The Hexi Corridor and the Frontier Governance of the Han and Tang Dynasties
Speaker: Zhang Guogang Venue: Tsinghua University "Humanities Tsinghua Forum" Speech time: September 2023
Editor's note
In September 2023, on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the Belt and Road Initiative, the Humanities Tsinghua Forum launched a special program "Reading China: Silk Road Tour". Zhang Guogang, a senior professor of liberal arts at Tsinghua University, a professor of history at the School of Humanities, and a historian, and Zhang Xiaoqin, a professor at the School of Journalism and Communication at Tsinghua University, were the keynote speakers.
"Studying in China, Silk Road Tour", today came to Yumen Pass in Dunhuang, Gansu Province. The significance of the pass where we are now has far surpassed its own geographical value and military status, and has become an important coordinate in the history, geography, and culture of the Chinese nation. Today, we will take Yumen Pass as the axis and review a series of humanistic stories that have happened here, to help you further understand the frontier governance system of the Han and Tang dynasties, and feel the magnificent historical context of the ancient Silk Road.
Overlooking the Great Wall of the Han Dynasty
The Great Wall is the pride of China, and the earliest Great Wall found so far appeared in the pre-Qin period, and was distributed in various countries with different functions, some were used to defend against the invasion of powerful enemies in the northern part of the frontier, and some served as military defense facilities between belligerent countries. The ancestor of the Qin State was the Western Doctor of the Zhou Dynasty, and the main duty of the Western Doctor at that time was to raise horses and guard against the Xirong in the Hexi Corridor, and the main function of the Great Wall of Qin in the pre-Qin period was to act as a barrier to the northwest of the Qin State.
After Qin unified the Six Kingdoms, the First Emperor built the Great Wall, connecting the Yan State in the east, the Zhao State in the middle, and the Qin State in the west, forming a complete northern protection system to resist the southward movement of northern nomads. At that time, the borders of the Qin Dynasty had not yet reached the Hexi Corridor.
Parallel landscape of the Hanming Great Wall in Shandan County, Zhangye City, Gansu Province. Xinhua News Agency
After the establishment of the Western Han Dynasty, from the Han Gaozu Liu Bang to the Wenjing period, because the national strength was not strong enough, so through the policy of peace and affinity to ease the contradictions between the Han Dynasty and the Xiongnu, until the Han Wu Emperor Huo Qubing Hexi Battle cut off the Xiongnu's right arm, the Han Dynasty began to set up the protection system of the Hexi Corridor. Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty spent decades building the Great Wall of Han in the northern part of the Hexi Corridor.
Today, there are remnants of the Great Wall of the Han Dynasty outside the Yumen Pass, which is special in that this section of the Great Wall in the Hexi Corridor was built on flat ground, unlike the sections of the Great Wall east of Hexi that were built in the mountains. The specific reason is that the lofty mountains and mountains that can be relied on in this area are too far away from the construction area of the Great Wall, and if the Great Wall is built in the distant mountains, the protection of the Hexi Corridor cannot be realized. At present, the ruins of the Han Great Wall in the Hexi Corridor are more than three meters high and wide, which can prevent the cavalry from directly crossing over to a certain extent. In order to defend against the attack of the Xiongnu cavalry, the Han Dynasty would also dig a ditch on the ground at the foot of the Great Wall, and then evenly fill the sand into the ditch, so that once an enemy horse passed by, it could leave traces on the sand, so as to provide early warning for the defenders of the Great Wall.
In addition to the Great Wall itself, the beacon system, which is distributed within a certain distance around the Great Wall and is supporting the Great Wall, is also an important information transmission system for the defense system of the Great Wall. In the era of cold weapons, the beacon was the most commonly used means of transmitting information by the ancients, and the story of the "Beacon Opera Princes" of King Zhou You in the Western Zhou Dynasty is familiar to everyone. In the long practice, the ancients gradually perfected the beacon information system: when the enemy situation was discovered, they held up smoke during the day and fire at night, and the number of torches represented the number of enemies. For example, if there are less than 500 people and more than 1 person, one fire alarm is used, and if there are more than 500 people, another fire alarm is used. Theoretically speaking, the ancient commanders needed to keep the symbolic meaning of the beacon system secret for a long time, but in order for the residents along the Great Wall and the beacon to know the invasion of the enemy in time, the beacon signal system was often used by cameras in ancient wars.
Speaker, Professor Zhang Guogang (right), and the moderator, Professor Zhang Xiaoqin, have a conversation in front of the Yumen Gate. Profile picture
In addition to transmitting military information, Fengsui messengers also have the role of reporting safety. The most famous story related to Ping'an Fire in history occurred in the Tang Dynasty, when the An Lushan rebels attacked Chang'an, Tang Xuanzong sent the general Ge Shuhan to guard the Tong Pass, and Ge Shuhan was forced out of the city by the powerful minister Yang Guozhong to fight, and was finally defeated and captured. At that time, in order to let Chang'an understand the battle situation on the front line in Tongguan, the local people in Tongguan had to raise a fire every day to inform them. After the defeat of Geshuhan, the fire of peace in the direction of Tongguan disappeared, and Chang'an immediately judged that Tongguan might be lost, so Tang Xuanzong fled in a hurry with Yang Guifei and others. In ancient times, it was quite expensive to set off a peace fire every day, and it consumed a lot of manpower and material resources, so this kind of peace fire would only be cast when there was a war.
The Great Wall of the Han Dynasty and its nearby beacons constituted an important frontier warning and defense system for ancient dynasties. From the perspective of ancient world history, this kind of alarm and defense system served by the Great Wall is not unique to China, and it is also a common practice in ancient Western countries to build similar long-distance walls for defense. For example, the Germanic Great Wall, built west of the Rhine River and south of the Danube during the Roman Empire, was a border defense between the Roman Empire and the so-called "barbarians" at the time. In addition, the Roman Empire built Hadrian's Wall and Antonine's Wall in present-day England, of which Antonine's Wall was a frontier defense system and was not a frontier fortification under the Roman Empire at that time.
Liguan Mountain is several heavy
"Why should the Qiang flute complain about the willows, the spring breeze does not pass the Yumen Pass", scholars have different views on the origin of the name of the Yumen Pass depicted in the Tang Dynasty poet Wang Zhilian's "Liangzhou Ci". One of the views is that the ancients transported jade from outside the pass to the inside through this pass, so it is called the Yumen Pass. However, so far, judging from the unearthed materials, whether it is the Juyan Han Slip or the Hanging Spring Han Slip, researchers have not found any materials for the jade to enter and exit this place in tens of thousands of Han Slips. Another view is that the ancients usually called the northern gateway "Jade Gate", and "Jade Gate" means "North Gate".
Examining the arrangement of the defense facilities between the Great Wall of Han and the Yumen Pass, we can clearly judge that this is a relatively complex and rigorous system. To the north of the Great Wall is the Shule River, which resembles a moat. In the Great Wall, the command center of the Yumen Commander at that time was Xiaofangpancheng, which can be understood as the local defense command center. As a local military unit, the rank of Yumen Lieutenant is similar to that of Taishou, and he is the deputy in charge of military affairs in county-level units. In addition to the small square city, there is also the big square city more than ten kilometers away, which is mainly used for storage and supplies for the daily necessities of the garrison personnel. In addition, there is a pass named Yangguan to the south of Yumen Pass, and further south of Yangguan is the remnant vein of Qilian Mountain, which leads to the desert to the west. The Great Wall of the Han Dynasty, the Shule River, the Xiaofangpan City, the Yangguan, the Qilian Mountains and the Yumen Pass together constitute a complete guard defense system in the eastern part of ancient Dunhuang.
The Gansu Bamboo Slips Museum has a collection of Chinese slips. Xinhua News Agency
At present, it is speculated that the purpose of these two passes is that Yumen Pass is mainly used for military purposes, while Yangguan is mainly used for civilian purposes. In the Han Dynasty, a certificate was required to go out of these two passes, which was called "passing the office". There is the word "passing" on the Han Jian, but no physical findings have been made. Turpan once had the physical discovery of the Tang Dynasty's "passing place". In addition to the name of the person written on the ancient "passing place", it is also written that the person carrying goods and goods (including horses, camels, slaves and maids, etc.) carried by pedestrians, and the place where the pedestrian passes will also indicate on the "passing place" where to go and where he will go on a certain day, and the corresponding stamping on the "passing place". For example, when an ancient pedestrian passed through Luoyang and Chang'an on his way to Guazhou, he stamped a stamp on each place he went, indicating that he had taken the correct route and proving that he had passed through this place. Because it was difficult for ancient dynasties to control the movement of population, they controlled it in this way.
In addition to the Yumen Pass and Yangguan Pass on the Silk Road, there are also Hangu Pass, Wuguan Pass, Yanmen Pass and other passages in the east, all of which are used to check the circulation of personnel and the materials carried to prevent accidents. Usually, the guards collect taxes on the merchants when they cross the border, and only the "passers-by" are inspected for ordinary pedestrians, and the pedestrians only need to prove that the items they bring belong to them. In addition, there is a concept similar to "Seki" in the history of ancient transportation - "Tsu". "Jin" means "ferry", for example, Mengjin is the famous Yellow River ferry in ancient times.
Count the old people of Yumen
The Tang Dynasty poet Li Ji's "Ancient Military March" has a cloud: "I heard that the jade gate is still covered, and I should chase my life away." Among them, "the jade gate is covered", which alludes to the story of Li Guangli's expedition to Dawan when Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty was exemplified. Li Guangli's sister was Mrs. Li of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, and his elder brother Li Yannian worked as a court musician beside Emperor Wu. At that time, Wusun was friendly with the Han Dynasty. The Han Dynasty sent several princesses to the Wusun Kingdom, and the Wusun Kingdom gave the Han Dynasty dozens of horses, horses were important strategic materials in ancient times, so Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty sent Li Guangli to the farther Dawan Kingdom to ask for horses. However, this time, Li Guangli led people to Dawan to find horses, and encountered strong resistance from Dawan, and the sergeants suffered many casualties, and Li Guangli was forced to retreat. When Li Guangli's men and horses withdrew to Yumen Pass, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty had already sent an edict, which not only forbade Li Guangli to enter the pass, but also ordered to cover the Yumen, claiming that if Li Guangli entered the pass, he would be beheaded. On the one hand, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty covered the gate, and on the other hand, he increased the army to supplement Li Guangli and let him continue the attack. Li Guangli led the army to attack Dawan again, but this time he did not die on the front line, but chose to bypass the front line and go straight to the capital of Dawan. The defenders of Dawan were frightened, so they killed the king and surrendered and presented their horses. Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty praised Dawan Ma. At first, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty called Wusun's horse "Tianma", and later he gave the name "Tianma" to Dawan Ma, and Wusun's horse was renamed "West Pole Horse".
We are very familiar with the two idioms "throw the pen from Rong" and "do not enter the tiger's den, but get the tiger", the copyright owner is Ban Chao of the Eastern Han Dynasty, and he is also an old man of Yumen. During the Western Han Dynasty, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty set up some post pavilions west of Yumen Pass to facilitate transportation and personnel exchanges between the two places, and deployed Tuntian. During the reign of Emperor Xuan of the Han Dynasty, in 60 BC, the Western Regions Protectorate was set up to control these facilities. At the time of the change of the Han Dynasty, the Central Plains Dynasty was too busy to take care of itself, and it was beyond the reach of the Western Regions. Liu Xiu, Emperor Guangwu of the Eastern Han Dynasty, devoted his main energy to stabilizing the country. It was not until the reign of Liu Xiu's son, Emperor Liu Zhuang of the Han Ming Dynasty, that Dou Rong's nephew Dou Gu was sent north to attack the Xiongnu again. At this time, Ban Chao was doing paperwork, and because he was deeply influenced by Zhang Qian, he decided to put pen to paper and help through the Western Regions. Ban Chao acted as an officer in the capacity of a fake Sima and followed Dou Gu's army to Yiwu to win the battle. However, Dou Gu's army was difficult to penetrate into the hinterland for a while, so Dou Gu sent Ban Chao to bring more than 30 people to the Western Regions. At that time, the oasis zone was very important in the transportation of the Western Regions, and without the cooperation of the oasis states in the Western Regions, it would be difficult for the Silk Road to be smooth. Ban Chao and others arrived at Shanshan (once called Loulan in ancient times) and persuaded King Shanshan to resume contacts with the Han Dynasty. King Shanshan was very enthusiastic at first, but after a few days he began to be cold and sluggish. Ban Chao called the person who received them and asked: "Did the Northern Huns send an envoy here?" The person who received them suddenly became flustered, and Ban Chao immediately understood that the situation had changed. According to the Book of the Later Han Dynasty, Ban Chao summoned his companions to report on the current dangerous situation and said: "If you don't enter the tiger's den, you can't be a tiger." The plan of the present day is only to attack the captives by fire by night, so that they do not know how much I have, and they will be greatly shaken, and they will be destroyed. That night, Ban Chao led everyone to wipe out the Hun envoys, and then the situation developed as Ban Chao expected. This is where the idiom "if you don't enter the tiger's den, you can get the tiger". Dou Gu returned victoriously and recommended Ban Chao as an envoy to the Western Regions. Since then, Ban Chao has been in the Western Regions for 31 years, and has been pacified in Khotan, Shule, Qiuci and other places. The third emperor of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Emperor Zhang of the Han Dynasty, Liu Wei, wanted to let Ban Chao return to the Central Plains, but the king of Shule disagreed, and said to Ban Chao: "Who do we have to find when you go back?"
Jinshanzi beacon tower in Shandan County, Zhangye City, Gansu Province. Xinhua News Agency
Ban Chao has been in the Western Regions for 31 years and has made outstanding achievements. His most outstanding achievements are two achievements, the first is to send protons to each other, with the efforts of Ban Chao, more than 50 countries in the Western Regions have taken the action of sending protons to Han; the second is to send Gan Ying to the west, Gan Ying has reached a place where Zhang Qian and others have never set foot before. "Later Han Dynasty" contains: "In the middle of Emperor Yongyuan, the Western Regions Protector sent Peng Ganying to return to the sea, with the terrain and customs of the western countries of the Green Mountains...... Gan Ying is over the suspension of the black yi, the mountain is separated, and the Tiaozhi is close to the sea. If you want to cross, people say Ying: 'The sea is vast, and the water is salty and bitter and inedible. When the wind is good, the traveler crosses in March, and if the wind is late, he is three years old. Therefore, those who enter the sea are all given three-year-old food. The good in the sea makes people think of the land, and there are many dead. 'Knowing what is the end, asking about its customs. At that time, Gan Ying was unable to cross the sea, and the Roman Empire and the Han Dynasty were unable to achieve direct communication. However, through the middlemen of the time, the Sabbatarians, the two sides were able to trade. Later generations saw that if the Han Dynasty had direct contact with Rome at that time, it would have caused great losses to the middlemen, so the middlemen were not active in helping the Han Dynasty to communicate directly with Rome.
In addition to westward exploration, harmony was also an important activity at that time. In the Han Dynasty, there were two princesses who married outside the Yumen Pass, one was the princess of Xijun, and the other was the princess of Xie Wu, the two princesses were married to the king of Wusun in the Western Regions, witnessing the complex game between the Han and the Xiongnu in the Western Regions, Princess Xijun died of illness in Wusun, Princess Xie Wu was involved in the civil strife in Wusun and was imprisoned for a time, and was rescued by Zheng Ji, the protector of the Western Regions of the Han Dynasty, and finally returned to the Han Dynasty.
Remembering the Silk Road Journey
After Ban Chao Ganying, there were many travelers in the subsequent dynasties who embarked on the Silk Road like "lonely braves" and opened up trade routes. During the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, some small local secession regimes had some people go west through the Silk Road to learn from them, but due to the lack of a unified and powerful dynasty as the backing, the Silk Road expansion was extremely difficult. By the Tang Dynasty, the Silk Road had reached its peak, which was closely related to its strong national strength. Among the Silk Road travelers in the Tang Dynasty, in addition to Xuanzang, who we are very familiar with, there is also the westward celebrity Du Huan. Du Huan was captured in a Western Regions War in the tenth year of Xuanzong Tianbao (751 AD), and then traveled around the countries of West Asia, reaching Baghdad, Damascus and other places, and finally returned to the Central Plains via Egypt, and wrote the travelogue "Jing Xingji". It is a pity that Du Huan's travelogue has not been handed down completely, Du Huan's uncle Du You wrote China's first classic history "General Dictionary", which has several passages quoted from Du Huan's "Jing Xing Ji" recorded in the experience, customs, human feelings, offensive and defensive related content. Historian Zhang Yichun once annotated the content of the "Jingxingji" in the "General Dictionary" and wrote the book "Jingxingji Notes".
After the Anshi Rebellion, the national power of the Tang Dynasty declined. In 783 AD, two years after Dunhuang fell to Tibet, due to the blockade of the Silk Road traffic in Tibet, the Tang Dezong sent Yang Liangyao to take the sea route from Guangzhou to the west to contact the Dayue clan. Similar to Zhang Qian's task in the Western Han Dynasty, Yang Liangyao's mission on this trip was to cut off Tubo's right arm. Eventual liaison efforts were ineffective. In recent years, however, some scholars have discovered his epitaph, which recounts the incident. Scholars believe that this matter is of great research value, because Yang Liangyao preceded Zheng He of the Ming Dynasty by more than 600 years, and was the only recorded official dispatch to the west by sea.
The Silk Road travelers in history, more pioneering and exploratory moves, there are many such people in all dynasties, Fa Xian, Xuanzang and others are westward for their ideals, Zhang Qian, Ban Chao and others are loyal to their mission. In this long history, the exploits of the Qin Emperor, the Han Dynasty, the Tang Dynasty, and the Song Ancestors, especially the development of Chinese civilization during the Han and Tang dynasties, contributed greatly to the development of the westward road. Of course, there are many ordinary people such as soldiers and merchants on this road, who have written the history of the Silk Road together with generations of heroes. We are now in front of the Yumen Pass, in front of the historical relics, it can be said that the ancients can be seen in the past, and the comers can be seen later.
It is worth mentioning that there was a special group of people among the travelers on the roads of the Western Regions in history, and that was the Sogdians who were engaged in trade on the Silk Road. Stein, a 20th-century British explorer, found more than a dozen Sogdian letters in the beacons of the Great Wall near Dunhuang, mainly reporting to their hometowns and suppliers that they were doing business east of Luoyang. The Sogdians themselves were not engaged in production, but acted as middlemen to exchange pepper, spices, jade or other treasures from the Western Regions with the Central Plains, and the Sogdians were very active in the ancient Silk Road trade. There is a Conghua township in Dunhuang, where about 1,400 Sogdians once settled, and it is speculated that the Sogdians had many similar "strongholds" in the Hexi Corridor during the ancient Silk Road trade. The Sogdians traded in the "strongholds", bringing in from the west and selling goods from the east. In this process, merchants not only do commercial sales, but also do the transportation of goods.
The balance of "passing" and "keeping".
The ancient Silk Road ran from Chang'an to the Mediterranean, and was a passage between China and the West. While successive dynasties of the Central Plains continued to expand westward and strive to keep the Silk Road open, the West was also trying to achieve eastward passage at the same time. When Zhang Qian of the Western Han Dynasty opened the Western Regions, the Persians on the west side of the Zhongxi Passage had already done work for hundreds of years for the eastward advance. The Achaemenid Persian dynasty, the opponent of the ancient Greeks, once opened up the eastward route, and the Persian king once said, "I am in Susa (that is, in the southeast of present-day Iran), I can eat the fish of the Mediterranean", which shows that the official Persian post road had been built at that time. Later, the Persian dynasty died in Alexander's crusade, and Alexander's empire was divided into three after the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC, and this part of Asia was then called the Seleucid or Seleucid dynasty. After Alexander and others arrived in Afghanistan, India and other places, they could no longer continue to advance eastward. Relatively speaking, the Silk Road oasis channel opened by the Chinese, whether it was managed by the Western Han Dynasty in the form of a post pavilion, or the Eastern Han Banchao was controlled by all parties, or the Tang Dynasty was managed by setting up some prefectures and counties, all of which were of great significance to the smooth flow of the ancient Silk Road.
For the ancient Silk Road, the Yumen Pass and other passes were the "gates" in the eyes of the ancients, inside and outside the "gates", Zhang Qian's chiseling through the Western Regions was "Tong", and the four counties were "guarded" according to the two passes, and the relationship between "pass" and "guard" was actually dialectically unified.
In order to maintain the balance between "passing" and "guarding", we must first guard the door. The Western Han Dynasty opened up the Western Regions and established a defensive system, so that the Silk Road was enlightened, and Tang Taizong expelled the Western Turks to operate the Silk Road, and the Silk Road flourished. In contrast, the Silk Road had a period of chaos between the Han and Tang dynasties. The role of Yumen Pass in the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties was not as significant as that in the Han and Tang dynasties, because the Central Plains Dynasty's strength to reach this place was weak, and it was not easy to "defend", and the "pass" of the Silk Road also became difficult. It was not until entering the Tang Dynasty that Yumen Pass regained its former prosperity, and Tang Dynasty poems on the theme of Yumen Pass appeared one after another, precisely because the Tang Dynasty had the ability to add counties and counties in some areas along the Silk Road, providing a guarantee for the smooth flow of the Silk Road, and being able to guard the gate and reach everywhere.
Historically, the Silk Road, as the intersection of Eastern and Western economies and cultures in ancient times, was a way for countries to communicate with each other and to interact with different civilizations. This is not only an important event in ancient history, but also has important reference significance for us in later generations.
Zhang Guogang is a senior professor of liberal arts at Tsinghua University and a professor in the Department of History of the School of Humanities. In 2004, he was selected into the "985 Hundred Talents Program" of Tsinghua University, in 2006, he was selected as a Changjiang Scholar Distinguished Professor of the Ministry of Education, and in 2014, he was selected as an outstanding teacher in Beijing Universities. His research interests include ancient Chinese history and the history of the relationship between Chinese and Western cultures. He has won the first and second prizes of the Ministry of Education's Outstanding Books in Humanities and Social Sciences, the first and second prizes of the Beijing Philosophy and Social Sciences Outstanding Works, and the "China Good Book" Award, the Wenjin Book Award (Principal Award and Nomination Award), and the China Outstanding Publication Award (Principal Award and Nomination Award). The History of Cultural Relations between China and the West offered at Tsinghua University was rated as an excellent course by Tsinghua University, Beijing Municipality and the Ministry of Education, and The Rise and Fall of the Tang Dynasty was rated as a national first-class undergraduate course by the Ministry of Education.
(The transcript of the lecture was compiled by Niu Xueying, a doctoral student at the School of Journalism and Communication, Tsinghua University)
Guangming Daily (December 23, 2023 06 edition)
Source: Guangming Net-Guangming Daily