#History# #Three Kingdoms#
At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, after the Battle of Guandu, there was a serious famine in Yecheng.
In the fifth year of Jian'an, in 200 AD, Cao Cao burned Wuchao in the Battle of Guandu and defeated Yuan Shao with fewer victories. After that, Cao Cao took advantage of the victory to pursue, and Yuan Shao retreated to his base camp of Yecheng and consolidated the rear of Hebei.
After nearly two years of tug-of-war between Yuan and Cao, jizhou's agricultural production was greatly damaged, causing famine.
In the seventh year of Jian'an, in 202 AD, in Yuan Shao's stronghold, the seat of Jizhou and Wei County, Yicheng, the famine was particularly severe. At that time, the price of rice in Yecheng reached 20,000 yuan.
According to the Book of Han, 20,000 yuan is a fairly high price.
During the Qin and Han Dynasties, one stone measuring weight was equivalent to one stone measuring capacity. That is to say, the price of rice in Yicheng in the seven years of Jian'an is 20,000 yuan per stone.
At the beginning of the Han Dynasty, after experiencing the war-torn society at the end of the Qin Dynasty, hundreds of industries withered, and the Guanzhong area where the capital Chang'an was located even appeared in the scene of "cannibalism". But even so, the price of rice at this time is only 10,000 yuan per stone. Later, the price of rice fell to 5,000 yuan per stone.
Later, after two generations of Wenjing emperors recuperated, the price of grain in the Han Dynasty dropped significantly. During Emperor Wen's great harvest period, Gu Yishi was only a few tens of dollars, and Su Yishi was only more than ten dollars.
Later, after experiencing the world turmoil caused by Emperor Wu's northern attack on the Xiongnu to open up the western region, by the time of Emperor Xuan of Han, the price of grain in the Han Dynasty was still stable. When Emperor Xuan was proclaimed, Gu Yishi was 50 yuan. After a continuous harvest, Gu Yishi even had only 5 yuan. A few border counties near the front line of the war, millet a stone 100 yuan.
After that, from the Han Yuan Emperor to the wang mang period at the end of the Western Han Dynasty, the price of grain only hovered between 200 yuan and 500 yuan.
During the Han Dynasty, ordinary peasant families were generally family of five. In a normal year, a year's worth of food income alone is about 4500 dollars. Counting the income of the female workers in the family, and deducting taxes, rations, sacrifices, clothes and other consumption, there is basically not much left, only about a hundred dollars.
This is still a normal year, the income and surplus of a family of five. It is conceivable that in the context of this great famine at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, how expensive it was to have 20,000 yuan of grain. At that time, the life of the people was miserable.
Regarding the Three Kingdoms at the end of the Han Dynasty, there are often records of "cannibalism" in history books. Coupled with the frequent wars at that time, therefore, after the entire Three Kingdoms period, by the early years of the Western Jin Dynasty, the national population had dropped from more than 50 million in the late Eastern Han Dynasty to more than 16 million, and the population had decreased by more than half.
Therefore, at that time, Cao Cao described the tragic situation in the Huainan region at the end of the Han Dynasty in the "Artemisia Lixing", which was "the armor is born of lice, and the surname of ten thousand people dies." White bones are exposed in the wild, and there is no chicken chirping for thousands of miles. The people are left behind, and the thoughts are broken."
