With Sima Yi's sly laugh, he left this chaotic era that had lasted for 73 years forever.
After successfully launching the "Gao Pingling Change", Sima Yi, who was sophisticated and calculating, must have anticipated the future direction.
Yes, everything was as he expected, and the Sima family became the biggest winner of the Three Kingdoms. After successively eliminating Shu Han, Eastern Wu, and, of course, Sima Yan's "persecution of Zen Rang", the Sima family completed the great cause of unification.
However, even so, Sima Yi must not have expected that among his 15 descendant emperors, only 1 was capable, and the remaining 14 were all waste!
From "Yi" to "Yan"
As early as after the vigorous "Gaopingling Incident" in Luoyang, many things were clear, but Sima Yi was 71 years old at this time.
Of course, Sima Yi knew that it would be meaningless to go further at this time, and he did not want to bear the stigma of history. Therefore, in the end, he kept the bottom line and kept his original promise - "forever for Wei Chen".
As for what the children want to do in the future, it's up to them!
After the death of the eldest son Sima Shi due to an eye disease, the second son Sima Zhao gradually showed his ambition, so much so that an idiom was later derived called "Sima Zhao's heart, known to passers-by".
But although Sima Zhao was really only one step away, although he was more ambitious than his father Sima Yi, he did not live as long as his father. In 265, the eighth lunar month of the year after Cao Wei destroyed the Shu Han dynasty, Sima Zhao, 55, died of illness in Luoyang.
Before Sima Zhao's death, there were two choices before him regarding the matter of "Li Chu": one was Sima Yan, and the other was Sima Yan's younger brother Sima Yu.
It stands to reason that his younger brother Sima Yufang is the best candidate. Sima Yu was not only very filial to his father Sima Zhao, but he was also talented and gentle.
But the reason why Sima Yan finally won was actually "arm span".
According to the Book of Jin and the Zizhi Tongjian, when Sima Yan was standing, if he dropped his arms naturally vertically, his arms could exceed his knees. In addition to the length of his hands, Sima Yan's hair is also particularly long, and if his hair is not tied when standing, he can drag it to the ground.
In the eyes of our modern people, this is simply as strange as the "gibbon man", I am afraid that it will only be seen in basketball players who are more than 2 meters tall, but to be placed in feudal superstitious ancient times, everyone will begin to "divine".
For example, a famous minister at that time, Pei Xiu, exclaimed that Sima Yan "had a different phase" after seeing it, and he was destined to be extraordinary in this life, so he returned to him.
Soon, several other ministers also began to secretly support and help Sima Yan, until Sima Zhao threw the question of establishing a reserve to the ministers, and the ministers all expressed their support for Sima Yan.
In this way, Sima Yan succeeded Sima Zhao to the position of Xiangguo after his death. This year, he was only 30 years old, and at this time, the Cao Wei regime was already in the hands of the Sima family, and the emperor was completely reduced to a puppet.
Without a doubt, the best time has finally come.
In 266 AD, the twelfth lunar month, Sima Yan forced the Wei Yuan emperor Cao Huanchan to cede the throne, and Sima Yan officially declared himself emperor, and the name of the country was "Jin", and the history was called the Western Jin Dynasty.
Perhaps in the eyes of many fans of the Three Kingdoms, this is not a glorious thing, but at least from the perspective of the Sima family, Sima Yan finally did an extremely tough and productive thing.
From the 71-year-old Sima Yi launching the "Gaoping Tomb Change", to the eldest son Sima Shi died early due to eye disease, to the second son Sima Zhao, who everyone knew his ambition, helplessly died at the age of 55, finally, in Sima Yan's generation, he realized the dreams of these people!
That is: to achieve a real replacement of Cao Wei!
Just let the Sima family put an end to all this
Although the Sima family had long held the power of the dynasty, and the Zen Rang matter seemed natural, when Sima Yan really took that step, the clan and ministers still felt a lot of impact. Their main concern is their own safety and future.
Of course, Sima Yan knew what they were thinking, and in order to reassure them, he sealed more than five hundred princes and nearly 60 kings. For those officials who were originally in Shu Han, they also continued to appoint and trust.
At the same time, Sima Yan made innovations on the basis of inheriting most of Cao Wei's systems. For example, the "household adjustment" economic system was formulated, and the "tuntian system" was abolished, which made the socio-economic level and the quality of life of the people flourish day by day, and gradually formed a prosperous image.
However, Sima Yan's series of measures is only paving the way for one thing, that is, to destroy Eastern Wu and unify China!
On the Eastern Wu side, on the other hand, the state of Wu was in shambles under Sun Hao's brutal rule, and in fact, many Eastern Wu generals had come to join Sima Yan over the years.
In 279 AD, the Jin state destroyed Wu and Eastern Wu perished. Since then, the era of the Three Kingdoms has completely come to an end. This also means that since the Qin Dynasty and the Han Dynasty, the Jin Dynasty of the Sima family has once again unified the whole of China.
Who would have thought that the peak would fall
When later generations talk about several great unifications in Chinese history, few people will include the Jin Dynasty. In a strict sense, the Jin Dynasty was also a great unified dynasty.
The reason behind this is that the "gold content" of the unification of the Jin Dynasty is too low. Not long before the Jin Dynasty was unified, it fell into civil strife again, which began to talk about the other 14 incompetent emperors besides Sima Yan.
However, the matter of civil unrest is still related to Sima Yan.
As we said earlier, Sima Yan was particularly generous, and liked to "seal people", sealing all the relatives of his Sima family, inside and out, and sealing a total of 57 kings. Even if the name is sealed, give them back the land, forget about the land, and return it to their soldiers.
In other words, the Jin state retreated to the division system, as it did during the Spring and Autumn Warring States period. The reason why Sima Yan did this was mainly because he was weak-hearted, after all, he had won the throne by usurping the throne, so only by giving those powerful people the greatest power and wealth would they recognize themselves.
After such an "operation", all the clans of the Sima family did recognize the "rationality" of Sima Yan, the emperor, but this also laid the seeds for what happened later.
After Sima Yan's death, the Jin state gradually became chaotic, in short, the Sima family's own people, in order to become emperors, fought each other, which is known in history as the "Rebellion of the Eight Kings".
Throughout the era of unification in Chinese history, there have actually been similar uprisings of clan kings, the most famous being the "San Francisco Rebellion" during the Qing Dynasty.
But all capable emperors can finally quell the rebellion, such as the Kangxi Emperor of Pingsanfan, and Sima Yan's successor, Sima Xin, compared with Kangxi, it is definitely 108,000 li worse, maybe more.
Speaking of Sima Zhi, it is estimated that friends who are familiar with the history of the Jin Dynasty know that his synonym is "idiot emperor", and his IQ is lower than that of ordinary people, and some people even think that Sima Zhi is "mentally retarded" at the medical level.
Regardless of whether he is mentally retarded or not, in short, from his various words and deeds, it can be seen that his thinking and logic are extremely naïve.
For example, once he heard a frog in a pond calling, and felt that the frog did not respect him, so he asked the minister: "Is this frog public or private?" ”
Another example is a famine and the people have nothing to eat. The minister came to report and asked the emperor to decide, and Sima Cheng asked rhetorically: "If there is no food, then don't you just go and eat meat?" ”
Note that this is not humor, because Sima Xin did not give any solution in the end, and "go eat meat" is his solution.
Seeing such a stupid emperor, some people were helpless, some people laughed, and some people were ambitious, talking about his wife Jia Nanfeng.
Relying on her own means, Jia Nanfeng gained Sima Xin's trust, and gradually gained more and more power, and enjoyed the pleasure of being in power, and finally she directly formed a dictatorship in the palace. She forged edicts, persecuted the empress dowager, and killed the prime minister, and Sima Xin had become a puppet.
The occurrence of this series of major events made the lords of the Sima family unable to sit still-how could the power of the Sima family be at the mercy of a woman?
In fact, the clan kings have long wanted to replace the "idiot emperor", but they can't find an excuse, no, the time has come.
The Rebellion of the Eight Kings began here.
It is worth noting that during this period, the Xiongnu and other peoples also rebelled.
"Deep Sinicization" of the Huns
The final result of the Rebellion of the Eight Kings was that Sima Xin was imprisoned until his death, and Sima Ji was made emperor by Sima Yue as Emperor Huai of Jin, and changed his name to "Yongjia".
At this time, it was 307 AD. Just over two years ago, Liu Yuan founded his own state in Zuoguocheng (present-day Shanxian County, Shanxi).
Don't look at the fact that "Liu Yuan" sounds like a Han name, but he is actually a Xiongnu, to be precise, a "deeply sinicized" Xiongnu. At that time, many of the Xiongnu nobles were like him, who grew up in Luoyang and wore Hanfu and wrote Chinese characters since he was a child.
Liu Yuan knew in his heart that with his so-called "Rong Di" lineage and identity, it was impossible to have appeal, so he thought of a way and declared to the outside world: "Back then, Han Taizu (Liu Bang) married Princess Liu to our Xiongnu and relatives, and my surname was Liu, so I am the descendant of Princess Dahan!" ”
Liu Yuan chased after the two Han Dynasties and the Twenty-Four Emperors, and then pursued Liu Bei and Liu Chan as the first emperors, shouting every day and vowing to "support the Han Dynasty". In this way, everyone believed in the identity of his Han family, and Liu Yuan was supported by many Han and Xiongnu people, and the Han kingdom gradually grew.
However, at this time, Liu Yuan was already 53 years old, and until his death at the age of 59, the Han state failed to capture Luoyang.
Liu Yuan's ideal was realized in his son Liu Cong's generation. The following year, Liu Cong attacked Luoyang and captured Sima Chi, the emperor of Jinhuai, who eventually escaped being killed.
Five years later, Liu Cong captured Chang'an and captured and killed Sima Ye, the emperor of Jin, who was just 18 years old when he died.
Although Sima Ye had united many forces to resist the attack of the Xiongnu Han Kingdom before his death, he was born in this "Yongjia chaotic era", and the demise of the Western Jin Dynasty was already a foregone conclusion.
The fate of the 11 Eastern Jin emperors
After the fall of Chang'an, the Jin imperial family was forced to move south, and Sima Rui became emperor to continue the Jin dynasty's life, a period known in history as the "Eastern Jin Dynasty".
After Sima Rui took the throne, power fell into the hands of outsiders, namely the ministers Wang Dao and Wang Dun, and finally Wang Dun did not pretend, directly rebelled, and with the secret help of Wang Dao, attacked Jiankang, the capital of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, and Sima Rui died of indignation.
Seeing this, have you found a common point among these Jin emperors, that is, they do not have the ability to hold power firmly in their own hands, such as the "idiot emperor" Sima Xin's imperial power fell into the hands of his wife, or this Sima Rui.
So what was the fate of the next few Jin emperors? Let's move on.
The next few emperors of the Jin Dynasty did not repeat the mistakes of great power, such as Sima Shao after Sima Rui, Wen Tao Wuluo, did things decisively, and quelled the Wang Dun Rebellion, but he, like the subsequent emperors, had a fatal flaw, yes, that is, his life was not long.
Like Sima Shao, who died at the age of 27; Sima Yan, who died at the age of 22; Sima Yue, died at the age of 23; Sima Dan died at the age of 19.
When Sima Pi succeeded to the throne, probably afraid that he would be as short-lived as previous emperors, he ran to the Taoist priest to learn the method of immortality, and then began to break the valley, alchemy pills and take medicine, but finally the medicine became great and was poisoned alive at the age of 25.
Since Sima Pi had no heirs, the Empress Dowager ordered that Sima Yi succeed to the throne.
Sima Yi finally fought and did not die young, but the old problems of the Jin Dynasty came again, and the imperial power fell again, this time, into the hands of the minister Huan Wen.
Huan Wenquan threw himself into the opposition, covering the sky with one hand, so much so that he later directly abolished Sima Yi, the emperor, and installed Sima Yu as emperor.
Sima Yu was really unwilling to be a puppet, but he had no choice, and finally died of indignation only 8 months after taking the throne.
Sima Yu died, and Huan Wen had to become emperor again, this time it was Sima Yao's turn.
After Huan Wen's death and his own growth, Sima Yao broke through the pattern of gate politics since the founding of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, and returned imperial power to the hands of the Sima family.
But the good times did not last long, and this kid did ridiculous things again.
First of all, he became proud and arrogant and addicted to pleasure, and then once joked with the pet Ji Zhang Guiren after drinking, saying that he would abolish the other party, but he didn't expect that this nobleman was a ruthless character, and in a fit of anger, let the henchman Palace people cover the sleeping Sima Yao alive with a quilt...
By the time Sima Dezong, the 10th emperor of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, came to power, the Jin state was already in chaos, and the country's situation was declining. Sima Dezong was soon strangled to death by the powerful minister Liu Yu, who made his brother Sima Dewen emperor.
Liu Yu is more ambitious than the previous Huan Wen, and his ambition can be described as "known to passers-by". Whether it is Sima Dezong or Sima Dewen, it is really very similar to Cao Xian and Cao Huan in the late Cao Wei period.
And next, what Liu Yu is about to do is very simple, it is to do what Sima Yan did back then.
In 420, the sixth month of the lunar calendar, Liu Yu surrendered the title of Sima Dewen, and the Eastern Jin Dynasty declared its demise. Liu Yu called the empire established, changed the name of the country to "Song", and the history called the "Liu Song" regime, and China also entered the era of the Southern and Northern Dynasties.
I can't help but sigh, history is really a reincarnation!
An important dynasty that inherits the past and the future
If you use one word to summarize this history of the Jin Dynasty, there is no doubt that it is - chaos.
Throughout Chinese history, there has really been no dynasty as chaotic as the Jin Dynasty.
Of course, this has a lot to do with the weakness and incompetence of the emperors of the Jin Dynasty, and it can also be said that it is the result of the heroes of that era.
For example, during the "Five Hu Chaohua" period, the five Hu tribes of the Xiongnu, Xianbei, Qiang, Qiang, and Di not only overthrew the Western Jin Dynasty, but also established their own regime. Although this is a shameful thing for the Han people, if we look at it from another perspective, it also promotes national integration and common development.
In addition, in the field of thought, Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism have begun to show signs of integration. In literature and art, people like Tao Yuanming and Wang Xizhi have also emerged.
Therefore, the Jin Dynasty can be said to play an important role in carrying forward the past and enlightening the future.