(Photo) Situation map of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms
The rise and fall of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms was one of the darkest and most turbulent periods in Chinese history. At that time, the monarchs were loyal, the people were miserable, the warriors were monopolistic, the feudal towns were divided, and the emperor's position changed in turn, like a marquee, coming and going in a hurry in the torrent of history. The Later Jin general An Chongrong once boasted: "Tianzi Ning has a kind of hu, and those who are strong in soldiers and horses are strong in their ears."
Shi Jingyao was one of the most notorious passers-by of this period.
Shi Jingyao, a member of the Shatuo ethnic group, was born in 892 in Fenyangli, Taiyuan, the second oldest in the family, and had a taciturn personality. His father Shi Shaoyong was originally a general under Li Keyong, convinced that force could dominate everything, Shi Jingyao was influenced by his father, and worked hard to practice sword, gun and archery skills when he was a child, and at the same time liked to study military books and battle strategies, and worshipped the famous Warring States general Li Mu and the famous Han Dynasty general Zhou Yafu.
As he grew up, Shi Jingyao, who was a general tiger, excelled in martial arts, and often accompanied his father on expeditions, fighting very bravely, and repeatedly fighting in the confrontation between the two armies to save the commander in danger.
In 916, the Liang dynasty general Liu Huan (xún) attacked Qingping in Shandong. Li Cunxun led his troops to help, and before he could finish his position, he was surrounded by Liu Yu, and at the moment of crisis, Shi Jingyao led only a dozen cavalrymen to attack the enemy position, and rushed all the way to rescue Li Cunxun from the siege, Li Cunxun was so happy that he patted him on the shoulder and said: "It is true that this is true when the door is out of the general." On the spot, he was given many gold and silver treasures, and according to the highest etiquette of the Hu people, he also fed him shortbread with his own hands, and Shi Jingyao became famous.
When Li Cunxun's brother Li Siyuan (李嗣源) was serving as the Assassin of Dai Prefecture at the time, when he heard of this, he asked Li Cunxun to transfer Shi Jingyao to his army, and asked him to command his elite cavalry "Three Seekings Army" and recruit him as a son-in-law, regarded him as a beloved general.
(Pictured) Shi Jingyao, also known as The Later Jin Emperor Gaozu, was the founding emperor of the Jin Dynasty during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period.
In 925, in his later years, Emperor Zhuangzong of Later Tang, Li Cunxun, because of his arrogance and extravagance, killed Li Min and provoked a rebellion among Wei soldiers, and the imperial court sent Li Siyuan to lead an army to quell the rebellion, not wanting Li Siyuan to be surrounded by rebel generals to rebel together as soon as he arrived there. At the same time, Shi Jingyao was ordered to lead 500 cavalry to directly attack Daliang, and after the city was destroyed, Zhuangzong was shot dead in the rebel army, Li Siyuan entered Luoyang and declared himself emperor, for Later Tang Mingzong, promoted Shi Jingyao to be an envoy to invite the martial army, and later appointed the founding duke, and since then he has grasped the power of the Later Tang military and government.
A few years later, Li Siyuan fell ill in old age, and due to the rebellion of the Khitans, Tuguhuns, turks and other tribes in the north, he sent Shi Jingyao as an envoy to Hedong Jiedushi, stationed in Taiyuan, and commanded the northern people and horses. Li Siyuan's eldest son was killed by Li Cunxun in his early years, and the position of crown prince was always vacant, and the second son, Li Congrong, the Prince of Qin, was then the Grand Marshal of the Terracotta Army, and took advantage of his father's serious illness to raise an army to launch a coup d'état in a vain attempt to eliminate the other brothers and plot to seize the throne. However, Li Congrong was killed by the forbidden army during the war, and Li Siyuan was frightened, and he cried out for his life, and before his death, he made his third son Li Conghou crown prince.
Li Conghou has a cowardly personality and is jealous. After ascending to the throne, he did not do anything else, and he spent all day worrying about someone seizing the throne. At this time, there were two major powerful factions in the Tang Dynasty, one was Li Congke, the righteous son of Li Siyuan, and the other was Shi Jingyao. Because of the high power of the two people, Li Conghou felt that it was difficult to sleep and eat, and finally ordered the two men to be stripped of their military power and transferred away from the Beijing Division.
After Shi Jingyao received the instruction, he did not make a sound, but waited and watched the changes. However, Li Congke could not resist his temperament, and after leaving the Beijing Division, he poured out all his family property to reward the soldiers, and Yu Fengxiang launched a mutiny and led an army to seize the throne. Li Conghou was panicked when he heard the news, so he summoned his brother-in-law Shi Jingyao to fight the enemy, and Shi Jingyao did not want to wade through this muddy water, and after receiving the order, he just led his troops all the way to watch. Soon Li Congke occupied the Capital Division and calmly took the throne.
Li Congke, who ascended to the throne, also began to commit Li Conghou's old illness, and from time to time suspected that Shi Jingyao wanted to seek power and usurp the throne, and had the intention of killing him, and he was afraid that Zhao Yanshou's father and son, who were also The son-in-law of Emperor Mingzong in Youzhou, would die of rabbits and foxes, and take advantage of the opportunity to cause trouble. Just when he was in a dilemma, Shi Jingyao was also restless in Jingshi, and he was also worried about being suspected by Li Congke and causing trouble. After a long time, he had a serious illness, resulting in a yellow and thin face and no human appearance. However, the old and cunning Shi Jingyao found an excuse and secretly spoke to Li Congke through his wife and mother-in-law, asking to return to Zhenhedong to recuperate. Li Congke could not withstand the pleas of his mother and sister, and when he saw that Shi Jingyao was seriously ill, he sent a personal affection for a moment and sent the envoy back to the town, so Shi Jingyao finally entered the sea and the tiger released the South Mountain.
After returning to Taiyuan, Shi Jingyao Mingli pretended to be weak and ignored the military, but secretly he was always recruiting troops and expanding his strength. After weighing up his own strength, he felt that he was still not sure of competing with Li Congke, so he set his sights on the Khitan people in the north and secretly sent emissaries with letters to ask for assistance.
During Li Keyong's lifetime, the Khitan had been a nemesis of the Shatuo army, and was later beaten back to the north by Li Cunxun. Time passed, and at this time the Khitan leader was Yelü Deguang, the son of Yelü Abaoji, who was extremely ambitious, taking advantage of the chaos of the Later Tang Dynasty to seize the reserves, and repeatedly harassed the border passes, and the current Khitan was no longer what it used to be, with a stable political power, a vast territory, and a strong army.
It is said that yelü Deguang received the letter the night before, and was having a dream, in which a god man descended from the sky and said to him: "Shi Lang sent someone to call you, you should go quickly!" "The next morning, when Yelü Deguang saw Shi Jingyao's emissaries, he could not help but be overjoyed when he took the letter, and it turned out that Shi Jingyao, in order to obtain the help of khitan soldiers and horses, promised that after the matter was completed, he was willing to cede all the sixteen prefectures of Youyun on the southern border between the Central Plains and the Khitan to the Khitan as a reward, in addition to offering 300,000 pieces of cloth to the Khitan every year. Yelü De was overjoyed to read the book and immediately agreed to Shi Jingyao's request.
It was September of that year, and Yelü Deguang personally led 50,000 cavalry, claiming 300,000 soldiers, and rushed to Jinyang in a murderous manner. With the support of the Khitans, Shi Jingyao's confidence soared, and he immediately began to swing his army all the way south, and after Tangzhou County was defeated by the two fierce armies, they went out of the city and surrendered. Soon, the Hedong army pointed its sword at Luoyang City. In the third year of Qingtai, Li Congke saw that the general trend had gone, and tearfully went upstairs and set himself on fire. In 936, Shi Jingyao's soldiers and horses marched into Luoyang to claim the title of emperor, and later set the capital of Bieliang, opening the third dynasty of the Five Dynasties period, the Later Jin. In 938, the Khitan changed its name to Jianliao and became a large empire in the north.
After the establishment of the Later Jin Dynasty, Shi Jingyao not only ceded the Central Plains barrier Youyun Sixteen Prefectures to the Khitan for the "Zhi'en Tu Bao", but also sent a large amount of money to express his gratitude. After thinking about it, it was still not enough to express the grace of knowledge, and simply called himself the emperor to Yelü Deguang, this move actually caught Yelü Deguang by surprise, and there was a loud thunder in the sky, but for no reason, there was a son who was ten years older than himself, so how could he explain it to his wife and mother at home? It was embarrassing, but he smiled and agreed. It is said that when the "father and son" met on the day when Yelü Deguang marched into the Central Plains, Shi Jingyao's tearful eyes were tearful, his pious and respectful attitude was revealed, and his face was thick, and he was afraid that he could not surpass him.
Although Shi Jingyao was a noble son of heaven, this earth-shattering move of Shi Jingyao caused an uproar in the Later Jin Dynasty and the public, and the Central Plains Dynasty was influenced by Confucianism, how could it be willing to submit to a foreign regime? It's a disgrace. As a result, rebellions began to be launched in various parts of the Central Plains, and Shi Jingyao was trapped in internal and external difficulties, and he was busy suppressing rebellion everywhere all day, and the people of the Central Plains were once again plunged into war.
Hedong Jiedu made Liu Zhiyuan the biggest hardline fighter in the Liao Dynasty' confrontation, and he also drew the Tugu Hun general Guo Wei to surrender to Liao, and his strength increased greatly for a while, which made Shi Jingyao fall into a quagmire, and later because the general An Zhongrong took in tugu Hunbu and opposed it, although the rebellion was eventually quelled, but was reprimanded by the Khitan "father emperor", Shi Jingyao advanced into a retreat valley, gradually became depressed, and finally became ill, and in June 942 AD, he died of illness in the Baochang Temple of the capital of Yidu, at the age of fifty, and after the temple number was promoted to Gaozu.
Author: Li Guang, the contracted author of the secret history of fish and sheep.
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