1. Royalty
Liu Xiu is the ninth grandson of Liu Bang, the ancestor of the Han Dynasty, from the lineage of Liu Fa the Prince of Changsha, the son of Emperor Jing of Han, Liu Xiu's ancestors, because of the observance of the "Tui En Order" issued by Emperor Wudi of Han, the title was reduced from the prince to his father Liu Qin's generation, but it was just a county order without a title.
On the sixth day of December (January 15, 5 BC) in the first year of Jianping of the Western Han Dynasty, Liu Xiu was born in Jiyang County, Chen Liu County. Aside from the legendary portrayal of the so-called founding emperor when he was born, even if it is only about the records of his adult appearance in the official history, he is an absolutely beautiful man, "seven feet three inches in length, beautiful eyebrows, big mouth and long, different."
In the third year of the Yuan Dynasty (3 AD), Liu Xiu's father Liu Qin died in the county commandery, and Liu Xiu, who was only 9 years old, and his siblings became orphans, and their livelihood was also deprived of financial resources, and they could only be taken up and raised by his uncle Liu Liang, who was far away in Caiyang County, Nanyang County (present-day Zaoyang, Hubei).
2. The New Mang Dynasty
Since Emperor Yuan of the Han Dynasty, the Western Han dynasty has been increasingly decaying. By the time of Emperor Cheng of Han, Emperor Cheng was faint and entrusted to the mother's family, causing the Wang clan foreign qi group headed by Empress Dowager Wang Zhengjun to monopolize the power of the imperial government; At the same time, Emperor Hancheng also favored the Zhao sisters (that is, the "Huan Fei Yan thin", Zhao Feiyan and Zhao Hede sisters who could dance in the palm of a man), thus forming a situation in which "the Zhao family is chaotic inside, and the outside family is good at dynasty".
However, the 46-year-old and physically strong Emperor Hancheng suddenly died one day in Zhao Hede's bed, and he had four sons but all died in infancy, so he passed a nephew in advance and ascended the throne for the Han Dynasty Emperor.
But this nephew was not as good as his uncle, and he also died at the age of 25 due to taking aphrodisiacs and overindulgence. Therefore, Wang Mang, nephew of the Empress Dowager Wang Zhengjun, successively supported the two generations of young lords of Emperor Hanping and his son (Liu Ying), and his status also went through the "Duke of An Han" and "Emperor Regent", almost a repeat of the former Duke of Zhou and Huo Guang.
However, Wang Mang was by no means satisfied with being only the Duke of Zhou, and in the first year (8 AD), Wang Mang abolished his son as the Duke of Ding'an, officially ascended the throne on behalf of the Han Dynasty, established a new dynasty, and Jianyuan "founded the state", and the surname Liu of the Western Han Dynasty perished after 214 years of rule.
Wang Mang is a contradictory community, say that he is blindly retro, he is more modern than anyone: he implemented the state ownership of land, implemented the state monopoly system of salt and iron wine, implemented the planned economy system and loan system, and abolished slavery; He also encouraged scientific experimentation and invention: he invented vernier calipers, dissected the human body with his own hands, and strongly supported the invention of flying machines...
But if you want to say that he is a modern crossing, among the 12 new policies he has pursued, just forcibly restoring the well-field system, which was abolished a thousand years ago, has already constituted an unrealistic retro luxury, which not only touched the arrogant, but also harmed the interests of the common people, coupled with the continuous natural disasters such as water and drought, and the vast Central Plains were full of red land and sorrow.
At the same time, he changed the titles of hundreds of officials and national place names according to the ancient style (referring to the Wu Zetian period, Shangshu Province was changed to Wenchangtai, Zhongshu Province was changed to Fengge, Menxia Province was changed to Luantai, and the six departments of Gonghu Libing and Criminal Works were changed to the six palaces of Tiandi, spring, summer, autumn and winter for organizational structure name changes. These bells and whistles are happy for himself, but others are not enjoying them.
Finally, during the Xinmang Tianfeng period, dozens of large and small peasant armies such as Chimei, Green Forest, and Copper Horse rose up one after another, and a large number of powerful landlords also began to recklessly take advantage of the situation. Suddenly, the sea fell apart, and the world was in chaos.
Third, Wancheng raised troops
Liu Xiu's eldest brother Liu Shu has a bold personality, inheriting the taibao habit of his ancestor Liu Bang of eating, drinking, playing and not working, and spending a lot of money to imitate the style of raising the four princes during the Warring States period, and befriending the world's heroes (of course, the people he raised who did not have much family background were mainly hooligans, and some criminals also accepted Liu Shu's support mostly because they broke the law to escape punishment, refer to the Water Margin). Seeing that the world was in chaos, Liu Wei felt that it was time to rush in, so he teamed up with his men to raise troops in Nanyang.
The personalities and styles of Liu Xiu and the Liu Shu brothers are completely different, during the Tianfeng period of the new dynasty (14-19 AD), Liu Xiu came to Chang'an and entered the imperial academy to study, until October of the third year of the new emperor (22 AD), the 27-year-old Liu Xiu felt that the time was ripe before announcing that he would start troops from Wancheng, under the banner of "restoring the cause of the ancestors and determining the autumn of all generations".
In November, Liu Xiu's troops came to Gongling from Wancheng, and the troops of his eldest brother Liu Shu were also here, so history called the soldiers and horses of Liu Xiu's brothers the Gongling Army, but at that time there were few major generals and poor equipment, and even in the early days, Liu Xiu rode bulls into battle.
In order to strengthen the momentum and strengthen the anti-reckless force, the Gongling soldiers and the main force of the Green Forest Army united, thereby expanding their mutual strength, and successively fought fiercely with the new reckless army, and achieved many victories.
In 23 AD, Liu Xuan, the emperor of the Western Han Dynasty, was proclaimed emperor by the main generals of the Green Forest Army, and Jianyuan was "more beginning", which was for the first emperor. In this regard, Liu Wei and the Nanyang Liu clan were extremely dissatisfied, but they were forced to be in the coalition army, the Green Forest army was powerful, and there were strong enemies in front, so they had to give up for the time being. Liu Wei was made a Grand Situ by Liu Xuan, and Liu Xiu was made a general of Tai Chang Bian (太常分).
The establishment of the original regime and the reuse of the banner of the Han Dynasty greatly shocked the new dynasty, and Wang Mang immediately sent the Great Sikong Wang Yi and the Great Situ Wang Xunfa prefecture and county elite soldiers totaling 420,000 to pounce on the line of Kunyang and Wancheng, in an effort to extinguish the nascent Genshi regime in one fell swoop. At this time, the Kunyang Green Forest Army was only 9,000 men, outnumbered, Liu Xiu persuaded the generals to hold Kunyang, and he personally led 13 cavalry out of the city by night to Dingling County and Hao County to mobilize 17,000 reinforcements to help Kunyang.
After the reinforcements arrived, the Green Forest Army decided to go out of the city to fight a decisive battle, and Liu Xiu personally led more than 1,000 elites as the forward, repeatedly rushed and killed more than 1,000 people of Wang Mang's army, and the morale of the Green Forest Army was greatly boosted. Liu Xiu then rode back to the enemy's flank with 3,000 steps, smuggled across Kunshui, and launched a fierce attack on Wang Yi's base camp.
Wang Yi still underestimated the enemy, and only led more than 10,000 forwards to face the battle, but as a result, the soldiers and horses fell into trouble, and Wang Xun died in battle. Seeing the victory outside the city, the defenders of Kunyang took advantage of the situation to attack, and Wang Mang's army was in chaos, and they all took the road and fled for their lives, trampling on each other, and accumulating corpses all over the field.
The main force of the million-strong army of the new dynasty collapsed under the city of Kunyang, and the Xinmang regime collapsed. In September of the first year (23rd year), the Green Forest Army invaded Chang'an, Wang Mang died in the melee, and the new dynasty collapsed.
4. Hebei is called emperor
When Liu Xiuzheng, who had made the first contribution in the Battle of Kunyang, went south to attack the city, Liu Xiu's brother Sima Liu Shu was jealous of Emperor Gengshi and killed.
Liu Xiu's death was a great blow to Liu Xiu, but Liu Xiu had to temporarily bow to Emperor Genshi for a great event, so he forcibly endured grief, Taoguang and raised obscurity, and in order not to be suspected by Emperor Gengshi, he returned to Wancheng to apologize to Emperor Gengshi Liu Xuan.
Although Kunyang's merit was the first to recommend Liu Xiu, he was not proud of his merits, and said that his brother had committed a mistake and that he was also at fault. Moreover, the first emperor had killed Liu Xiu because he had always disobeyed the imperial power, but he was a little ashamed to see Liu Xiu so humble. Therefore, Liu Xiu was not only not convicted, but was made the Marquis of Wuxin. Soon after Liu Xiu returned to Wancheng, he married the Xinye wealthy family Qianjin Yin Lihua, whom he had longed for for many years.
However, Liu Xiu knew in his heart that even if he let Emperor Gengshi not suspect himself for a while, he might end up in the same fate as his brother Liu Shu in the future, after all, he was famous and his achievements were high.
At that time, although the Xinmang Dynasty collapsed, the prefectures and counties north of the Yellow River were all holding a wait-and-see attitude and had not been subordinate to the original regime, and the Chimei army was developing rapidly and gaining momentum in Shandong, as well as the "Three Kings of Hebei", Tongma, You Lai, Kui Yao, Gongsun Shu and other separatist forces, so appeasing Hebei became the focus of the current first regime.
At this time, there were two factions of opinion in the DPRK, with the ministers headed by Liu Ci believing that Liu Xiu was capable and prestigious, and was the best candidate to go to Hebei to appease, but the generals of the Green Forest Army, represented by Grand Sima Zhuqun, strongly opposed it. At the beginning, Liu Xuan killed Liu Wei because he listened to the advice of Zhu Qi and others, and if Liu Xiu is allowed to go to Hebei this time, his power will definitely grow uncontrollable. Just when Liu Xuan was hesitating, Feng Yi suggested that Liu Xiuzhong and the Prime Minister Cao Jing to fight for this opportunity to fly in the sky.
Finally, in October of the first year (23 AD), Emperor Liu Xuan sent Liu Xiuxing to cross the Yellow River north to comfort Hebei Prefecture. After a series of large and small battles, Liu Xiu won the Battle of Nanluan and conquered Handan. It is worth mentioning that in order to promote an alliance with Liu Yang, the king of Zhending, Liu Xiu personally went to the palace of Zhending and married Liu Yang's niece, Guo Shengtong, with grand ceremonies, less than a year before Liu Xiu married Yin Lihua in Wancheng.
Seeing that Liu Xiu was growing stronger in Hebei, and the first emperor was extremely uneasy, he sent an envoy to Hebei, made Liu Xiu the king of Xiao, ordered him to hand over his soldiers and horses, and returned to Chang'an to receive the reward, and at the same time ordered Shangshu to make Xie bow as the pastor of Youzhou to monitor Liu Xiu's movements on the spot.
Liu Xiu first refused to accept orders on the grounds that Hebei was not peaceful, and soon after Liu Xiu ordered his subordinates to kill Wu Han and other ministers sent by Emperor Gengshi such as Xie Gong, and Liu Xiu publicly broke with the Genshi regime.
At the same time, Liu Xiufa's Youzhou troops fought fiercely with the peasant armies such as Tongma and You Lai who occupied Hebei Prefecture, and after fierce battles, they forced down hundreds of thousands of Tongma peasant troops, and incorporated the strong people into the army, and their strength increased greatly, and the people in Guanzhong at that time called Liu Xiu of Hebei "Bronze Horse Emperor".
In June of the third year (25th year), Liu Xiu, who was already a "cross-state stronghold, with a million armor", was supported by the generals, and took the throne of Qianqiu Pavilion in Yancheng, Hebei Province (present-day Guchengdian Town, Baixiang County, Xingtai City, Hebei Province), and established Yuan Jianwu.
In order to express the meaning of reviving the Han dynasty, Liu Xiu still used the name of "Han" when he built the state, and the history called Later Han (after the late Tang dynasty, the Han Dynasty built by Liu Xiu was also called the Eastern Han Dynasty because the capital Luoyang was located in the east), and Liu Xiu was the ancestor of the Han dynasty, Emperor Guangwu.
5. Guangwu Zhongxing
From the first year of Jianwu to the twelfth year of Jianwu (36 AD), it took Liu Xiu twelve years after he ascended the throne to finally conquer the world, first the Green Forest Army and the Chimei armament, the Han army sat on the profit of the fisherman, and then Liu Xiu went southeast, and the use of troops in Bashu made China that had been divided and war-torn since the end of Xinmang unification again.
From the chaos at the end of the new year to the reunification of the world, the country's population was only one-tenth of the Western Han Dynasty. Liu Xiu was diligent in political affairs, firstly, he repeatedly issued edicts on the release of slaves and the prohibition of mutilation of slaves, which greatly improved the problem of a large number of peasants who had lost their land since the end of the Western Han Dynasty becoming slaves, and also solved the problem of a large amount of land being barren and underpopulated after the war. The second is to practice light taxes, frequently distribute relief grain, reduce lease and conscription, develop agricultural production, build water conservancy, remove corrupt officials and officials, and strengthen the centralization of power. Third, vigorous efforts were made to abolish officials and merge counties and counties, greatly lightening the people's burden. By the end of Liu Xiu's reign, the population had more than doubled to more than 20 million, and the economy had developed tremendously. During this period, the country was prosperous, known as the "prosperous era of Jianwu".