I have seen "Water Margin", read "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", in many historical novels, heroes are often admired, there are peerless heroes, martial arts masters, but the most exciting are those generals who fight for the country, they are majestic and admirable. However, there are many generals as we know them that are actually fictional, and these characters do not exist in history. But perhaps it is precisely because of these fictions that the heroic image of that era longs for can be reflected. First, let's talk about Li Yuanba, who was based on Li Xuanba, the fourth son of Emperor Gaozong of Tang and known as one of the heroes of the Sui and Tang dynasties. Although Li Yuanba is slender, he has infinite strength, often holding a pair of huge iron hammers, and looks extremely powerful. It is rumored that this iron hammer weighs four hundred pounds, two of which reach eight hundred pounds, its power can be imagined, swinging it is enough to take human life, even if it is just lifted and knocked, it will definitely be able to smash a huge pit. But in fact, Li Xuanba died early at the age of only sixteen, and he is not the heroic and invincible image we see.
Next, we mention the vulture bone, whose uniqueness can be felt from the name alone. Woody was the king of the Nanban Ugo Kingdom during the Three Kingdoms period, who was twelve feet tall, and did not eat food, but raw snake meat, as if the way of life of primitive people. Legend has it that after Zhuge Liang captured Meng Liu, Meng Yu asked him to borrow vine armor soldiers, and the vulture bone sent 30,000 vine armor soldiers to support, and at first he did win, but when he chased to Pansnake Valley, he fell into Zhuge Liang's scheme, and all 30,000 vine armored soldiers were killed in the sea of fire. However, the name Vulture is hardly recorded in the official history, and the only mention may be only in the novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms.
Talking about Yang Zongbao, almost everyone knows the story of the Yang family general, and Yang Zongbao joined the army when he was a teenager and was captured by Mu Guiying when he attacked Muke Zhai with his father. Later, the two married and continued to fight after marriage, but they were trapped by a conspiracy when they defeated Western Xia, and were eventually trapped in Jinshan, which gave birth to the legend of the female general of Yangmen and also showed Mu Guiying's bravery. However, there is no such character as Yang Zongbao in history, and there are few conclusive records of his life and ending.
The last mention is Xue Dingshan, mentioning that he mostly thinks of Fan Lihua. However, the prototype of Xue Dingshan was actually Xue Ne, the son of Xue Rengui, and no one knew about his wife. Xue Ne, also an outstanding general in history, was sent to attack the Turks during the reign of Wu Zetian to perform important tasks. Later, in the era of Emperor Xuanzong of Tang, he was responsible for rectifying the army, went to Tubo to defeat his opponents, and was promoted to the general of Zuo Yulinjun until his death in his seventies. Having told so many heroic stories about these great generals, whether they ever existed in history or not, the patriotic spirit conveyed by their stories still inspires us. We hope that their spirit will be passed on to us.
References: New Book of Tang, Records of the Three Kingdoms