The real Western Han Dynasty in history existed for a total of 210 years. However, what many people may not know is that the real peak of the Western Han Dynasty was not actually in the most famous Han Wudi period, but during the han Xuan emperor period. Prior to this, the national strength of the Han Dynasty had been constantly improving. After Emperor Xuan of Han, for various reasons, the Western Han Dynasty had the phenomenon of foreign relatives controlling power, and finally perished because of it.
The Western Han Dynasty went from the founding of the country to the extreme prosperity, and then from the extreme prosperity to the decline, this story is really a long story.
In the last years of the Qin Dynasty, a surging peasant uprising destroyed the Qin Government's rule over the country. At the same time, powerful people in various places rose up against Qin one after another and established separatist forces. During this period, Liu Bang, a native of Pei County, also took advantage of the situation, pulled up a team, and soon became the main force in the rebel army.
After that, Liu Bang took the lead in rushing into Guanzhong with his troops, entered Xianyang, and accepted the surrender of prince Infant Qin. But after this, because Xiang Yu, the overlord of the anti-Qin coalition army, was very dissatisfied with Liu Bang, Liu Bang had to give up Xianyang and recognize Xiang Yu's leadership. After that, Xiang Yu enfeoffed the princes and assigned Liu Bang to the land of Bashu.
Later, Liu Bang took advantage of the civil strife among the major princes, appointed Han Xin as a general, and waved his army to the east, kicking off the prelude to the Chu-Han War. After several years of fighting, Liu Bang lasted. Defeated Xiang Yu and became the new overlord.
However, after Liu Bang became the hegemon, he did not choose to continue to implement the sub-feudal system like Xiang Yu, but chose the system of county system and sub-feudal system in parallel. In 202 BC, Liu Bang declared himself emperor in Dingtao, Shandong, and the Western Han Dynasty officially opened the country.
In the following years, Liu Bang, on the one hand, recuperated and restored his national strength, and on the other hand, began to solve the problem of the existence of a king with a different surname. After several years of hard work, the Han Dynasty finally solved all the remaining princely states and completely unified the world. However, at the same time, in order to consolidate his rule, Liu Bang began to divide the Liu clan relatives on a large scale, and left behind the ancestral precept that non-Liu clans could not be crowned kings.
In 195 BC, Liu Bang died of illness, and his son Liu Ying ascended the throne as a teenager. However, Liu Ying died young after just seven years on the throne. Because Liu Ying was a teenager on the throne, it was difficult to suppress the courtiers, so after Liu Ying ascended the throne, his birth mother Lü Yan began to meddle in the government. After Liu Ying's death, his son Liu Gong was a teenager who took the throne and could not handle the government at all, so Lü Hou began to make a claim to the dynasty.
Lü Yan was called a system for a total of eight years. During this period, as Liu Gong grew older, Liu Gong threatened revenge because his birth mother was killed by Empress Lü. After that, Lü Yan imprisoned and killed Liu Gong and replaced Liu Ying's other son, Liu Hong, as emperor.
In 180 BC, Lü Yan died. After that, the Meritorious Party of the Western Han Dynasty launched a coup d'état, killed the Lü clan, and then installed Liu Bang's fourth son Liu Heng as emperor, which was Emperor Wen of Han. Emperor Wen of Han reigned for 23 years, and during his reign, he always adhered to the policy of recuperation and recuperation, and the national strength of the Western Han Dynasty was once again significantly improved. In 157 BC, Emperor Wen of Han died, and his son Liu Qi took the throne, historically known as Emperor Jing of Han. After the Han Jing Emperor ascended the throne, he continued to implement the policy of recuperation and recuperation, and the Western Han Dynasty had a good life. During the nearly forty years of the reign of Emperor Wen of Han and Emperor Jing of Han, later history is called the rule of Wenjing.
However, in the period of the Han Jing Emperor, because Liu Bang had previously enfeoffed the princes of the Liu clan, the local clan kings were too powerful, and finally a rebellion occurred, which was later known as the Rebellion of the Seven Kingdoms. Fortunately, the Han Jing Emperor was still relatively capable, and finally appointed Zhou Yafu to quell the rebellion, which did not cause the country to suffer major losses, but strengthened the centralization of power.
After the death of Emperor Jingdi of Han, the next person to take the throne was the famous Emperor Wu of Han. After Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty ascended the throne, on the basis of the rule of Wenjing, he further enhanced his national strength. Internally, the edict of grace was enforced, splitting the originally powerful princely states into multiple small states, and then solving the problem of the local princes' tails being too large. At the same time, Emperor Wu of han also launched a war against the Xiongnu in the north, attacking the Xiongnu and expanding the Han Dynasty's sphere of influence to the western region.
In addition, Emperor Wudi of the Han Dynasty also "deposed a hundred families and respected Confucianism alone", choosing Confucianism as the governing principle, which also became the mainstream idea inherited in China for thousands of years.
During the reign of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, he made great contributions to Chinese history. But at the same time, Emperor Wudi of the Han Dynasty launched wars for many years, which also greatly damaged the national strength of the Han Dynasty. Especially in his later years, Emperor Wu of Han listened to the rumors of his traitorous ministers and killed his own prince by mistake, resulting in a situation in which the Han Dynasty once had no successor.
After the death of Emperor Wu of Han, his youngest son Emperor Zhao of Han ascended the throne at the age of eight. Because of his young age, the government could only be handled by Huo Guang and others. Emperor Han Zhao, on the other hand, had just come of age, but he died young and had no heirs. Therefore, the ministers could only choose Liu He, the king of Changyi, from the clan room to be emperor.
However, after Liu He ascended to the throne, he was very absurd and could not bear the responsibility of the emperor at all. Therefore, after only 27 days on the throne, he was deposed by the powerful minister Huo Guang. Later, Huo Guang supported another member of the clan, Liu Qing, who was the famous Emperor Xuan of Han in history.
After Emperor Xuan of Han ascended the throne, the power in the early stages was always controlled by Huo Guang. However, after Huo Guang's death, Emperor Xuan of Han soon took the throne and became a good emperor. During the reigns of Emperor Zhao of Han and Emperor Xuan of Han, although there were often turmoils at the top, the Han Dynasty as a whole began to focus on recuperation. The national strength consumed during the period of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty was also compensated.
In the late han xuan emperor, the national strength of the Han Dynasty finally reached a new peak, and it was also the peak of the entire Western Han Dynasty. At this time, the Western Han Dynasty not only established the Western Regions Capital Protectorate in the Western Regions, but for the first time actually brought the Western Regions into the control of the Central Plains Dynasty. At the same time, it completely defeated the Xiongnu and solved the security problems in the north.
After the death of Emperor Xuan of Han, his son Emperor Yuan of Han took the throne. Emperor Yuan of Han was actually a good emperor and continued to suppress the Xiongnu in the north. The famous phrase "those who commit crimes against the strong, although they are far away, will be punished" appeared in this era. At the same time, in order to appease the surrendered Xiongnu tribes, the Han Yuan Emperor also began to re-implement the policy of peace and pro-peace. The historical Zhaojun out of the plug occurred during this period.
However, Emperor Yuan of Han was not the kind of emperor who was brilliant and ambitious. Although he did a lot of things during his reign, he could not fundamentally solve the problems of the Western Han Dynasty. At that time, the Western Han Dynasty, because the founding time of more than a hundred years, the problem of land annexation became more and more serious, and the centralization of power began to weaken again. And these problems, the Han Yuan Emperor was not able to solve.
In addition, Emperor Yuan of Han married an empress named Wang Zhengjun. This prince was not very good at teaching children, and after the death of Emperor Yuan of Han, his son Liu Huan ascended the throne and was known as Emperor Cheng of Han. After Emperor Hancheng ascended the throne, he coveted pleasure and ignored state affairs. Coupled with the further deterioration of the land problem, peasant revolts gradually began to arise within the Han Dynasty.
What is even more fatal is that because Emperor Hancheng did not like to take care of the government, the foreign relative Wang Jia took advantage of the situation to take power, laying the groundwork for the later usurpation of the throne.
After the death of Emperor Hancheng, because Emperor Hancheng had no sons to inherit when he died, he could only be succeeded by his nephew Liu Xin, who was known as Emperor Han. Liu Xin was also not a good emperor, and died after six years on the throne, which further strengthened the corruption of the Han dynasty's ruling machine. After Liu Xin's death, because he had no sons, Wang Mang, a powerful minister, chose a Liu Yan, who was only nine years old at the time, from the clan to take the throne, and was known as the Hanping Emperor.
After the Hanping Emperor ascended the throne, Wang Mang took full control of power. Because at that time, most of the Liu clan relatives were suppressed, and the low-level people were more disappointed in the rulers of the Han Dynasty. So in the end, Wang Mang usurped the throne and forced the Hanping Emperor to give the throne to himself. In the eighth year of AD, Wang Mang officially ascended the throne and changed the name of the country to 'New', and the Western Han Dynasty fell.