" are not recorded, but all kinds of wild histories are relished and cannot be verified at all. Perhaps it is because the fame of the main poem of the Southern Tang Dynasty Li Hou is too big, and the people around him have been interpreted more stories. In this matter, Zhao Guangyi was innocent, and there was not enough evidence so far.
Looking at Zhao Guangyi's imperial career, in the face of the beginning of the establishment of the Northern Song Dynasty, the world was still divided, the divided regime in the north was expanding step by step, and the imperial court led by Zhao Guangyi had not had many effective methods, and compared with Li Shimin of the Tang Dynasty and Zhu Di of the Ming Dynasty, who were also known as Emperor Taizong, Zhao Guangyi really did not have much praise. After all, the Northern Song Dynasty could not be strong and prosperous, and it could not achieve the unification of China, which was an obvious watershed in Zhao Guangyi's tenure.