One of the biggest unsolved cases of the Ming Dynasty was when Zhu Di, the King of Yan, hit Nanjing, and what happened to Emperor Jianwen. Over the years, various legends of the whereabouts of Emperor Jianwen have emerged in an endless stream, adding a lot of legendary color to this unfortunate emperor. Zheng He went to the West seven times, was he ordered to find out the whereabouts of Emperor Jianwen?
Zhu Di
The most official version is that Emperor Jianwen himself burned himself.
In that year, Emperor Jianwen's fourth uncle, Zhu Di the Prince of Yan, raised an army in Beiping on the grounds of the Qing Emperor's side, known as Jingnan. To put it bluntly, it was to seize the throne of his nephew, and after three years of fighting, he managed to conquer Nanjing and block Emperor Jianwen in the palace.
According to the Records of Emperor Taizong, when Zhu Di led the people to the Jinchuan Gate, the kings and the ministers of culture and military affairs all came to see him, and Emperor Jianwen originally wanted to come out to greet him, but when he looked around, there were only a few internal servants, and those who were "loyal" in ordinary days disappeared, and Emperor Jianwen sighed and said, "What face do I have to see him", so he closed the door, lit a fire and burned the palace, burning it to ashes.
In the year when Zhu Di seized the throne, in an edict to the king of Joseon, he falsely said that he only wanted to clean up the side of the king, and "did not expect Jianwen to force the power to rape and coerce, and the palace set himself on fire."
The records of the Yongle period and the ming history revised in the Qing Dynasty both repeat this statement, so emperor Jianwen set himself on fire and died, which has become a conclusive conclusion.
It seems that the history books clearly concluded that Emperor Jianwen set himself on fire and died on the day the city was destroyed. However, there is a sentence in the "Biography of Zheng He of the Ming Dynasty" that is contrary to this view. The book says that Emperor Cheng suspected that Emperor Hui (Emperor Jianwen) had died overseas, and wanted to trace it, and wanted to flaunt his army in a foreign land and show that China was rich and strong.
This sentence recorded in the canonical history shows from another angle that Emperor Jianwen did not die, but fled overseas, so Zhu Di sent Zheng He to the West to continue to find the whereabouts of Emperor Jianwen, but also to show off force, deter or envelop overseas countries to come to worship.
Look at the record of the "Ming Shi Gong Min Emperor Benji" - the capital fell, the palace was on fire, and the emperor did not know the end. The King of Yan sent the empress dowager's body into the fire, and yue eight days to bury it.
Here it is said that "the emperor does not know the end", in the ashes of the fire, Zhu Di only found the dead body of the empress.
The record in the "Ming Dynasty Chronicles" is even more legendary
On the day of the destruction of the city, the harem was in chaos, Emperor Jianwen was at a loss, and the Young Overseer Wang Yu told Emperor Jianwen that when your grandfather was dying, he left you an iron box and asked me to hand it over to you when you were in great trouble, and I have been secretly storing it in the Fengxian Hall. The courtiers hurriedly brought the box and opened it to see that there were three dumu, that is, the identity cards of the monks. There were also three monk's robes, a razor, ten platinum ingots, and a suicide note. The suicide note reads; "Emperor Jianwen came out of the ghost gate, and the others walked from the Shuiguan Yugou and met in the evening in the West Room of the Gods."
Emperor Jianwen sighed and said; "The Mandate of Heaven is so, what else can I say?" So Emperor Jianwen shaved his head, changed into the monk's clothes, and brought Cheng Ji, Yang Yingneng, Ye Xixian and others to the ghost gate.
The ghost gate is inside the Taiping Gate, which is a small low door on the inner level, which can only accommodate one person to enter and exit, and the outside is connected to the waterway.
Emperor Jianwen bent over and went out of the ghost gate, and the others followed, and then they saw a small boat parked on the waterway, and on the boat stood a monk, who beckoned them to board the ship and bowed to Emperor Jianwen and said long live.
Emperor Jianwen asked him; "How do you know I'm having trouble?" The monk replied; "My name is Wang Sheng, I am the optimistic abbot of God, and last night I dreamed of your grandfather Zhu Yuanzhang, who was originally a monk, and told me to wait here and take you into the temple as a monk."
From then on, Emperor Jianwen cut his hair and became a monk and inherited his ancestral inheritance.
This legend is rather strangely written, but it basically affirms the fact that Emperor Jianwen fled. The question is, is there such a secret passage in the Ming Dynasty Palace that can be used to escape?
There really is.
In 1978, there was a Nanjing steel filing factory in Taipingmen, and when it was time to dig the foundation, it dug out an abandoned tunnel. This tunnel is 2.5 meters high and two meters wide, and the location is right next to the original Ming Palace.
If the inside and outside of the palace wall were connected, Emperor Jianwen could completely escape from the palace from this tunnel.
In June 2005, a Ming Dynasty culvert was also discovered next to QingliangShan, located outside the palace walls of the former Ming Palace. Mr. Ji Shijia, who has studied this history very much, deduced from the discovery of the scene that this culvert was mainly used for drainage in the Ming Dynasty, but there was no water when it did not rain, and it could fully accommodate a person to pass.
Linked to the tunnel inside the royal palace discovered many years ago, this culvert is likely to be the exit of the tunnel. The "Ming History Examination" says so - the yin ditch in the palace, directly outside the tucheng, tall and two feet wide, foot-to-foot one person and one horse, ready for disaster to sneak out, can be described as thoughtful.
Later, some Qing dynasty people wrote a poem about this matter.
It is the siege of the city on all sides, how the tunnels can be passed from afar.
I don't know what happened to Fei Yan, but I said that the hidden dragon went here.
The missing FeiYan refers to Zhu Di, the King of Yan, and the Qianlong refers to Emperor Jianwen.
In this way, it seems that Emperor Jianwen made a golden cicada shed its shell and ran.
Where did Emperor Jianwen, who ran out of the palace, hide?
Historians say the most – monks became monks.
In the Ming Dynasty, Wang Jun's "Zhenze Chronicle" has a legendary story.
The story goes that during the orthodox years, when a royal master was out on patrol, he met an old monk and stood in the way. When he was drinking and reprimanding, he did not move, so he personally inquired about it when The Imperial Master got off the car. The old monk trembled and said that he was Emperor Jianwen.
The Imperial Master was startled and did not dare to be careless, so he invited him to the Department of Envoys. The old monk sat cross-legged and said with great enthusiasm, "I have traveled here since Shu Lidian and traveled to this place, and now that the wind and candle are in the dead of the year, I have nothing else to ask for, I just hope that the skeleton can return to the Central Plains!" ”
Yushi Dafu did not dare to specialize himself, so he reported to the imperial court and sent him to Beijing, where Ming Yingzong summoned Wu Liang, an old eunuch who had served Emperor Jianwen, to identify him.
As soon as Wu Liang showed his face, the old monk said, "Aren't you Wu Liang?" ”
Wu Liang said, "Where am I Wu Liang." ”
The old monk smiled calmly, "That year, I was eating goose in the temple and dropped a piece of goose meat on the ground, when you were lying on the ground with a teapot in your hand and picking up the goose meat with your mouth, did you forget?" How dare you say you are not Wu Liang? ”
As soon as the words fell, Wu Liang pounced, kneeling in front of the old monk and weeping.
Strangely, that night, Wu Liang returned home and hung himself silently, whether he committed suicide or killed him, which is an unexplainable mystery within a mystery. It is said that this old monk spent the last sun and moon peacefully in the palace, and was buried in Xishan, Beijing, after his death, known as the "Master of the World".
Emperor Jianwen was a monk, and there is also a basis for expert research.
Researchers such as Liu Zhicheng of the Quanzhou HaijiaoGuan found that in the two books "Zheng He, the Outstanding Navigator" written by the Taiwanese scholar Chen Shuiyuan and "Zheng He Goes to the West" written by the Japanese scholar Shangyi Qiannian, there was even a claim that Emperor Jianwen had been a monk at the Kaiyuan Temple in Quanzhou. In these two books, it is recorded that Emperor Jianwen and his entourage dressed as monks, escaped from the secret passage of the palace, and followed the Yangtze River to the Wuchang Luohan Temple.
The abbot of Luohan Temple, Monk Daxuan, was a well-known monk in the country, and he had many disciples under him, including the abbot of Quanzhou Kaiyuan Temple at that time, Monk Nianhai. After Da Xuan saw Emperor Jianwen's degree, he quickly contacted Nian Hai, the abbot of The Kaiyuan Temple in Quanzhou, and arranged for Emperor Jianwen to become a monk in Quanzhou.
The most amazing thing is the emergence of the "Jean Family Tree".
A few years ago, Mr. Jean Qingguang, an 84-year-old retired engineer at the Nanjing Cable Power Plant, published a copy of the "Family Tree of the Jean Family" compiled in 1945, which had been kept for many years. The "Genealogy of the Rang Clan" also records that Emperor Jianwen did not set himself on fire that year, but fled from Nanjing to change his name to "Rang Luan", pretending to be a monk and traveling in Yunguichuan and Huguang. Finally, he settled in Hunan and Hubei and multiplied for generations. And Mr. Rang Qingguang himself was the 15th grandson of Emperor Jianwen.
Rang Qingguang said that he still remembered that The tomb of Emperor Jianwen was located next to the pagoda behind The Hongshan Baotong Temple, and when he was a child, he often listened to the monks of the Baotong Temple talk about the specific location of the tomb of Emperor Jianwen, and the monks also guided Qingguang's ancestors to go to the shrine.
Let Qingguang say that Emperor Jianwen believed that he had abdicated the throne and renounced the country and ceded Jiangshan, so changing his name to Rang Luan meant giving up the Golden Ruan Treasure Hall.
Let the gracious light
Others asked him why it took more than 500 years after Emperor Jianwen's death to revise the family tree?
Let Qingguang say that after our ancestors were stripped of the throne, Zhu Di also looked for many ways to cut the grass and remove the roots, and the ancestors naturally did not dare to expose their identities during the Ming Dynasty. In the Qing Dynasty, it is even more impossible to say that you are a descendant of the Ming Dynasty royal family. For 600 years, the Jean clan has had to hide the identity of its ancestors, and the history of the family can only be passed on by word of mouth. Therefore, this "Genealogy of the Jean Family" can only be publicly compiled until now.
If many clues are true, then it is possible that Emperor Jianwen really did not set himself on fire that year, but escaped from the palace. Then, Zhu Di will definitely trace the whereabouts of Emperor Jianwen to the end.
Then the results of the study of Liu Zhicheng of the Quanzhou Haijiaoguan said,
After Zhu Di learned of Emperor Jianwen's escape to the Luohan Temple, he immediately sent an official named Li Ting to track down his whereabouts.
Li Ting arrived at the Luohan Temple, and after an interrogation, he learned that there were indeed two monks who had come, but they had already gone to Quanzhou. When Li Ting arrived in Quanzhou, Nian Hai had already arranged for Emperor Jianwen to take an Arab ship and go to sea from quanzhou port because the wind was too tight. Quanzhou is the starting point of the Maritime Silk Road, and was a worldwide port during the Song, Yuan and Ming dynasties, from which you can travel all over the world. It was in order to track down the whereabouts of Emperor Jianwen that Zhu Di arranged for Zheng He to go to the West seven times.
On June 15, the third year of Ming Chengzu Yongle (1405 AD), Zheng He led a team of more than 27,000 people and more than 200 huge ships, slowly sailing out of the mouth of the Yangtze River, starting the feat of seven voyages to the West in the history of continental navigation. Zheng He's fleet traveled through more than 30 countries and regions in Asia and Africa, reaching the east coast of Africa as far as possible.
Zheng He's Western Ocean Map
Did Zheng He go to the West to find Emperor Jianwen? Did Emperor Jianwen really not die out of the house?
Regardless of the truth, Zheng He's mission to the West opened the prelude to the era of world navigation and was a symbol of China's embrace of the outside world. Guided by multi-religious culture, Zheng He opened up the practice of the Maritime Silk Road in Southeast Asia and inscribed China's maritime industry on the milestones of world navigation history.
What do you think about the whereabouts of Emperor Jianwen?