The earth is rich in everything. Apples can also be related to our history of the Silk Road and the War of Resistance, and can also become our glorious history.
Apple originated in Xinjiang, China. In 2017, the world-famous academic journal Nature Communications published a research result on apples by Professor Chen Xuesen's team of Shandong Agricultural University, which caused a sensation in the world. After six years of cooperation with The Fei Zhangjun team at Cornell University in the United States, Professor Chen's research team proved through genetic sequencing that the world's cultivated apple originated from the Wild Apple of Xinjiang (Sever's Apple), evolved westward to form Western apples, and evolved eastward to form early Chinese cotton apples.
This means that apples all over the world are flowing with Chinese blood.
Li Shanxiang, 1880-1959, a native of Xiaogang, Zhenhai, Zhejiang (now Beilun District, Ningbo), was the son of Li Lianshui, a physician of Tongfeng in the late Qing Dynasty. Famous patriotic industrialist. In addition, there are at least two identities: first, the father of the Chinese apple; second, the father-in-law of General Zhang Aiping, former vice premier of the State Council and former state councilor and defense minister. It was Mr. Li Shanxiang who cultivated the mainland's Guoguang and Red Marshal apples in the northeast in the 1920s and 1930s, which made the mainland's apple industry rise from then on, overpowering the Nissan apples that were dumped at that time.
01. The story of Li Shanxiang, the father of Chinese apples
There are apples in that place in Jinzhou
It was the color of peace and celebration
It is most peaceful to give to friends and family
Sweet days go by beautifully
Chairman Mao said yo three times
Heroes of the city heritage red
The days of the common people are booming...
This is a song written by Northeast songwriters Zhang Kun and Zhang Yuanfu in 2021, "Apples in that place in Jinzhou", the work is full of positive energy, and it is quickly sung in Jinzhou as a gift for the centenary of the founding of the party. On November 8, 1948, Higashino sent a telegram to Chairman Mao, several of which were as follows: "After the battle was settled in Xingcheng, a large number of apples from a certain landlord, none of the soldiers moved..." Because of this, Chairman Mao knew about the Jinzhou apple and has always regarded the story of "the People's Liberation Army does not eat apples" as a typical example of party style building. The story behind it goes like this:
In October 1948, after the end of the Battle of Yixian County, the three columns of Dongye were ordered to rush to the outskirts of Jinzhou to participate in the Jinzhou Offensive, and the 3nd Battalion and 9th Company of the 22nd Regiment of the 8th Division rushed to the outskirts of Jinzhou after a one-night rapid march. The distance of nearly a hundred miles made the officers and men who had previously fought fiercely and bitterly sleepy, their mouths were dry, and their throats were about to smoke. When it was almost dawn, the company came to an orchard north of the city and received an order from its superiors: "Stop advancing and hide in place." ”
The fruit trees were covered with bright red apples, and the officers and men were thirsty and tired, but one by one they could only look at the apples and listen to their stomachs grumbling. The reason is that our army has discipline and cannot take a needle and a penny from the masses, let alone eat apples.
Such stories abounded in Jinzhou at that time, and a company was stationed in a village that day, and a farm compound became a temporary company headquarters, where officers and soldiers ate and studied. There were several tall apple trees growing in the yard, with fruitful branches, and some apples would fall from the trees, but the warriors would always pick them up and put them in the baskets of fallen apples in the courtyard of their fellow villagers. Some of the apples were already difficult to preserve because they had scars on them and had fallen to the ground, and the compatriots wanted the officers and soldiers to eat these apples, but the soldiers still refused. The fellow villagers were too upset to go, and they felt that the officers and soldiers should not eat apples with scars or fallen wounds, and the officers and soldiers were disgusted, so they specially plucked good apples from trees and gave them to the officers and soldiers, but they were still rejected by the soldiers.
Today, the Jinzhou Apple Integrity Culture Exhibition Hall also has such a real scene restoration display: two soldiers are holding an apple with a scar under the fruit tree in a farm yard, and one soldier believes that if the apple has a scar and does not eat it, it will be broken, and if it is broken, it will be thrown away by the fellow, which is a pity; the other soldier believes that even if it is broken, thrown away, it cannot be eaten, because there is no such thing as an apple with pain in the discipline.
This is our officers and men, in the face of iron discipline, there is no loosening or concession, only uncompromising implementation and observance. In Chairman Mao's eyes, "not eating apples" is the inherent political essence of the People's Liberation Army, and he hopes that the People's Liberation Army will always maintain the glorious tradition of "not eating apples." It is precisely because of this that he mentioned the Jinzhou Apple three times, the last time on July 27, 1972, when he instructed the relevant report sent by the troops:
Jinzhou Apple Integrity Culture Exhibition Hall
"There were apples in that place in Jinzhou, and when the Liaoxi Campaign was fought, it was autumn, and there were many apples in the homes of the common people, and none of us soldiers went to get them. I was very touched to see that news. On this question, the warriors consciously believe that it is noble not to eat, and it is despicable to eat, because this is the apple of the people. Our discipline is based on this self-awareness. This is the result of our leadership and education. Man must have a little spirit, and it is from here that the revolutionary spirit of the proletariat comes out. ”
This passage was published in the "People's Daily", "Guangming Daily" and other major newspapers on August 1 of that year, and while being educated and enlightened, the "Jinzhou Apple" was deeply imprinted in the minds of the people of the whole country.
However, why does Jinzhou produce apples, or why do apples get large-scale, high-quality cultivation in Jinzhou? This has to start with Li Shanxiang.
Li Shanxiang
Li Shanxiang's ancestral home in Port Village, Zhenhai County, Zhejiang Province, was the first to engage in agriculture, and when Li Shanxiang's grandfather was in his generation, he began to break into Shanghai, and after having some savings, he opened a ship, set up a money bank, and operated real estate, becoming a huge fortune and becoming one of the giants of the Ningbo Gang. In this context, Li Shanxiang's father, Li Lianshui, entered the career path and was awarded the title of Tongfeng Doctor and Hua Ling.
Li Shanxiang was born in Beijing in 1880. In 1894, under the influence of his father's indoctrination of "non-jun theory", he accepted Sun Yat-sen's revolutionary ideas, returned to his hometown, participated in the Xinhai Revolution of 1911, and served as the civil administrator (county magistrate) of Zhenhai County. However, in the process of work, because of impartial work and non-favoritism, it attracted the attack of the powerful and inferior gentry at the upper echelons of society at that time. To this end, he resigned indignantly and decided to take his ideal path of "saving the country through industry" and "saving the country through agriculture."
Jinzhou Nanshan Shengsheng Orchard
Linghai Is a county-level city under the jurisdiction of present-day Liaoning Province, which is administered by Jinzhou City. In 1912, Li Shanxiang was recruited to Linghai City and was responsible for the dredging and drainage project at tianyi reclamation company (now Jianye Township). Since then, it has been placed on the vast northeast land. In 1915, Tianyi Company sold a large amount of land to the original reclamation farmers, and the remaining more than 10,000 mu of land was mortgaged to Li Shanxiang's brother Li Yongxiang, who naturally thought of his brother Li Shanxiang, so he handed over this more than 10,000 mu of land to Li Shanxiang, who was specifically responsible for management. This is also the beginning of Li Shanxiang's road of "industrial salvation".
Because he had received a good education since childhood, read a lot of books, and had received revolutionary ideas and had the experience of becoming an official, Li Shanxiang decided to realize his dream through this land of more than 10,000 mu. He did not follow the old corporate approach of managing the land, recruiting local farmers as workers and then selling them to them at high prices as the crops matured for profit. He decided to use foreign technology to turn more than 10,000 acres of land into an advanced farm.
Li Shanxiang in the orchard
To this end, Li Shanxiang referred to the model of American farms, operated in a joint-stock manner, purchased advanced agricultural tools and equipment from abroad and transportation tools such as automobiles, and also purchased generators for power generation and lighting, and installed telephones and other equipment for communication. At the same time, he improved the soil of more than 10,000 mu of land and tried to plant rice, and achieved success. In order to recycle raw materials, he not only raised pigs to accumulate fat, but also opened processing sites such as oil mills, founded Wansheng Sauce Garden, and produced soy sauce for the first time in Linghai. The Hengkang Farm he founded had many new agricultural measures that had never been seen in northeast China at that time, and then made the curd milk and shrimp oil side dishes produced in the sauce garden become well-known Jinzhou specialties.
In 1920, Li Shanxiang saw apples, when the Japanese planted apples in the northeast and occupied a monopoly position in the market, when ripe, a pound sold for more than 2 cents, more than 20 times higher than the price of sorghum rice that the people eat every day. Why can't Chinese grow their own apples? Li Shanxiang realized that if he ran his own orchard, he would not only be able to make a profit, but also break the monopoly of the Japanese. So he decided to invest in the establishment of Chinese his own orchard.
In 1923, Li Shanxiang raised a part of the funds himself, purchased 2,000 mu of hillside wasteland in the Nanshan area, and together with Chen Shaoting, Cao Xiaofen and other founded the Miaogou Shengsheng Orchard Co., Ltd., introduced excellent varieties from abroad at high prices, planted apples and other fruit trees, and founded the first apple orchard in the Chinese - Nanshan Shengsheng Orchard.
In addition to planting nearly 10,000 apple trees he imported from abroad, Li Shanxiang built water conservancy projects in barren mountains, built square ponds, reservoirs, drilled deep wells, and diverted water with water pumps and iron pipes for irrigation; in addition to planting nearly 10,000 apple trees he had imported from abroad, the orchard also planted the autumn pears, huagai pears, duck pears, white pears, hawthorns, peaches, apricots, plums, and peaches that he imported from famous places throughout the country. At first, he entrusted the orchard to a Japanese expert, but soon found that the japanese expert's theories could not be combined with the local reality of Jinzhou, and he was decisively dismissed. Subsequently, Liu Xiongfei and others from the Department of Fruit Arts of Yenching University (Peking University) were invited to use science and technology to operate orchards. 300 oceans a month were given to them, allowing them to devote all their energy to the fruit trees.
On this basis, Li Shanxiang also purchased a large number of English and Japanese fruit art books and periodicals from abroad for technicians to study with him. In order to prevent soil erosion in the orchard, he also closed the mountain to cultivate forests, and planted drought-tolerant pine trees on some hills that were not suitable for fruit trees. The vegetation of the orchard is thickened and the groundwater level is raised, presenting a beautiful scene of vitality and prosperity. In spring, the garden is full of flowers; in summer, the trees in the garden are shaded; in autumn, the bright apple smiling faces in the garden welcome people... Soon, it attracted people living in Jinzhou City, flocking to the orchard, turning the orchard into an outinging resort.
While improving the apple tree species, Li Shanxiang also founded the "Harvest Fruit Art College" in the orchard, with a primary school, a middle school and a university department, on the one hand, to help local poor children go to school for free; on the other hand, he wanted to rely on this to vigorously cultivate horticultural talents. In the sound of children's reading, he and Liu Xiongfei and others used advanced technology to improve varieties, and bred the mainland's Red Marshal and Guoguang apples, which were sold after being listed, and even more popular than the apples planted locally by the Japanese. But it was also at this time that he suddenly realized that if he wanted to completely overwhelm the Japanese apple, he could not rely on his own strength.
Therefore, under the call of Li Shanxiang, the land of Jinzhou "popped" out one orchard after another: Dongjia Orchard, Yangjia Orchard, Changjia Orchard, Tailai Company Orchard, Liujia Orchard, Lijia Orchard... Successively established, one after another quite spectacular, and under the technical support of Yenching University, Nanjing Jinling University Wu Yinghua, Zhang Maoen, Zhang Ruiting and Song Xiangyuan of Xiongyue Fruit Art Research Institute, Jinzhou apple fragrance drifted thousands of miles, the fruit industry has since risen, and many cities in the northeast and even In guan have come to Jinzhou to buy locally cultivated red marshal and Guoguang apples, both in terms of fame and sales. As a result, Shengsheng Orchard is known as the first apple base in western Liaoning, and Li Shanxiang is also known as the "father of Chinese apples".
After the "918" incident, the Japanese army invaded Jinzhou and repeatedly wooed Li Shanxiang to serve as the president of the Jinzhou Farmers' Association. Li Shanxiang resolutely resigned, resolutely refused to cooperate with the Japanese and puppets, and was put under house arrest by the Japanese side. After avoiding the surveillance of the Japanese, Li Shanxiang led his family to flee Jinzhou in disguise and return to his hometown of Xiaogang in Zhenhai County. After the outbreak of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, he actively participated in the anti-Japanese rescue activities, in addition to funding the construction of a small hospital, so that all his wives, children, old and young could go out to participate in the field rescue work, he also sent his 5 children to join the New Fourth Army.
Li Shanxiang had 8 children, all of whom participated in the Anti-Japanese Salvation Movement under the leadership of their father. In 1937, li Shanxiang sent five women to join the New Fourth Army: the eldest son Li Zuping and the second son Li Zuning; the second daughter Li Youlan, the third daughter Li Jin, and the fourth daughter Li Yi. At that time, Li Youlan was 17 years old, Li Jin was 14 years old, and Li Yi was 12 years old. After experiencing baptism in the torrent of revolution, in 1942, Li Youlan married Zhang Aiping, deputy commander of the Third Division of the New Fourth Army. Later, Li Shanxiang had many contacts with Zhang Aiping, Li Yihao, chairman of the Suwan Provincial Government, and Chen Yi, commander of the New Fourth Army, and had close relations, and contributed his children and family property to the anti-Japanese resistance.
Lee Youlan
In the summer of 1946, Li Shanxiang returned to the "Shengsheng Orchard" in Nanshan, Jinzhou, where he had been away for 9 years, and began to engage in his fruit art business again. After the liberation of Jinzhou, he wrote a letter to the Liaoxi Provincial Government, and dedicated the "Shengsheng Orchard" that he had devoted his life to running and the "Farming Yu College" he had founded free of charge to the country. The red apple is like his patriotic heart at this moment, fresh, moving and fragrant. With the founding of New China, our own Red Marshal and Guoguang Apple also started from Jinzhou, went to the famous places in the country, and "settled down" in more lands in the motherland.
Today, Jinzhou Shengsheng Orchard is still known as "China's first apple garden", but also has become a key cultural relics protection unit in Jinzhou City, apples are still smiling here.
Old shadow of "Raw Orchard"
02. The spread of apples on the ancient Silk Roads
Today, there is a kind of saying about the introduction of apples to China, that after the middle of the 19th century, the sea ban was opened, Western culture was imported in large quantities, and the exchange of fruit and vegetable resources was frequent. Apple fruit trees were introduced to China at this time, with Shandong being the earliest. It is reported that in 1871, an American named John Neeves brought varieties of fruit trees such as apples, pears, European plums and sweet cherries to China and planted them in the "Guangxing Orchard" in the southeastern foothills of Yantai Yuhuangding. But this must not be the earliest apple in China, but can only be said to be an apple variety introduced abroad by China.
Regarding the origin of apples, earlier traditional views believe that apples come from wild European apples. That is to say, the European wild apple is the origin of the cultivated apple. This claim was not passed down until the 19th century, when it was rejected by the Swiss botanist Alphonse de Condor. De Condor believes that wild apples from Turkey, the Caucasus and northern Iran are the ancestors of apples. Shortly thereafter, however, De Condor's claim was rejected by the Soviet botanist Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov.
Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov
Vavilov, from 1887 to 1943, devoted his life to the study of wheat, corn, and other grains that support the world's population. In 1924, after he became the director of the All-Soviet Institute of Applied Plants and New Crops (later renamed the All-Soviet Crop Cultivation Research Institute), he conducted a large number of crop variety resource investigation and collection work. After in-depth investigation and research in Central Asia, it was concluded that the true ancestor of apples was the wild apples in Xinjiang.
In 1930, Vavilov announced to the outside world that the Xinjiang wild apple was the ancestor of the cultivated apple, and this conclusion was quickly accepted by scientists around the world. Based on this, later scholars gave a new route map for the spread of apples, that is, the first humans who entered Xinjiang discovered the delicious Xinjiang wild apples that grew in the north of the Tianshan Mountains, and spread outward through the "Silk Road" and the "Silk Road" complementing each other.
The team of Professor Chen Xuesen of Shandong Agricultural University also discovered the "old ancestor" of the world's apples in the wild fruit forest of Ili in Xinjiang - Xinjiang wild apples. At the same time, they also found that there are 84 types of wild apples in the Ili region alone. It is precisely because of the discovery and utilization of this unique resource that in 2019, they selected and bred China's "red meat apple". That is, 4 new varieties of high flavonoids (red meat) apples, such as "lucky red", "lucky red", "lucky red", "beautiful red" and "full red". Apple, here is really corrected, changed the birthplace on the "household registration book", and its historical transmission route has been re-planned.
In this process, Ili in the northern Xinjiang region of Xinjiang, in the light of apple ripening, once again glowed its role as a node or hub located on the Silk Road connecting the East and the West, so that people could see and touch it at the same time, and also began to search for the "Apple Road" in ancient books.
Sima Xiangru, circa 179 BC ~ 118 BC, Han Dynasty literary scholar, one of the "Four Great Masters of Han Fu", known as "Fu Sheng" and "Ci Zong". In his "Shanglin Fu", there are such sentences: "Lu Tangerine Summer Ripe, Yellow Sweet Orange Neem, Loquat Persimmon, Tingnai Houpu, Juju Arbutus, Cherry Pu Tao, Hidden Fu Zhen Di, Shu Shu Zhi, Luo Hu Harem, Liehu North Garden." "Nai" here is the apple, which is the earliest name of the cotton apple.
In the Jin Dynasty Ge Hongji's "Xijing Miscellaneous Records and Repairing the Forest Garden", it is said: "At the beginning of the cultivation of the Forest Garden, the group of subjects was far away, and each of them offered a name and fruit tree. "The famous fruit trees offered by the courtiers and the distant countries include "Nai". There are three kinds of "Nai" called "Nai" in the offering, purple tree (referring to the purple flower), and green tree (referring to the flower being green).
Shanglin Garden, originally an old garden of the Qin Dynasty, was expanded during the reign of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty. South of the South Mountain, north of Weishui, around three hundred miles, of which 70 are repaired from the palace; more than 3,000 rare trees, all kinds of birds and beasts, innumerable, for the royal family to shoot and hunt at will. It can be seen that in the royal gardens of the Han Dynasty at that time, apples and putao (grapes) from the western region have begun to grow leafily.
Guo Yigong, a naturalist of the Jin Dynasty, was born in an unknown date and his life deeds are unknown. In his book "Guangzhi", it is said that "there are three kinds of white, green and red. Zhangye has white oak, Jiuquan has red oak, and the West also has many trees. "Zhangye and Jiuquan are located in the Hexi Corridor of Gansu Province, where the white apples and red apples are abundant, and it is not difficult to see that the apples have spread to the West far away in Central Asia in the process of spreading to the Chinese mainland through the Hexi Corridor.
Xinjiang Ili wild apple forest
In addition, in Jia Sixun's "Qi Min Zhi Shu" at the end of the Northern Wei Dynasty, it is also said: "During the reign of Emperor Ming of Wei, the dynasties gave winter to the throne at night. "This one is from Liangzhou." Liangzhou is the ancient name of wuwei city in present-day Gansu Province, enjoying the reputation of "the key to the world, the national guard" and "the capital of Wuliang Jinghua, Hexi Metropolis". Before Huo went to open the Hexi Corridor, there were many ancient ethnic minorities living here, such as Xirong, Yueshi, Wusun, Xiongnu, etc., who could not grow apples. Emperor Cao Rui of Wei was the second emperor of Cao Wei, the eldest son of Emperor Cao Pi of Wei. By this time, apples had been widely cultivated in Gansu and spread to Luoyang, the capital of Cao Wei.
In the middle of this process, apples may also have spread across the Altai Mountains along the steppe tea ceremony to China, and also from the Hexi Corridor to Qinghai, Tibet and southwest China. Around this time, people gave Apple a new name on the basis of the original name- Lin Zhen. The Guangzhi says: "Lin Ishiru resembles a red chestnut, also known as a black oak." In the "Qi Min Zhi Shu", it is said that Lin Zhen is also called "Lai Fowl", why is it called "Lai Fowl"? This is because when the apple is ripe, it will attract many birds, and "the birds will come when they are sweet and ripe." ”
In the Tang Dynasty, on the basis of the names of "柰", "Lin Bao" and "Lai Fowl", people gave apples some new names - Wen Lin Guo, Ping Po Guo and so on. Zheng Chang's "Records of Qiawen": "Tang Wei County's people wang dialect tasted a forest, the fruit is large, the color is white, there are Zhu dots, dedicated to Tang Gaozong." Emperor Gaozong was overjoyed and bestowed upon Wang Wenlinlang, who was also known as Wenlinguo.com. "Ping po guo is also called pin po guo, phoenix eye fruit, "Journey to the West" once mentioned that Tang Taizong in order to entertain the four Tang monks and apprentices who returned from the scriptures, set up a feast, ping po seed is one of the delicacies.
Ili wild apple grove
Pinpo fruit like a pod, thick skin ripe in autumn, the stalk length of 10 to 20 cm, the fruit pod is not ripe after the pale reddish with blue, when ripening the fruit pod cracks open with seeds, the pod changes the liver color of the pig, the cracked mature seed changes from the soil color to black, its shape resembles the phoenix eye called the phoenix eye fruit, the immature fruit is pale yellow-green, the inner ripe seeds are edible, the unripe taste is poor with bitterness, the mature one has a sweet taste, delicious and delicious. The Buddha's Great Dictionary explains the word "Pinpo", which is a transliteration of Sanskrit and Pali bimba, which originally means "figure". Also known as india has a pinnacle tree, trees, bright red fruit, meaning "acacia tree".
However, why did the Tang Dynasty people call two different things the same name? The Tang Dynasty monk Shi Xuanying said in the All Sutras and Sounds: "Dan, Chiye. Clean, pure also. The fruit of the frequent po fruit, whose fruit resembles this square forest, is extremely distinct and red. It can be seen that with the spread of Buddhist culture in China, although the Tang Dynasty people knew the apple, they believed that the apple and the pinpo fruit were from ancient India, so they gave them the same name. It can also be seen from this that the Tang Dynasty did not specially cultivate apples. The apple was introduced to Japan with Buddhist culture at that time - the Japanese also called the apple "Hayashita", and the Japanese name was "りんご".
It is not that it is called "mixed", which means that the original name is gone. Bai Juyi's "West Province's Memories of The New Flowers on the East Slope of Chungju New Flower Trees Because of the Title of the East Building": "The most memorable of the red and rotten burnt on the eastern slope, the wild peach mountain apricot water forest. "In the Song Dynasty, people had a further distinction between apples, such as: Golden Forest, Red Forest, Water Forest, etc. Such names have also been reflected in many poems, such as Song Huizong's "Golden Forest You Chun Ying": "The good name He Bacuo, the reputation of Zhan You Chun." In March, the birds are charming and entertaining. Yang Wanli's "Spring Looking at the Second Song": "The spring light blooms all the hundred flowers and blooms to the forest and begonias." Qingjuzi City Thousand Trees Willow, high branches like a branch of yellow. "The linden mentioned here is the apple.
Xinjiang wild apples
In the Yuan Dynasty, Apple was also "called" a new name - Orangutan Pingbo. Orangutan blood is the color, and the pronunciation of Pingbo is close to that of apple. The tenth chapter of the Yuangong Zi Hundred Chapters: "Xinghe West Road is new, and the blood of the apes is flat and even." Held in the inner courtyard of the first product, a momentary proclamation and merit. "It means that the apple has been paid tribute to the Central Plains again." And because the Yuan Dynasty had a vast territory and close ties with the western region, apples were widely planted and cultivated in the interior of the motherland at this time.
The word apple really appeared in the Ming Dynasty Wanli Period's agricultural book "Qunfang Spectrum fruit spectrum", which has a special apple entry in the book, which is considered by experts to be the earliest Chinese classic to use the word "apple". At this time, the name of Lin Zhen has nothing to do with apples - "Materia Medica": "Lin Zhen, that is, the small and round ones, its categories include Golden Forest, Red Forest, Water Forest, Honey Forest, and Black Forest, all of which are named for their color and taste." "The forest tree mentioned here is the rose family of plants - pear fruit, flat spherical, 2.5-4 cm in diameter, the surface is yellow to dark red, a bit of yellow skin holes. The apex is concave and erect, with a remnant sepal that is deeply sunken at the bottom. The aroma is fragrant and slightly sweet and sour.
Similarly, the sycamore family plant Pinpo Fruit was also "restored" - according to legend, the Ming Dynasty loyal minister Hai Rui, due to a serious illness, received a basket of Apple Fruit from a friend, and took it in several times of porridge, and soon recovered. It is a delicacy that Tang Taizong entertained four Tang monks and apprentices— the phoenix eye fruit from the "acacia tree" from India. And because pingbo leaves can emit a plain aroma, it is favored by farmers in Huizhou, Guangdong, and often wraps it to give gifts to relatives and friends.
Xinjiang Ili wild apple
With Xinjiang Ili as the center, spreading to the east and west, spreading to the Western Zhou, this is the historical "apple road", although there are many "misunderstandings" on the road, but in the end it was named "apple". After leaving his hometown of Ili, apple has become a common cultivation in Liaoning, Hebei, Shanxi, Shandong, Shaanxi, Gansu, Sichuan, Yunnan and Tibet. It is suitable for growing in hillside terraces, plain mines and loess hills, etc., at an altitude of 50-2500 meters.
At present, Shaanxi is the largest apple planting area and the largest apple province with the highest yield in the mainland, with an apple planting area of 11 million mu and a quarter of China's output and one-seventh of the world's output. Shaanxi concentrated apple juice production and export volume is the first in the country, Shaanxi concentrated apple juice accounts for one-third of the world's total output, and one cup of every three cups of apple juice in the world comes from Shaanxi.
Resources:
This article refers to Shangguan News "Scientific research team confirmed that Apple originated in China, there are so many stories behind the small fruit, do you know? "2020-11-11;Ningbo Zhenhai District People's Government Network", "Li Shanxiang: The "Father of Chinese Apples" from Xiaogang" 2019-09-06; The Paper's "Father of Chinese Apples" Li Shanxiang" 2019-10-14; Zhang Xinwen Wan Zhong, "Chairman Mao's Three Mentions of "Apples in That Place in Jinzhou"" Liaoning Daily, 2016-07-29; et al. The picture is also from the Internet, thanks to the original author!
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The Apple City in Chinese history
God is the god of the creation of the universe in judaism and Christianity, and when the apple appeared in God's Garden of Eden, it was stolen and eaten by the legendary Eve and Adam, and was called the "forbidden fruit". The apple originally stood in the form of "evil" in Western mythology, and with the spread of the popular Latin translation of the Old and New Testaments, this "forbidden fruit" gradually became the fruit of wisdom that allowed human beings to distinguish between right and wrong, so that it fell on the head of Newton, who discovered the law of universal gravitation.
In this way, the apple has completed its qualitative transformation in the improved "taste" of human beings.
Today, many people think that Apple comes from the distant West, but ignore Apple's Chinese hometown, and there is also an "Apple Country" and "Apple City" in Chinese history.
Alima, meaning "apple" in Turkic; alimari means "apple forest". Alimari is not only the "apple country" and "apple city" in Chinese history, this place surrounded by fruit trees and careworthy, has been praised by Europeans as "Central Asia Paradise" and "Capital City of the Central Empire".
Yelü Chucai's Journey to the West Record Yun: "The Western People's Eye Lin Shu Is known as Ali Ma, attached to Guo Ju Lin Yuan, so it is named"; "Changchun Zhenren Journey to the West": "The native Hu Guo is Ali Ma." Gaido fruit tree, to be the name of its city. ”
Alimari Ancient City is a cultural relics protection unit of Xinjiang Autonomous Region, located in the northwest of Huocheng County, 30 kilometers away from Huocheng County.
Alimari is the first Islamic kingdom to emerge in northern Xinjiang in the early 13th century, when the Hasharube clan was founded as a city and established as a city and believed in Islam. The Khashrube is a branch of the Gelug. Gelug, also known as Grolu, Kaluk, etc., was a Turkic-speaking nomadic tribe in Central Asia from the 6th to the 13th centuries, one of the tribes of the Tiele people, located in the northwest of the North Garden, west of the Golden Mountains (present-day Altai Mountains), bordering the nose of the car.
In the Yuan Dynasty literature, Ha Shilu is also translated as Shi Lu Wu, He'er Lu, He Lu Wen, He Lu, Chu Thorn Lu, etc., some people say that they are "fearful Of Wu people" and "Hui Hui people" in the Yuan Dynasty, but this statement is unscientific, and in the 13th century, the countries in the western regions that migrated to China were "Hui people", they were not all the same ethnic group. Among them were Persians and Arabs, as well as Turkic-speaking peoples such as Arkhun and Khazaru. And among the Khitan people, there is also the saying of the Khitan thorn, a combination of thorns and begging, also called black Khitan, Khitan language has thorn, "black" meaning. Therefore, it is difficult for us today to directly link them to a certain people.
According to the New Book of Tang and the Tale of the Uighurs, the Gelulu people of the Tang Dynasty were originally distributed in the areas of Altai, Tacheng and Bortala, but after the decline of the Tuqishi Khanate centered on broken leaves in the middle of the 8th century AD, from 766 AD, the main pastoral land of the Gelulu tribe has been moved to the Ili River, Chu River, and Talas River areas, and the Gelulu Khanate has been established. Because the Northern Silk Road of the Tang Dynasty was once very prosperous.
Experts speculate that the city of Alimari was probably built in the mid-8th century.
Today, there are many differences about the specific geographical location of Alimari City, but according to historical records, the scale of Alimari City was second to none in the Western Regions at that time. It is north of the southern foothills of the Ikkan Mountains, south of Thekgan Seyi, east of Tuhuluk Maza, west of Kanawee, the circumference of the city is about 50 miles, and the East-West Avenue alone is 10 miles long. There were two huge gates, open to the east towards The Fruit Ditch and to the west towards the Khorgos Wilderness.
According to some local reports in Xinjiang, before the liberation, there were still some broken walls and ruins on the ruins of the ancient city of Alimari, and in 1964, the regiment organized tractor operators to drive bulldozers to bulldoze the land, and the current ruins were all set aside as farmland except for timur Khan Maza.
After the Tang Dynasty, Alimari passed through the rule of the Qarakhanid Dynasty and the Western Liao Dynasty. Huzaar, Ahmedhube, Muslim monarch of the Kingdom of Alimari, date of birth and death unknown. According to the "History of the Conquerors of the World", Huzao'er originally made a living by stealing horses and robbing horses, and then gathered a group of bandits to conquer Alimari and its neighboring areas, and built a castle to claim the king. So, the Kingdom of Alimari, the "Apple Country", was originally a small tribe on the steppe.
He opposed Qu Chulu (西辽乃農部陽陽肷子), and in 1211 he annexed genghis Khan of mongolia and married a jurchen woman. Later, he converted to Islam and became a devout Muslim. Around 1215, huzar was killed by qulu's soldiers while hunting, and his son Sygnahei Jin succeeded to the throne of Alimari and embraced Islam.
In 1225, Genghis Khan divided the vast lands he conquered among your four sons. Chagatai has the city of Alimari as its capital. During this period, the city of Alimari developed rapidly and became a famous city in history, known as the "Paradise of Central Asia". Yelü Chucai, Qiu Chuji, and Changde also visited here, leaving a text describing the city of Alimari at that time for people today.
Yelü Chucai said that at that time, the area around the city of Alimari "sowed five grains, just like the Central Plains."
"Changchun Zhenren Journey to the West" recorded an interesting incident, the original local residents mostly took water from bottles and carried them home. Later, when he saw that the city was using a drawer from the Central Plains to fetch water, he said approvingly: "Everything in peach blossom stone is coincidental." Peach blossom stone refers to the Han people.
In the fifth year of the Yuan Dynasty (1263), when Changde was traveling west through the Pine Tree Head Pass of Ili Guozigou, he saw that "all the guards of the pass are Han people". In the city of Alimari, "Hui hui lived with the Han people, and their customs gradually became tainted, quite similar to China.".
Through these dots and accounts, it is not difficult to see that Alimari City is a multi-ethnic city where the Han and local ethnic minorities get along well. In the phrases such as "just like the Central Plains", "Peach Blossom Stone", "quite like China", it can be seen that the cultural exchanges between the Central Plains and Alimari City at that time were very common. It is precisely in this very common cultural exchange that Alimari, the "apple country" and "apple city" in the grasslands of northern China, has achieved the development of commerce and trade and economic prosperity.
Ibn Battus, a Moroccan known as one of the four great western travelers of the Middle Ages, passed through Pharazm, Central Asia, in 1333 when he encountered a caravan from Karbala to China, who took the route through Alimari and claimed that the caravans from Western Asia to China were active at that time. Before and after the founding of New China in 1949, a large number of gold, silver and copper coins of the Chagatai Khanate unearthed in various parts of Xinjiang, as a means of circulation and medium of exchange, contained and recorded the political, economic, historical development and mutual relations between various ethnic groups at that time.
According to the History of the Mongols, the fiefdom of Chagatai at that time was in the southwest of mount Tarbahatai, west of Lake Alas, south of the Seven Rivers Valley, and even in the vast area of the river. The Persian historian Chifini, who visited Alimari three times, said in His History of the Conquest of the World: "The palace of Chagatai became the nucleus of all mankind. ”
This is clearly an exaggeration, but through it one can imagine the grandeur of the city of Alimari: faces of all colors, intricate languages, and different customs all meet at a meeting point of this Eastern and Western civilization, among them are dusty merchants, tireless missionaries, and travelers who travel all the way, and in the clamor of small merchants and vendors to solicit business, beautifully dressed western beauties and Mongolian soldiers in armor are all the streets of Alimari.
However, Kublai Khan's claim to be emperor made the Mongol nobles fight for central control and not hesitate to wage war. After decades of war, the countryside in the north and south of the Tianshan Mountains has been desolate and the people's livelihood has withered. In the end, Alimari, the "apple country" and "apple city" in China's history, disappeared into the vast sea of history. Even today, some people still sigh like this: I used to hear that the apple in Alimari was the best in Ili, and later I knew that "Alimari" meant apple. Turning over the history, I know that Alimari is an ancient apple city.
War destroyed the ancient city of Alimari civilization, today, although the ancient city of Alimari is difficult to find ancient traces, but the place name of Alimari meaning apple has been preserved, the information of the place name has been completely preserved in word of mouth, and now Ili and Alimari Township, Huocheng area there are many wild apple forests, and Almaty, the largest city in Kazakhstan, is also the meaning of "Apple City".
Guozigou, also known as Taleng ditch, a 28-kilometer-long canyon, has been an important gateway connecting the Central Plains and Central Asia and Europe since ancient times, and now the Uyi Highway between Sailim Lake, Bole and Yining still passes through Guozigou. Its name comes from the many wild apples growing in the mountains, and it is also the name of the place that accompanies the "Apple Country" and "Apple City" in Chinese history.
I remember when I was a soldier in Xinjiang in the early 1990s, it was difficult to even eat a "Fuji apple", and I often remember the long-distance drivers who were scared when they passed through Guozigou in Xinjiang. It is said that during Genghis Khan's western expedition, in order to speed up the pace of the march, Chagatai "chiseled the stone road, the wood was forty-eight bridges, and the bridge could be combined with the car" in the territory of Guozigou, chiseling through the natural danger, and finding a shortcut for the new north road of the ancient Silk Road. Today, Guozigou has erected a 56-kilometer-long flying bridge, and the graben has changed its route. But on this road, why is it not just Apple that is spreading?