Royal father and son, look through the annals of history, with this sentence to describe the family relationship between the imperial family is the most appropriate, for the sake of imperial power, father and son against each other, cannibalism examples, can be described as everywhere.
During the Kangxi Dynasty, in order to seize the throne of the emperor, the princes also played a real fire, and brotherhood became an indifferent thing in the face of imperial power, and this historical event is also the famous nine sons and wives in history. The final victor of this conquest was the fourth brother Ai Xinjue Luo Yin chan, who had always been quite low-key, that is, the later Yongzheng Emperor.
The Yongzheng Emperor, who stood out from the nine brothers, did the first thing after his father, the Kangxi Emperor, died and he sat on the coveted throne, but he executed Zhao Chang, a confidant of the Kangxi Emperor for more than sixty years.
It is said that the emperor is ruthless, and Yongzheng obviously does not need any reason to kill a person, but his father is still cold, so he kills his henchmen, which is a little too hasty. And what made Yongzheng kill an old man who had been working in the imperial palace for sixty years. Is there something else behind this?
The night his father died, he killed the killer
In the 61st year of the Kangxi Dynasty, on the 13th day of the 13th lunar month in 1722 AD, the Kangxi Emperor died in Changchun Garden at the age of 69.
The once prosperous emperor, after death, was finally reduced to a handful of dust. After the death of the Kangxi Emperor, the throne passed to Yongzheng. On the night of Kangxi's death, another eunuch in Changchun Garden was forced to follow his master to the underground early, and this eunuch was the grand eunuch Zhao Chang.
Later generations even have corner historical records that record the strange events that occurred during this period.
The Qing Dynasty advocated closing the country and the people could not access the outside world, but the Qing Dynasty royal family was very curious about foreigners and foreign ideas, and there were many foreigners in the Qing court. In his memoirs, "Thirteen Years of the Qing Court: Memoirs of Ma Guoxian in China", Ma Guoxian, a missionary from Italy, recorded the unusual sights of Kangxi at the time of his death.
On the night of Kangxi's death, the missionary Ma Guoxian also happened to stay in the palace, and in the dead of night, Ma Guoxian heard a loud cry for help in Changchun Garden, and as this sound gradually turned into a scream, the last night turned into silence, and Ma Guoxian spent the night in a trembling mood.
In his memoirs, Ma Guoxian describes his feelings in four words: extremely terrifying.
At the end of this passage, Ma Guoxian wrote another sentence: The next day, he learned that the Kangxi Emperor had died, and Zhao Chang had been murdered for his crimes, confiscating his family's wealth, and his children were enslaved.
Obviously, the cries for help and screams heard by the missionaries that night belonged to the Grand Eunuch Zhao Chang.
There was a rule in the imperial palace of the Qing Dynasty, when the prince was young, there was a special person who would choose a eunuch of the same age as the emperor from the coat as a companion to read, and Zhao Chang was selected as the existence of Kangxi companion reading, although they were servants, but the friendship established from childhood also made them also a monarch and a friend.
As a playmate from childhood to adulthood and a confidant after growing up, the slain eunuch Zhao Chang had accompanied the Kangxi Emperor for nearly sixty years.
Although during the reign of Kangxi, Zhao Chang enjoyed all the glory and wealth, but when the people left, they still took tea and cold, and the Yongzheng Emperor was impatient to attack him after taking office.
In the early days of the Qing Dynasty, after the death of the emperor, the eunuchs and palace ladies who carried them were often martyred, which was very popular in the Imperial Family of the Qing Dynasty, but eunuchs with special status and status such as Zhao Chang were often not arranged to die in this way, but were continued to be reused by the next emperor and continued to serve the next emperor.
Moreover, during the Kangxi Dynasty, for the burial system of the Qing Dynasty, a Han general Zhu Fei specifically requested an end, and the Kangxi Emperor also adopted a proposal in the twelfth year of Kangxi, strictly prohibiting slaves of the following status as the Eight Banners to follow the death of their masters and be buried, which also allowed eunuchs not to worry about the death of the emperor.
However, despite this, the Yongzheng Emperor still killed Zhao Chang, and the Yongzheng Emperor even listed zhao Chang's three major crimes as the reason for his execution.
The first is that Zhao Chang installed eyeliner to monitor himself.
In ancient times, imperial power was supreme, and as the supreme emperor, if he knew that a eunuch sent someone to stare at him and observe day and night, it was inevitable that he would not have the intention to kill in his heart.
Zhao Chang stared at himself, either the meaning of the Kangxi Emperor or the meaning of other princes, no matter which point he was, he was not his own person, and he became the object of Yongzheng's killing after he ascended to the throne.
With this first crime, it was enough to sentence Zhao Chang to a great rebellion, and the crime deserved death.
The second is that Zhao Chang once made a fire sickle for Yin Rong's son, which was singled out by the Yongzheng Emperor to find fault, and thought that he had the idea of plotting against him.
Yin Rong was also the eldest son of the former Kangxi Emperor, he was the last crown prince in the History of the Qing Dynasty and China to be publicly registered, but it was a pity that a father like Kangxi was put on the table, after two abolitions, Yin Rong did not have the position of Heavenly Son, and Yongzheng stood out from the nine sons and became the emperor of the Qing Dynasty.
As for the fire sickle, it was a fire-making tool in ancient times, people used him to make fire, and Zhao Chang gave this kind of item to the emperor to play, which was originally a justifiable thing, but it was deliberately targeted by the Yongzheng Emperor and also put on a high hat of intention to rebel.
The third is the theft of treasury property. From the state treasury, Zhao Chang fished out a full fifty million taels of silver, which was also the biggest basis for Zhao Chang's death sentence.
The reason why Yongzheng later publicly executed Zhao Chang was that Zhao Chang bought and sold officials and embezzled money from the treasury, which was self-destruction and challenged the royal bottom line. Such a set of combined fists built Zhao Chang into an insatiable and self-destructive eunuch.
Why did Zhao Chang have to kill?
Although the Yongzheng Emperor gave a reasonable enough reason, and the emperor wanted to kill a person, it was already a rare and valuable idea to be willing to give an explanation, not to mention that the answer given was still reasonable, Zhao Chang's death was silent, and only the Westerners were horrified by what they saw that night, and recorded the death of this unfortunate eunuch.
However, in general, even if the former courtiers had any major mistakes, after the new emperor took the throne, he would not immediately kill him, either directly reducing him to a waste, or settling accounts after the autumn, but Zhao Chang's death was a little outrageous, and it seemed that Yongzheng was eager to erase any traces.
So, why did Zhao Chang have to kill? So much so that Yongzheng took the throne, he was not in a hurry to clean up the several princes who were opposed to him and completely sweep away the troubles, but instead arranged a "welfare" for Zhao Chang to accompany his father, the Kangxi Emperor, on the road to Huangquan.
Revisiting the reasons why the Yongzheng Emperor sentenced Zhao Chang to death, the first was to install eyeliner to monitor himself.
In ancient times, eunuchs, as eunuchs, did not have the possibility of changing dynasties and ascending to the throne, so they were also the most trusted people of the emperor, but in the final analysis, as long as the emperor trusted, it was a powerful person, and once the emperor did not trust, the eunuch was defenseless.
The Great Eunuch of the Ming Dynasty, Wei Zhongxian, was once The Wei Qianshi of the Small Population of the A-Qing Dynasty, but when he was overthrown, he was cut off by the Jiaqing Emperor in two days, because the power of the eunuch depended on the emperor's trust.
From this point of view, as long as he was not a fool, no matter how bold Zhao Chang was, he did not dare to run to spy on the prince himself, and his men did not dare to take this ridiculous order from his superiors.
Therefore, the so-called insertion of eyeliner by Zhao Chang can only be an order issued by the Kangxi Emperor, and Zhao Chang is only an executor.
The Kangxi Emperor's cultivation of his sons can be said to have reached the point of being described as "extremely harsh". What's more, the Qing Dynasty is different from the imperial inheritance of many dynasties in history, and the Qing Dynasty passed on the throne as a lixian and not a concubine.
As a result, the system of primogeniture, which had been practiced in other dynasties, no longer existed in the Qing Dynasty. Kangxi himself was the third oldest, Yong was the fourth oldest, and Qianlong was also the fourth oldest, so every prince had the possibility of standing out and taking the supreme godless throne. This system also led to infighting among the brothers, and the famous nine sons and wives of the Kangxi Dynasty broke out.
In order to investigate which of his sons was more outstanding, Zhao Chang may have been assigned the heavy responsibility of supervising the ability of the crown prince, so it was not impossible for Yongzheng to dislike it.
Therefore, Zhao Chang was killed for doing something to spy on the crown prince, and it was probably either a crime of being forcibly installed, or doing things for the Kangxi Emperor and causing the subsequent liquidation.
The second is to make a fire sickle for Yin Rong's son, this crime can only be said that the emperor is not happy with a person, and it is not difficult to find stubble to pick out the thorns. It is impossible for Zhao Chang to be killed by the yongzheng Emperor because of this dissatisfaction.
The last reason Yongzheng found was corruption and bribery, and during the Yongzheng years, the Qingming Emperor's rectification of corrupt officials did reach a fierce point.
As for the relatives of corrupt officials, if they enjoy the benefits brought by corrupt officials, once the corrupt officials are caught, they will definitely end up with a full door. Even if they are lucky enough to escape the relatives of corrupt officials a few generations away, they will be forced to the point of poverty because of corrupt officials. Yongzheng believes that the crime of corrupt officials is extremely evil, then his descendants will have to pay for the bad influence brought about by corrupt officials.
And Zhao Chang's greed just hit the muzzle of the gun, but as a former courtier, according to common sense, even if Yongzheng is not happy with it, he will not be impatient to kill the killer that night, so this is probably only a secondary reason.
There is a widely spread saying that the Kangxi Emperor's health was originally good, but Yongzheng poisoned his father in order to sit on the throne as soon as possible, in order to avoid the consequences, resulting in his father's early death, and Zhao Chang was killed by the Yongzheng Emperor precisely because he discovered this layer of royal secrets.
If this is the case, then I am afraid that Zhao Chang's death will also have to die.
Is Yongzheng really in the right place?
The reason why many people suspect that the death of the Kangxi Emperor is related to Yongzheng is that the way the Kangxi Emperor cultivated successors was similar to raising clams.
During the Kangxi Dynasty, the nine sons and daughters of the nine princes fought for the throne and broke their heads. Until the end of Kangxi's life, the throne of the crown prince was still abolished, and the princes were all crouching on the supreme throne under the kangxi emperor's ass.
The key training object that Kangxi originally chose in the last few years was the fourteenth son of the emperor, Yin Yu.
One of the several major achievements that Kangxi was proud of was the Three Expeditions to Kaldan, which defined the territory of the northwest region.
In the fifty-fourth year of the Kangxi Dynasty, the Qing government once again sent troops to the west to conquer Dzungar, and after three years, Yin Yu was even given the title of Fuyuan General, which is not difficult to see the Kangxi Emperor's high trust and recognition of this prince. After all, Yin Yu had achieved success in the war he was proud of, and it was not surprising that Kangxi felt good about it, and it was not surprising that he vigorously cultivated it.
However, when Kangxi died, among the wills he took out, it was the turn of the fourth brother Yinchen who ascended the throne. There is a historical saying that the Kangxi Emperor's testament originally wrote that the fourteen brothers Yin Yu won the world, but Yin Chan changed ten to yu characters, and this "change ten to ten" was widely circulated, and even caused controversy at one time.
However, looking through the annals of history, such a hasty edict of succession is actually not in line with the actual situation, and in the testament of the Kangxi Emperor promulgated by the Yongzheng Emperor, it is written: "The fourth son of the Yong Prince, Yin Chan, is of noble character, deeply humbled, and will be able to inherit the great unification and succeed to the throne, that is, the emperor's throne." ”
Such a special document naturally takes into account the rigor and avoids being tampered with, so if the fourth brother is on the throne, then the will must be written on the fourth son of the emperor, if the fourteenth brother is on the throne, then the will is written on the fourteenth son of the emperor.
Regarding the edict that the Yongzheng Emperor was passed on to the throne, it is still properly preserved to this day, and the text on it is also clearly visible, it is not difficult to prove that Yongzheng is indeed the emperor elected by Kangxi, so the so-called poisoning and harm can only be said to be a fictitious thing.
In fact, looking through the annals of history, Kangxi was already 69 years old when he died. In ancient times, this age was definitely a high lifespan, and Kangxi was the longest-lived of the emperors of all dynasties.
Kangxi, on the other hand, ascended to the throne at the age of eight and sat on the throne for sixty-one years. Therefore, rather than saying that Kangxi was killed, it is more likely that he died of overwork, and in kangxi's last few years, his body had already experienced many discomforts. It was precisely because of his serious physical illness that Kangxi was not able to survive the age of sixty-nine after all.
No matter what kind of psychology the Yongzheng Emperor had inflicted a hard hand on Zhao Chang, the confidant of his father, the Kangxi Emperor, as an emperor, especially in a dynasty where feudal oppression thought had reached its extreme, imperial power was Providence, and Zhao Chang's death could only be said to have died worthlessly but had to die.
The struggle for imperial power and the dirty history hidden behind this have been covered up by time, and may only be waited for future generations to excavate.
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