Comrade | Guevara
In Jin Yong's classic martial arts novel Tianlong Babu, Murong Fu's ultimate ideal is the Great Yan Kingdom, which was founded by his ancestors but has been destroyed for hundreds of years. However, Murong Fu's term for the State of Great Yan was only a generic term, which actually referred to the four empires established by Murong Shi during the two Jin Dynasties with the name of "Yan", namely Former Yan, Later Yan, Western Yan and Southern Yan. Among them, Southern Yan finally withdrew from the stage of history, and its fallen monarch was the legendary last emperor Murong Chao.
01 From beggar to emperor
Murong Chao was the grandson of Murong Zhao, the Emperor of the Former Yan Dynasty, the widow of Murong Na the Prince of Beihai, the nephew of Murong Chui, the founding prince of Later Yan, and Murong De, the first emperor of Southern Yan. After the Battle of Shuishui, Murong Chui and Murong De took advantage of the chaos to march to Hebei to revive the Yan state that had previously been destroyed by Former Qin, while Murong Na and others who had not had time to escape from Guanzhong were executed by order of former Qin emperor Jian Jian. After Murong Na was killed, his wife Duan Shi, who was pregnant with Liujia, escaped from prison with the help of Murong De's old subordinate and prison official Hu Yanping, and gave birth to Murong Chao shortly after fleeing to Qiangdi.
Murong Chao lived and pretended to be a beggar for a long time
When Murong Chao was ten years old, his grandmother Gongsun Shi died of illness, and before he died, he handed the golden sword left by Murong De to his grandson, and told him to take the golden sword with him to recognize his uncle once the situation improved. Although Murong Chao did not know where his uncle was, he still responded with tears. Soon, Hu Yanping took Murong Chao's mother and son to Houliang, and when Houliang was destroyed by the Later Qin emperor Yao Xing, Murong Chao's mother and son moved to Chang'an. During his stay in Chang'an, Murong Chao, fearing that his identity would be exposed, went crazy and sold fools in the streets and spent all day hanging out with a bunch of beggars, thus avoiding the opportunity to kill people.
Murong De declared himself empress dowager, sent people to inquire about his family, and once the true identity of the other party was confirmed, emissaries tried to take them to the capital Guanggu (廣固, in modern Qingzhou, Shandong). After searching for a long time, the emissaries finally found Murong Chao in the beggar pile and persuaded him to follow him and flee from Chang'an. Murong Chao was afraid that the news would be revealed, and he did not even tell his mother and wife, so he followed the emissaries to the east. In April of the first year of the Eastern Jin Dynasty (405), Murong Chao arrived in Guanggu, showed Murong De a golden sword and told him all of his grandmother's last words, and the uncles and nephews inevitably had to cry with headaches.
Because Murong De had no sons, he made Murong Chao crown prince
In that year, Murong Na was killed along with several nephews stranded in Guanzhong, and Murong De never had any heirs after that, so Murong Chao became his only relative. At this time, Murong De was old and sick, and he knew that there were not many days to come, so for the sake of Jiangshan Sheji, he could only make Murong Chao the crown prince. Coincidentally, Murong De died in the same month as crown prince, and Murong Chao immediately succeeded to the throne in August of the same year. Soon, in order to curry favor with Southern Yan, Later Qin sent Murong Chao's mother and wife to Guanggu together, and the family was reunited again.
02 Perverse
The Southern Yan state was small and widowed, and the situation could be described as very critical in the "gap" between the two major regimes of the Northern Wei and Eastern Jin Dynasties. Therefore, during Murong De's reign, he exerted great efforts to establish iron smelting and salt officials in the territory, and implemented the policy of gathering displaced people and rewarding cultivation and weaving in order to restore production, increase taxes, and accumulate materials. At the same time, Murong De also ordered the training of troops, the cultivation of weapons, and the recruitment of a large number of Eastern Jin generals for his own use. All this has made the national strength of Southern Yan continue to increase, and the situation has become increasingly stable.
Southern Yan confronts other regimes
It is no exaggeration to say that if Murong Chao could continue to follow his uncle's policy, even if Southern Yan could not destroy the Eastern Jin and Northern Wei, at least it would not be a problem to ensure survival, but the performance of this jun disappointed the people of the country. Originally, after Murong Chao came to power, he blindly indulged in hunting and wine, and built a palace on a large scale, doing his utmost in luxury. To this end, Murong Chao increased his tyranny on the people, even to the point of knocking out the marrow of the bone, which caused the people to complain and make the southern Yan's national power change from prosperity to decline.
Murong Chao did not make a great contribution to the empire before ascending to the throne, so it was difficult to make the imperial family or meritorious people willingly submit. In this regard, Murong Chao adopted the strategy of killing Li Wei, but whenever the imperial family or meritorious person had a slight transgression, he wantonly insulted or even killed them, so that the hearts of the people at the imperial court were in danger. At the same time, Murong Chao also favored the fifth floor of Gongsun Anderson, using him to spy on and frame the imperial family or heroes. Under the administration of this pair of tyrannical monarchs, the political corruption of Southern Yan can be imagined.
Murong Chao caused the Southern Yan disaster to the end
It is precisely because the Southern Yan state is small and sparse, so when dealing with major powers such as the Eastern Jin Dynasty and the Northern Wei Dynasty, it should try to adopt a low posture of "valuing peace" and avoid providing them with an excuse to attack, but Murong Chao did the opposite. It turned out that Murong Chao often sent troops to attack the counties of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, and plundered and captured the local people as slaves, which made Jiangnan resentful. Due to Sun En's rebellion and Huan Xuan's rebellion, the Eastern Jin Dynasty had no time to attack Southern Yan, but after the general Liu Yu eliminated Sun En and Huan Xuan successively and stabilized the domestic situation, Murong Chao's "good days" were coming to an end.
03 Annihilation of the nation
In April of the fifth year of Yixi (409), Liu Yu personally led an army of 150,000 to the Northern Expedition to Southern Yan. In the face of the raging Jin army, Gongsun Fifth Floor proposed three countermeasures to Murong Chao: Shang Strategy, holding the Natural Danger of Da Da Tian, sneaking up on the Jin army from behind, cutting off the enemy's military food supply, thus crushing the opponent; Zhongce, ordering the defenders to hold on to the danger and clear the field, and dragging down the opponent with a protracted battle; and the lower strategy, letting the Jin army pass through Da Da Nang, and then fighting a decisive battle outside Guanggu City (Note: Da Da Is Mu Ling Guan, in present-day southeast of Linqi County, Shandong Province).
Map of the situation in which Liu Yu destroyed Southern Yan
Realistically speaking, the upper and middle strategies of gongsun fifth floor were all good strategies, and if Murong Chao could adopt them, it would make the Jin army suffer a lot. However, the brave and belligerent genes of the Xianbei tribe flowing in his blood made Murong Chao ashamed of the turtle defense, and instead preferred to fight with his opponents in a bright and upright battle. Therefore, Murong Chao did not send a single soldier to Da Dan, but let Liu Yu pass through the pass and meet the enemy at Linqu. However, once the Jin army crossed the sky, it pounced on Linqu like a fierce tiger descending the mountain, and Murong Chao was defeated in successive battles, and could only flee back to Guanggu in a panic.
After Murong Chao saw Liu Yu's performance of using soldiers like gods, his arrogance and arrogance suddenly turned into fear and cringe, and in order to save his life, he sent envoys to the Jin army to seek peace, but Liu Yu strongly refused. In desperation, Murong Chao had no choice but to ask Later Qin for help, but at this time, the Qin army was being "hanged" by Helian Bobo, the lord of the Hu Xia state, in Guanzhong, and he still had no time to take care of himself, where could he send troops to rescue Southern Yan? Therefore, Murong De could only sit in the city of sorrow, and the only thing that could be pinned on high hopes was an unpredictable fate.
Murong Chao was eventually beheaded with thousands of his relatives
However, Murong Chao did not expect the favor of fate in the end, and Guanggu City was finally lost after nearly half a year of siege, and Murong Chao was captured without success in breaking through. However, Murong Chao was also a Hanzi before his death, and in the face of Liu Yu's intimidation, he had no intention of crying and begging, and the only thing he said was to ask Liu Jingxuan to help him take care of his old mother (Note: Liu Jingxuan was Liu Yu's general, and Huan Xuan had surrendered to Southern Yan during the rebellion). Soon, the 26-year-old Murong Chong, along with thousands of his relatives, was taken to Jiankang at the same time, and then beheaded in the downtown area for public display, and Southern Yan perished.
bibliography
Fang Xuanling (Tang): Book of Jin, Zhonghua Bookstore, 1974.
Cui Hong (Northern Wei): Spring and Autumn of the Sixteen Kingdoms, The Commercial Press, 1937.
Sima Guang (Northern Song Dynasty): Zizhi Tongjian, Zhonghua Bookstore, 2015.