In "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", there is an exaggerated description of the strength of the troops, Yuan Shao's battle of Guandu gathered an army of 700,000, Liu Beifa Wu also sent an army of 700,000, Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition was often 300,000 or 400,000, and the Battle of Cao Cao Chibi gathered a staggering 830,000. This is a clear misunderstanding of the size of the populations of the three countries. The real population of the three countries was at the trough of the Middle Ages, and it could not support such a large number of troops. So, the population of the three countries counted in the historical records must be accurate?
Liu Jibian painted "Three British Battles Lü Bu"
A total population of only 8 million?
The population of the Three Kingdoms was known for its unusually small population throughout the dynasties. According to records such as the "Records of the Three Kingdoms" and the "Book of Jin", at the time of the fall of the Shu Han Dynasty (263), there were 280,000 households, 940,000 mouths, 102,000 troops, 40,000 officials, and a total of about 1.082 million troops and officials were added to the hukou. At the time of Sun Wu's demise (280), there were 523,000 households, 2.3 million mouths, 32,000 officials, 230,000 troops, and 5,000 harems, totaling about 2.567 million people. Together with Cao Wei's 4.43 million people, the total is about 8.07 million. Of course, this is not the most authoritative calculation method, some researchers believe that the number of armies and the number of officials and harems of each country are themselves included in the total number, so the "General Codex" compiled by Du You of the Tang Dynasty recorded the population of the three countries as 7672881 people.
What calculation method is adopted has little impact on the total population of the three countries, even 8 million people, it is a shocking trough in the ancient Chinese population history. From the Qin and Han dynasties to the Tang dynasty, the population of the most prosperous dynasties was about the same, with a population of 12.23 million households and 59.59 million people in the second year of the Ping Emperor of the Western Han Dynasty (2 AD). The peak population of the Eastern Han Dynasty occurred in the third year of Emperor Huan's eternal life (157), totaling about 56.48 million people. There were about 46.01 million people under Emperor Jiao of Sui and 52.91 million under Emperor Xuanzong of Tang. The total population exceeded 60 million until the twenty-sixth year of Ming Taizu Hongwu (1393), and the registered household registration reached 60.69 million. Of course, there are also some researchers who say that during the Huizong period of the Northern Song Dynasty, plus the Jin Kingdom in the north, the Western Xia in the northwest, and Tubo, Uighur, Dali and other places, the total population is estimated to exceed 100 million, but because there is no detailed and reliable data to support it, we will not talk about it. According to the range of fluctuations in the peak population before the Tang Dynasty, we can roughly assume that under the condition that there is no major improvement in the level of productivity between the two Han Dynasties and the Sui Dynasty, the size of the population that can be supported by the ancient agricultural production level will not change much, and the peak should be 50 or 60 million. The population of the three kingdoms has decreased by 85% compared with the peak of the Eastern Han Dynasty, and if this figure is true, it will be a human catastrophe.
On the basis of such a small population, it is absolutely impossible for the armies of the Three Kingdoms to be 700,000 or 800,000 at every turn, Cao Cao's strength in the Battle of Chibi is only about 200,000, and the maximum value of Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition will not exceed 100,000. "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" is just an artistic exaggeration. The powerful people everywhere attach great importance to the increasingly scarce human resources, and while fighting wars and plundering resources, plundering the population of enemy countries and hostile forces has become an important content. For example, in the process of starting a business, Sun Quan attacked Lujiang Taishou Li Shu in the city of Anhui, and after breaking the city, he "moved 30,000 people", beat Huangzu and broke Jiangxia County, and fought twice, plundering tens of thousands of people each time and returning it. Before the Battle of Chibi, Cao Cao pursued Liu Bei, and the classic scene described by the speech Liu Xuande and the people crossing the river, it is difficult to explain Liu Bei's motives from the perspective of benevolence and righteousness, and it is too far-fetched to talk about benevolence and righteousness in the face of an urgent existential crisis. Liu Bei fled south with a large number of people, but in order to control a certain population. Later, Liu Bei successfully established a business in Xichuan and competed with Cao Cao for Hanzhong, but the situation was reversed, Cao Cao was defeated, and Cao lost the city of Hanzhong, but all the people of Hanzhong were moved. Zhuge Liang's first Northern Expedition to Cao Wei, Jieting lost and retired, and in a panic, he still did not forget to bring all the people of more than 1,000 families in Xixian to Hanzhong, more than 5,000 people, Zhuge Liang was not willing to give up, which shows the importance attached to human resources. We cannot ignore that some warlords will carry out the slaughter of cities with extermination of humanity, such as Cao Cao who took revenge on his father and attacked Xuzhou, killing five counties uninhabited, but it should be the consensus of all powerful people to attach importance to population and compete for human resources.
Second, there are problems with statistical methods
Why is there such a drastic decline in the population? From the chaos of the Eastern Han Dynasty to the formation of the confrontation between the Three Kingdoms, there has been an extremely chaotic situation in the middle, and its intensity is not comparable to that of several eras. The main reason is that after the complete loss of the authority of the Eastern Han Emperor, there were powerful factions in almost all geographical units based on prefectures, such as Cao Cao of Qianjun, Yuan Shao of Hebei, Liu Biao of Jingzhou, Yuan Shu of Jianghuai, Sun Ce of Jiangdong, Zhang Xiu of Nanyang, Zhang Lu of Hanzhong, Liu Zhang of Yizhou, Gongsun Kang of Liaodong, Tao Qian of Xuzhou, Ma Teng of Longxi, Shixie of Jiaozhou, and so on. Such a degree of chaos, the Sixteen Kingdoms of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, the Five Dynasties and the Ten Kingdoms cannot be compared with it, at least the Eastern Jin Dynasty in the south is complete during the Sixteen Kingdoms period, and the Central Plains of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms are also relatively complete, and there is no high chaotic situation in which the late Han Dynasty fought against each other in the prefectures.
However, it seems that it is not enough to explain the mass disappearance of the population by turmoil, after all, the warlords will not kill to the end with humanity, and will rule and manage the people under their rule normally. After the unification of the Western Jin Dynasty, the population doubled almost overnight to more than 16 million people during the Taikang period, which is simply a myth based on the natural growth rate. The brief unification of the Western Jin Dynasty was only about thirty years, and immediately the Rebellion of the Eight Kings and the southern crossing of Yongjia broke out, and the Five Hu and Sixteen Kingdoms appeared in the north, and an incredibly strange situation appeared, and the Murong clan Former Yan Kingdom carried out large households in Hebei, Shandong, Henan and other places, and actually counted a population of nearly 10 million. Former Yan ruled only half the territory of Cao Wei, and the population was actually larger than the entire Three Kingdoms. Obviously, the turmoil caused losses to the population of the late Han Dynasty, but there must be a reason for such a bizarre trough, not a large number of deaths.
In addition to the direct population losses caused by war and famine, a considerable part of the population decline in the three countries is due to book factors, namely statistical methods and statistical degrees. As we all know, before the real realization of apportionment into mu during the Yongzheng period of the Qing Dynasty, the statistical population of any dynasty in ancient China was lower than the actual population, which was driven by interests, and the poor and helpless people hid under the rich and powerful families, only providing profits for the landlords, and the landlords would naturally spare no effort to make them "disappear" in the state hukou. Especially in troubled times, armed with hoeed farmers is the capital that can cut the land and self-pride, Emperor Xian of Han once ordered Xuzhou Tao Qian to disband the tribe servants, but Tao Qian always refused, he relied on Xuzhou to divide Xuzhou is his tens of thousands of people.
The decline in the population of the three countries is largely due to the concealment of hukou. The so-called hukou concealment means that the people who should have been included in the unified household registration of the state are transferred to the names of powerful people, noble officials, and large landowners, who are controlled and managed by them, and no longer bear taxes and conscription to the state. Cao Wei's general Li Dian's clan tribe has more than 3,000 families, Cao Ren, Cao Hong, Xu Yu, Yan Rou, Tian Zhuo, etc. have many private soldiers, Shu Han Milan has 10,000 servants, Eastern Wu Haoqiang has more amazing parts, Zhou Yu, Lu Su, Lu Xun are all powerful people with a large number of parts, Wei general Deng Ai analyzed the situation in Eastern Wu and said: "Wu Ming clans, all have tribu, blocking the situation of the army, enough to build a life." "Eastern Jin Dynasty Ge Hong's "Holding Puzi" Yiyun: "Servants become an army, closed doors for the city, cattle and sheep cover the original limit, and the field pond is clothed for thousands of miles." "The private armed and material forces possessed by Hao Qiang are already strong enough to threaten Lord Wu's rule.
The monarchs of the Three Kingdoms did not want to liberate these common people who were hidden in the hands of the powerful family, but Cao Cao, Liu Bei, and Sun Quan themselves started by this, and they could not and did not dare to offend the powerful too much, and could only have limited struggle and limited liberation of some hukou, Wei and Shu did relatively well, and Sun Wu has been unable to effectively solve the problem of tribute, so Deng Ai has the so-called "enough to build a life" language. This is not only a problem in the Three Kingdoms era, most of the successive dynasties have implemented the poll tax, as long as the tax is taxed according to the person, there will always be people who exploit loopholes to hide the household registration, but the world is peaceful, the imperial court taxes less when the hidden household registration is less, the world chaos, the pressure of harsh taxes and miscellaneous taxes hide more.
In addition, the three countries also implemented the tuntian system, as well as the household registration management system with the characteristics of the times, such as parallel military households and official households, which stole a large number of people from the regular household of the state. For example, under the tuntian system, Wei Shu and Wu once organized large-scale tuntian settlements, in which peasants who had been exiled or landless were organized into certain production organizations and allocated to abandoned fields for cultivation. The imperial court sent officials under the jurisdiction, that is, the so-called canon officials, tuntian du lieutenants, etc., and the tuntian income was divided according to 64 or 55 (in the later period, it was serious to the official eight people and two), and the displaced people did not have to bear taxes and conscription, as long as the exploitation was not particularly heavy, it could continue to be maintained, so this system could exist for a long time. The peasants in Tuntian are not included in the national household organization, and the population cannot be underestimated, which has a great impact on the total population statistics of the country. After the reunification of the Western Jin Dynasty, it was ordered to abolish the tuntian, and all the tuntian organizations were incorporated into the county where they were located, and the tuntian people were converted into regular household Qi people, and the hukou suddenly skyrocketed, which is the reason. But no matter how many factors there are, the population of the Three Kingdoms has plummeted by 85% compared to the time of Emperor Huan of Han, which is too large to believe. Moreover, three countries confront each other, can they still fight for years, with a population of less than eight million, can they create such a big movement?
3. True population size
With the deepening of the study of the Three Kingdoms period in recent times, as well as the development of sociology, natural science and other fields, people have mastered more tools to explore the historical truth, and gradually found that there are great misunderstandings in the ancient history of the population of the Three Kingdoms.
According to the most basic social laws and common sense, it is impossible to support a total of more than 800,000 troops in the three countries with more than 7 million people and hundreds of thousands of nobles and officials who are completely out of production, and less than nine people to support a person who has left the property, under such a low level of social productivity.
Compared with the civilian households, the number of military personnel is relatively fixed and convenient to count, and the register submitted to Cao Wei when the Shu Han dynasty died states that the number of troops is 102,000. Imagine that 940,000 people provide 100,000 horses, and tens of thousands of officials, it is already difficult to maintain basic survival, how can they still withstand years of conquest? The Shu Han must have had a large number of ordinary people who could produce grain but were not included in the state hukou. A record in the "Book of Jin and Geography" has a clue that Liu Beizhangwu had 200,000 households and 900,000 mouths in the first year of Wu (221). This number is basically the same as when the Shu Han dynasty died 42 years later, with a gap of only 40,000. However, in the past 42 years, in addition to the wars in the northern Hanzhong and Longxi areas, and the wars in the distant southern China, the internal stability of Hanzhong and Shuzhong has basically remained stable, and Zhuge Liang's rule of Shu has made quite achievements, "Three Kingdoms Zhi Zhuge Liang Biography" cloud: "Liang Zhizhi Shu, Tian Zhuo, Cangxi Shi, equipment is profitable, accumulation is spared, the dynasty is not gorgeous, and the road is not intoxicating", but also a large number of forcibly relocated Nanzhong people to Shuzhong to be included in the official hukou, the population should have a relatively large positive growth, why almost stagnated in 42 years? There must also be a considerable number of people in the Shu Han Dynasty who were hidden in the homes of powerful landlords, as well as a large number of military and civilian households, which were not included in the state household organization. Zhuge Liang's last Northern Expedition, because he was repeatedly trapped by grain and grass, divided his troops in Weinan to settle the fields, which can be proved by this.
So if you squeeze out all kinds of water and count all kinds of people who are not included in the national household, what is the population of the three countries? At present, subject to the lack of historical materials, especially the "Three Kingdoms" only has this chronicle, a list of legends, but no food, geography, prefectures and counties and other chronicles, there is no direct record of the population, to accurately calculate the population of the three countries, especially accurate to hundreds of tens or even single digits, it is simply impossible to do it, can only make a rough estimate based on various circumstantial materials. At present, the academic consensus on the population of the three countries is that the population trough of the three countries appeared when the three families of Cao Liu and Sun formed a confrontation situation, and after the tripod was basically stable, the population resumed natural growth, although it did not reach the level of ruling the world, but at least it was growing. So how many are there?
Mr. Wang Yumin's "History of Chinese Mouth" is the most representative, the book takes the population of implicit hukou, soldier households, tuntian households, official households and other households that are not included in the state registration households, as well as a large number of fugitive populations, etc., as the starting point to make inductive statistics, based on the average number of households of about five or six people, it is inferred that the lowest value of the population of the three kingdoms in the late Han Dynasty was about 4.752 million households and 26.539 million households, and reached the highest value on the eve of the unification of the Western Jin Dynasty, about 37.988 million people. Mr. Ge Jianxiong's "History of Chinese Mouth" generally agrees with this statistical method, but further corrects and supplements some of Wang Shu's inferences, arguing that Wang Yumin's inferences are too high, and the true bottom figure is about 22.24 to 23.61 million, and about 30 million at the end of the Three Kingdoms. Real data is lost, and being able to make such estimates is the limit of the current historical conditions. In the future, will rare historical materials like the Sleeping Tiger Land Qin Jian appear to facilitate us to more accurately count the population of the three countries? We'll see.
Column editor-in-chief: Qin Hong Text editor: Song Yanlin Title image source: Visual China Photo editor: Shao Jing
Source: Author: Beijing Evening News