Aisin Kyoro Nurhachi
Aisin Gyoro Nurhachi was the first great khan of Houjin and the founder of the foundation of the Qing Empire.
His mother died early, he was abused by his stepmother, and he was rejected by his father. Although he was the son of the leader of the Jurchen tribe, he lived like no one, often going up the mountain to dig wild vegetables to eat in order to fill his stomach, and his maternal grandfather couldn't stand it, so he took him to his side and raised him.
Later, when his grandfather and father persuaded the leader of another Jurchen tribe to surrender in the process of serving the Ming Dynasty, they were mistakenly killed by the Nikan Wailan army sent by the Ming Dynasty to help. Nurhazi feared that he would also be killed, so he immediately went home to look for his younger siblings, but only found his brother Shulhazy, and the two brothers went up the mountain to hide.
The days in hiding in Tibet were not all bad things, although he was afraid every day, but he also made a lot of friends, and then the famous "five ministers" under him were basically good men made in those days.
With the support of more people, Nur Hachi had the capital to challenge the Ming Dynasty, and the Ming Dynasty also consciously took care of the loss, after all, the grandfather and father of the people they sent were helping themselves to do things, and the people they sent did not know why they killed people by mistake, so they conveyed the compensation plan through Li Chengliang, made Nur Hachi the governor of Jianzhou, gave thirteen edicts, thirty horses, and returned the remains of Nur Hachi's grandfather and father. That's it.
Although Nur Hachi hated the Ming Dynasty in his heart, his strength was too weak to shout to the Ming Dynasty, so he wrote his hatred on Nikan Wailan, went home to collect his father's relics, and only got thirteen armors, and resolutely took this bit of his own men and horses to fight against Nikan Wailan, Nikan Wailan is also a city lord, and was actually beaten by Nur Hachi so that he couldn't get up, and finally he was killed by Nur Hachi, and his own territory was occupied by Nur Hachi.
The Ming Dynasty knew that it owed Nur Hachi, so it turned a blind eye, anyway, it was a dispute within your clan, and you couldn't provoke this, so Nur Hachi used the name of revenge to launch a war against the surrounding tribes, and after five years of conquest, finally unified the Jianzhou Jurchens.
The rise of the Jurchens
Nurhachi is very good at fighting and has liked to watch "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" since he was a child, and many of his later strategies are borrowed from the classics inside. Seeing that Nur Hachi, who unified the statehood, became more and more powerful, the other Jurchen tribes were restless, so the powerful Haixi Jurchen Yehe tribe and eight other Jurchen tribes launched a general attack on Nur Hachi. At this time, Nurhachi was sleeping, and his wife woke him up and asked him how can you sleep in such an emergency? As a result, Nurhachi said that he only knew that they would attack, but did not know when they would come, so he couldn't sleep at night, but now that he knew that he was coming, I was relieved. So he turned his head and went back to sleep.
In the end, the two sides fought at Mount Gule, which is the famous "Battle of Mount Gule" in history, and Nurhachi is worthy of being a military genius, and actually defeated nine coalition forces, which is a classic battle to win more with less. After this battle, the Jurchen departments were in a slump. Nurhachi then adopted the strategy of "long-distance friendship and close attack", gradually dividing and attacking various departments. After more than 20 years of conquest, the Songhua River basin and the Jurchen tribes north of the Changbai Mountains were unified.
In the process of unifying the entire northeast of China, Nur Hachi established the famous Eight Flags system, peacetime farming, wartime charge, the army combat effectiveness is extremely strong, throughout the world at that time, Nur Hachi's Eight Flags Army is definitely the strongest cavalry team, there is a saying "Manchu people are not but 10,000, more than 10,000 is invincible in the world", which shows how famous the Eight Flags Army was at that time. In addition, Nurhachi also created the Manchu script, and the Manchus have since had their own script.
In the forty-fourth year of Wanli (1616), Nurhachi established the "Dajin" in Hetuala, later called "Houjin", established himself as a khan, established the Yuan Mandate of Heaven, and changed the Jurchen to the Manchus. At this time, Nur Hachi finally had the confidence to confront the powerful Ming Dynasty, and he took the oath to heaven, read the "Seven Great Hates" to seek the Ming Dynasty, and officially broke and confronted the Ming Dynasty.
Eight flags
With the fall of several cities in eastern Liaoning, the Mingshen Sect felt that the situation was serious, so he gathered an army of 400,000 and surrounded Nurhachi in four ways. Nur Hachi's strategy this time was very simple, that is, "let you come a few ways, I will only go all the way", led the 100,000 Eight Banner Army to strike first, took the initiative to attack, did not wait for the Ming Dynasty's four-way army to assemble, and eliminated the other side one by one. In just a few days, the Ming Dynasty's western, northern and southern roads were eliminated, and the remaining road had to retreat in a hurry, so far, the famous "Battle of Salhu" ended in Nurhach's complete victory. In this battle, the Ming Dynasty lost many generals, and the 400,000 army was almost completely destroyed, and then the Jin army gained momentum, and the contrast between the strength and weakness of the two sides was reversed. Another classic battle to win more with less.
Positive white flag
After that, Nur Hachi moved his capital to Liaoyang, sweeping the entire eastern Liaoning region, and later Jin Lian fell to more than 40 castles in western Liaoning, including Yizhou, Jinzhou, and Dalinghe. Xiong Tingbi and Wang Huazhen led the remnants of the Ming army and hundreds of thousands of displaced people to flee to Shanhaiguan. Three years later, Nurhachi moved the capital to Shenyang and changed its name to Shengjing. It is getting closer and closer to the Central Plains.
Shenyang Imperial Palace
If you eat too much hard things, you will also break your teeth, and Nur Hachi finally meets his nemesis, he is Yuan Chonghuan. In January of the eleventh year of the Mandate of Heaven (1626), Nurhachi launched the Battle of Ningyuan, which was bombarded by the Ming defender Yuan Chonghuan with Portuguese-made Hongyi cannons. Houjin dug holes, climbed ladders, smashed walls, and shot arrows exhausted all means, attacking madly day and night; Yuan Chonghuan's side also tried his best to defend, pouring oil, smashing stones, igniting fires, firing cannons, and also taking advantage of the cold weather to water the city wall at night, and the water on the city wall froze overnight to strengthen the city wall.
In short, the battle situation was extremely tragic, and after the battle, countless deaths and injuries were counted, and Nur Hachi's army could not be conquered for a long time, and finally could only retreat to Shengjing. Failing to capture Ning Yuan also became a regret in Nur Hachi's life, and he hated Yuan Chonghuan so much that he gritted his teeth, but he couldn't help him.
In mid-July of the eleventh year of the Mandate of Heaven (1626), Nurha fell naked and suffered from poison, and in early August, his illness turned critical, and on August 11, he died of illness in Longenmen Jibao (present-day Dajianbao Village, Zhai's hometown, Yuhong District, Shenyang), at the age of 68. Nurhachi was buried in Fuling, Shenyang (present-day Dongling, Shenyang), with the temple name "Taizu".
Eight flags charge
Summarizing Nurhach's life's achievements.
He spent 44 years in the horse fighting, and history said that he "used troops like a god", was an excellent military commander, and in terms of military strategy and command art, concentrated troops, broke down each one, besieged the fortifications, combined inside and outside, rode with iron, and fought quick victories, reflecting superb wisdom. In the end, he used his war wisdom to unify the Jurchen forces, flatten the eastern Liaoning region, shock the surrounding nationalities, and lay the foundation for Later Jin's future victory in the Central Plains.
The eight-banner system created by Nur Hachi, in addition to the military, also has administrative, production, judicial, and clan functions, which integrates the cohesive Jurchen people from different regions into a highly disciplined social whole, and enhances the combat effectiveness of the army, while the eight-banner system runs through the entire history of the Qing Dynasty and becomes a sharp blade for the future Qing Dynasty to achieve hegemony.
Eight flags armor
The Jurchens created Jurchen characters according to the Khitan characters during the Jin Dynasty, but because the Jurchens in the Central Plains were highly sinicized after the death of the Jin State in the Yuan Dynasty, and the Jurchens in the northeast were influenced by Mongolia, the Jurchen script was completely lost in the middle and late Ming Dynasty. During his reign, Nurhachi recreated the Manchu script, making it easier for his subordinates to communicate with each other, write official documents, record political affairs, and translate Chinese Chinese. The large number of Chinese translations also allowed Nurhachi himself and his subsequent rulers to learn a lot of experience in the history of the dynasties of the Central Plains.
The following is what some of the characters recorded in the history books have to say about Nurhach.
Li Rumei: "This thief has seven thousand elite soldiers, and three thousand with armor; This thief is 7,000, enough to be a slave of 100,000. His father was killed by his grandfather, and his congregation was only thirty, but now he is seven thousand from the gathering of people, and although ten people have invaded the territory, he reported to Liaodong for help. Although there are tartars in the northwest, they are not such thieves, and they must not be neglected. ”
Xiong Tingbi: "The slave chief can be strong and weak, treacherous and difficult to control." ”
Yuan Chonghuan: "The slave knows the soldiers, and now he has repeatedly won battles and is familiar with the use of soldiers." ”
Li Deng: "The slave chieftain is mighty and goes east, although his children will be destroyed if they commit crimes, so people are in trouble, and when they use troops, they will advance or retreat." ”
Cai Dongfan: "Wisdom is deep and courageous, and he is worthy of being the founder of the country, but it is all made of fierceness." The ancient so-called one who is born of sorrow and dies of happiness can be seen here. ”
Jin Yong: "Since Genghis Khan, the military genius Nurhachi has never appeared in the world for more than four hundred years. This god-like commander passed down a strict military system and discipline, making his soldiers invincible in the world for the next two hundred years. ”