#历史上有哪些细思恐极的事件 #
Qingming upper river map model
The traditional view is that ancient megacities were symbols of economic prosperity and national strength.
But with the deepening of historical research over the years and the re-combing of historical materials, this traditional view has gradually become outdated, and historians now believe that in ancient societies, super-large cities were more like an environmental curse.
The larger the city, the more serious the environmental problems.
Taking ancient China as an example, all the large cities in ancient China did not have a sewer system that covered the whole city in modern times, no large garbage disposal areas, and even no public toilets.
Until the 19th century, Beijing, the capital of the Qing Dynasty, did not even have a public toilet.
In March 1886, Ennos, a German representative on a visit to China, entered Beijing in a mule cart, and what impressed him was not only the tall Beijing city walls and ancient buildings, which was the "intolerable stench of the nose". In his eyes, Beijing's urban planning is absolutely imposing, but the "near-foot-thick black dust and dirt" on the street really makes him unbearable, and the sight of thousands of poor people squatting in the streets and defecating really startled the German who came from afar.
Of course, successive dynasties have had very high requirements for public health, and have made quite strict regulations, and the cost of violating these regulations is very heavy.
For example, the Tang Dynasty stipulated that those who wear the wall out of the filth, the staff is sixty, the so-called wearing the wall out of the filth also refers to the and urine on the street to hit sixty boards.
But one of the characteristics of ancient dynasties is that regulations are regulations, and the actual situation is the actual situation.
For example, since the Yongzheng Dynasty, the Qing Dynasty has enacted very harsh laws prohibiting the sale of opium in the Territory of the Qing Dynasty, and those who sell opium are the death penalty, but until the First Opium War, no opium dealer was really sentenced to death for more than a hundred years.
Therefore, in all ancient super-large cities, there will be domestic sewage polluting the groundwater, resulting in the situation that the urban groundwater is "salty and brine, not very pleasant".
Ancient Chang'an
Many people say that ancient people found out early on that they can compost with human feces, so even if there is domestic garbage, it will be collected by surrounding farmers to fertilize the land.
However, the amount of domestic waste generated by these super-large cities every day is staggering, and the surrounding rural areas cannot use such a large-scale manure, even in the developed agricultural Jiangnan region, the urban manure problem cannot be comprehensively solved.
Professor Bao Weimin of Zhejiang University pointed out in "On New Problems in the Urban Development of the Song Dynasty" that during the period from the late Tang Dynasty to the Song Dynasty, major cities "showed a tendency to filth, the area of solid garbage and stagnant water increased, and infectious diseases rose." ”
In addition to domestic garbage, another problem of super-large cities in ancient times is that because of the fuel problem, it will cause great damage to the surrounding environment.
Taking the Northern Song Dynasty Kaifeng City as an example, Kaifeng may be the world's most densely populated city in the 200 years from the 10th century to the 12th century AD, according to chongning annual statistics, Kaifeng has a total of 261,117 households, 442,940 mouth, which is not counting the floating population.
Counting the floating population, the population of Kaifeng City must have reached one million during the Northern Song Dynasty.
Map of the Upper River in the Ming and Qing Dynasties
However, at the same time, the population of Kaifeng City, which is close to one million, has also brought devastating damage to the surrounding environment of Kaifeng.
Shen Kuo of the Northern Song Dynasty once said: "The pine forests of Present Qi and Lujian are exhausted, and gradually to Taihang, Jingxi, Jiangnan, and most of Songshan are children." Also known as: "Zhangshui, Tuotuo, Zhuoshui, Mulberry and the like, all of them are turbid." ”
In order to obtain fuel, the people of Kaifeng in the Northern Song Dynasty and the entire north China region even cut down mulberry trees and jujube trees, which were cash crops that were banned in ancient times.
For example, Zhuang was nicknamed "The villagers stole mulberry branches in the cold moon to pay firewood, which was very harmful." ”
As early as the Song Taizu period, the Song Dynasty issued many decrees severely prohibiting the people from cutting down mulberry and jujube trees, and severely punishing them with capital punishment, even if they cut down one tree, they had to be "exiled for three thousand miles".
The punishment is not heavy, but from the beginning of the Song Taizu to the fall of the Northern Song Dynasty, the Song Dynasty could not solve the problem of Kaifeng and the people of Northern China cutting down mulberry and jujube trees for fuel.
Su Yan, a poet during the Ningzong period of the Southern Song Dynasty, once mentioned in his poem that even in the Southern Song Dynasty, the problem of people cutting down mulberry trees and jujube trees for fuel was still very serious:
Mulberry forest cut down the jujube forest, and sold firewood for money and food. Tomorrow is still uncertain, and it will be wrapped up in autumn and winter.
The situation around Kaifeng is more serious, such as the Liaozhou near Kaifeng, yes, it is the Liaozhou of the Alliance of Liaoyuan, "the Shaolin trees of the Liaozhou and Jizhou, that is, the people of present-day Lanzhou, send for the no wood plants, and cut down the Sang Tuona officials", and the Hua Prefecture (now Shui County) is even more "the ground is without ruler wood, and the sand is as flat as the palm".
Therefore, whenever Kaifeng encounters a slight cooling temperature and heavy snow in winter, a large number of civilians will freeze to death.
For example, jiayou four years, because of extreme weather, resulting in a large number of civilians in Kaifeng because of lack of fuel and freeze to death", "since last year's rain and snow, the people are hungry and cold, and the road to death is very difficult." "Cold rain and snow, small people are unemployed, the market is lonely, the people who are frozen are dying and losing a lot, and the price of charcoal food is doubled." The people are hungry. ”
So, from this point of view, in ancient times when there was not enough material, super-large cities were really not a good thing.
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