In October 123 AD, in the history of the Eastern Han Dynasty, a strange thing happened.
The cause of the incident is this: Liu Hu, the reigning Emperor of the Han Dynasty at that time, felt that his adoptive mother, Wang Sheng, had the grace of nurturing him. Therefore, Liu Hu ordered to build a big mansion for Wang Sheng in the capital.
As a generation of emperors, there is nothing wrong with repaying the nurturing grace of his nursing mother. Therefore, when Emperor Han An first proposed this idea, no one objected.
But then, when Emperor Han An took out the design of this mansion, everyone was dumbfounded.
Because this house is so big!
As for Wang Sheng's mansion, how big it is, everyone has not completely figured out until today. We only know that the inner city of Luoyang City at that time was actually not very big. Luoyang City in the Eastern Han Dynasty was only about 2.5 kilometers from east to west, and about four kilometers from north to south.
At that time, it was already the largest city in the world. But if you compare it to modern times, you still think it's a bit small. And in such a large Luoyang city, about half of the place is directly occupied by the imperial palace. The remaining half is the office of other civil and military officials, as well as various functional departments.
And in addition to these places, there are too few places left to live, and it is definitely worth every inch of land. Therefore, even the Taixue of the Eastern Han Dynasty at that time had to be placed outside Luoyang City, and there was no place in the city at all.
But even so, at that time, Emperor An of the Han Dynasty still gave the southwest corner of the capital, the part of the area near the entrance gate, to his nurse Wang Sheng. Moreover, because he felt that the area divided by Luoyang Street was too small, Emperor An of Han also deliberately issued an order to merge the two squares on both sides of the street directly, and then package them and send them to Wang Sheng.
The most important thing is that what Wang Sheng got at that time was not just the land of these two squares. Instead, Emperor An of Han directly ordered to raise money from the treasury to directly bulldoze all the buildings in the two squares! and then directly build a new mansion on this blank land.
How much does it cost?!
If a wealthy businessman did this, the ministers might at most impeach him for trespassing the etiquette system. But deep down, you might be a little happy. After the project begins, it will be a good thing that it will be able to promote the employment environment in the capital. Besides, after the completion of this house, I don't know who it belongs to?
But if you put it here in this Wang Sheng, it will be different, because this is paid by the state treasury! Although everyone understands very well, Emperor Han An's feelings for his nurse. However, at that time, the Eastern Han Dynasty had just experienced more than 10 consecutive years of natural disasters, and the Xiqiang side had been fighting for more than 10 years, and the treasury had already been empty! How could it still support such a large and unnecessary project?
So next, countless ministers of the scholar clan began to write one after another, asking Emperor An of Han to reclaim his fame. But as a result, the ministers' letters aroused the anger of Emperor An of Han. After that, Emperor An of Han directly forcibly ordered the treasury to pay for the supply of various materials and funds openly.
In the end, at the forced request of Emperor An of the Han Dynasty, the project began directly. In the end, the specifications of this mansion completely exceeded the level that ordinary ministers should have, and the total investment exceeded 100 million yuan! The various decorations inside were even more luxurious! Even many princes and kings did not dare to imagine it.
But the irony is that when this mansion had just been repaired, or even not completely repaired, and Wang Sheng had not really lived in it, the situation in the Eastern Han Dynasty changed abruptly! Probably less than two years after Emperor An of the Han Dynasty ordered the mansion to be repaired, Wang Sheng was directly exiled by his family to the border area in the north of Shanxi. She has been missing since then, and no one knows how she died.
I have to say, this is really a pretty ironic thing.
So, what kind of person was the real nursing mother Wang Sheng in history? Why did Emperor Han An have such a deep affection for this nursing mother at that time? He even opened the treasury to build a house for this nursing mother? And what did this nursing mother do in the end, and why did Emperor Han An finally build a house for her, but she never even lived in it? On the contrary, she was directly exiled?
In this story, we actually have to start with the Han An Emperor being proclaimed.
Many years ago, when Emperor Han An was a child, he was not actually qualified to inherit the throne. Because his father Liu Qing is not an emperor, just a prince.
The reigning emperor at that time was the uncle of Emperor An of Han, Emperor Liu Zhao of Hanhe. This Emperor of Han He is also one of the most accomplished emperors in the history of the Eastern Han Dynasty. It was during his reign that the Eastern Han Dynasty reached its heyday.
As for Liu Hu, the young Emperor of Han An at that time, he was not only the son of the prince, but also the concubine of the prince. His mother, the daughter of a criminal officer. The law of the Han Dynasty paid attention to the system of joint sitting, and if an official committed a crime, then the official's wife and daughter would also be confiscated as slaves.
It's just that because Liu Hu's mother is relatively good-looking, he was favored by his grandfather's father. So later, she was admitted to the palace and became a concubine of this prince. Later, by mistake, the prince pampered this little concubine, and then gave birth to Liu Hu.
However, giving birth to Liu Hu did not make this poor woman start to value her mother and son, completely changing her fate. On the contrary, not long after, Zuo Xiao'e passed away directly. Until her death, she never saw her son become the emperor and take power. Moreover, because she is just an ordinary concubine of the prince, her year of birth and death is not recorded in the history books, let alone her related deeds.
And then, because of Zuo Xiao'e's early death, the closest woman to Liu Hu became his nurse, Wang.
In ancient times, the nurse was a very common role. Especially in the families of many powerful ministers, the biological mother of the child will not raise the child by herself. After the child is born, the nursing mother is usually responsible for the baby.
Therefore, for Liu Hu in his childhood, he may not have much impression of what his biological mother Zuo Xiao'e was like. In his impression, the real mother is actually this nursing mother.
In this way, under the nurturing of the Wang family, Liu Hujian lived to the age of ten in good health and gradually grew up. And after the age of ten, Liu Hu's fate began to change quietly.
To put it simply, the situation at that time was like this: Liu Hu's father, Liu Qing, although he was only a prince, was a prince when he was young. It's just that later, for various reasons, he was deposed, and then replaced by his younger brother as the emperor, this is Emperor Han He.
Because when they were fighting for the right to inherit the throne, the two brothers were relatively young, and there was no conflict. In addition, the two grew up together, and later Liu Qing assisted Emperor Han and got rid of the powerful Dou family. So later, the relationship between the two brothers has always been better. Although Emperor Han and Emperor snatched Liu Qing's crown prince back then, the brotherhood between the two did not arise because of this.
On the contrary, before Emperor Han He died, Emperor Han He felt more and more that he was sorry for his brother. Emperor Han He always felt that he had robbed his brother of the throne. Therefore, when Emperor Han He was in power, he was trying his best to make up for Liu Qing.
But even so, Emperor Han He still felt that it was not enough. Therefore, before Emperor Han He died, Emperor Han He had a very amazing idea.
He wanted to make his brother's son his heir.
Because Emperor Han He's physical condition was not very good at that time, although he was only in his twenties, he had already reached the point where he was about to die immediately.
Moreover, the sons of Emperor Han and Emperor are not in good health, and they basically give birth to one and die young. Before the death of Emperor Han He, there were only two who were still alive at that time. One has been sick for many years, and the other has just been born at this time.
Therefore, Emperor Han He thought at that time, could he pass his brother's child to his own name and then make him the crown prince? In this way, it would not only ensure the legitimacy of the heir to the throne, but also make up for the regret that his brother did not become the emperor back then?
Of course, these ideas were speculated by later historians, and they are certainly not explicitly stated in the history books. However, judging from the behavior alone, Emperor Han He was indeed surprisingly good to Liu Qing's lineage.
Therefore, after Liu Hu grew up, he often entered the palace under the arrangement of Emperor Han He. After many contacts, Emperor Han He also liked Liu Hu, his nephew, very much, and often gave him all kinds of good things, and the treatment was far better than that of the children of other princes and kings.
At that time, Liu Hu may not have understood what this meant. But from this time on, his fate has begun to change completely.
After that, it didn't take long for Emperor Han He to die. After the death of Emperor He of the Han Dynasty, according to the vassal management system of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Liu Qing had to return to his fiefdom. But what is interesting is that before Liu Qing left Beijing, Deng Sui, the empress of Emperor Han He, specially ordered Liu Qing to leave his son Liu Hu in the capital.
In the months that followed, Deng Sui embraced Liu Long, the youngest son of Emperor Han He, and became the new emperor. As for Liu Hu, he has always stayed in the capital in the name of studying Xi. But at the same time, a very small number of high-level officials in the Eastern Han Dynasty knew that Deng Sui at this time had already cultivated Liu Hu as a 'deputy prince'.
And then, about eight months later, Liu Long, who was supported, died directly. After this, Deng Suili overrode public opinion, gave up the eldest son of Emperor Han He, and instead ordered Liu Hu to succeed to the name of Emperor Han He, and at the same time put Liu Hu on the throne.
This year, Liu Hu was only twelve years old.
From an ordinary feudal prince to being put on the throne, it is really hard to say how much impact this had on a child who was only twelve years old at the time.
And in the whole process, there was only one person who accompanied Liu Hu.
It's the nurse Wang.
There is no record in the history books of what kind of life and family background the Wang family has. But in the Eastern Han Dynasty, most of the women who would normally go to be nursing mothers were born poor and could not have any family background. In the history books, except for the record that her name is Wang Sheng, there is no record of her early experience.
After becoming an emperor, in the next ten years, Liu Hu gradually grew into adulthood. During this period, the Eastern Han Dynasty was always in power by the Empress Dowager Deng Sui. As for Liu Hu, he is basically a puppet emperor.
For Liu Hu himself, Deng Sui is actually more like one of his sisters than his mother. On the one hand, Deng Sui himself is only twelve years older than Liu Hu, and he is not a generation older than Liu Hu. On the other hand, Deng Sui is very strong. In Deng Sui's eyes, Liu Hu seems to have always been the unsuccessful child, although he treats him as his own child, but he can't trust his ability to do things, and he is unwilling to give up power.
In this case, when Liu Hu was young, there was no problem. But when Liu Hu grew up and Liu Hu had a desire for power, the relationship between the two sides began to become more and more delicate.
And in this process, the nurse Wang Sheng must have always been on Liu Hu's side.
Unlike Deng Sui, Wang Sheng is not a knowledgeable woman. She did not understand the politics of the court, nor did she know how to conduct political struggles. Moreover, judging from Wang Sheng's performance later, she didn't even know what she really wanted. She will only rely on her instinct to judge the superficial right and wrong of things.
Therefore, in Wang Sheng's eyes, the original Deng Sui was a good person, because she supported Liu Hu. But later Deng Sui was a demon who held on to power and even planned to get rid of her son!
And then, Wang Sheng didn't know where he heard the rumors, and heard that Deng Kui, the elder brother of the Empress Dowager Deng, tried to depose Liu Hu, and then set up another cousin of Emperor Liu Hu of the Han Dynasty as the emperor instead. Whether this is true or not is impossible to know later, so when the case was investigated later, all the real insiders had already passed away.
But obviously, Wang Sheng's words made Liu Hu gradually scared. Liu Hu was also worried that Empress Dowager Deng might depose herself at any time and then appoint another person as the emperor.
Of course, until the end, Deng Sui didn't really do anything. Although Deng Sui has always been dissatisfied with Liu Hu, at least, Liu Hu has been the emperor for more than ten years at that time, and it is no longer realistic to abolish him and replace him with others.
In this way, in 121 AD, Liu Hu finally came out. This year, Deng Sui died.
At this moment, no one can care about Liu Hu anymore.
At this time, Liu Hu was 28 years old. In the past ten years, Liu Hu has been living a life of fear. So at this point, after the knife hanging over Liu Hu's head disappeared completely, Liu Hu began to completely let himself go.
This feeling is very similar to a modern child who has worked hard for more than ten years under the pressure of his parents for exams. Previously, under the pressure of my parents, I had to Xi. But when I went to college and had no constraints at home, I suddenly began to let myself go.
Although years of education told him that he should do something serious. But the rebellious psychology that suddenly flew off made him start to try all kinds of possibilities.
And Liu Hu at that time was probably this contradictory appearance. So in the next few years, we will see a very contradictory Liu Hu. On the one hand, he also does the serious work. Under his arrangement, the Eastern Han recaptured the Western Regions, defeated Xianbei, and forced Goguryeo to submit.
But on the other hand, in terms of personal life, Liu Hu began to completely let himself go.
The first is to treat the Deng family. Although the Deng family did nothing wrong, he still dismissed all those people from the Deng family and drove them out of the capital. Although the Deng family did not show any intention of coercing him at that time, for the sake of his own sense of security, Liu Hu still completely cleaned up the Deng family and let several core figures of the Deng family commit suicide.
Secondly, it is to reward those who were good to them before.
And among them, the first to bear the brunt is naturally his nursing mother Wang Sheng.
For Liu Hu, Wang Sheng is comparable to his biological mother, who has been with him all these years. Therefore, as soon as Liu Hu took power, he ordered the king to be crowned as the prince of the wild! Before this, there had never been a precedent in history for a nursing mother to be directly crowned a monarch because she was nursing the emperor. But at this time, Liu Hu insisted on going his own way and broke this convention.
In this regard, the ministers below must not be convinced one by one, and they have played impeachment.
But as a result, Liu Hu did not hesitate, and directly showed Wang Sheng all the twists and turns of impeachment of Wang Sheng.
In this way, Wang Sheng naturally hated these ministers to the core. After that, Wang Sheng began to slander these ministers and find a way to put small shoes on these ministers.
But judging from the historical records, Wang Sheng's slander is actually more like 'gossip' in modern urban dramas, rather than the high-IQ struggle in power conspiracy dramas. Therefore, the real Wang Sheng in history may really be a middle-aged woman who has no heart, but likes to do things. And Wang Sheng said bad things about those ministers, from beginning to end, he never thought of really killing them.
However, in the end, because Wang Sheng's identity is too special, what she said casually will still cause many high-ranking officials to be dismissed. And among them, there is one person who is particularly important. This person's name is Yang Zhen, and a few years later, he has a great-great-grandson named Yang Xiu.
At that time, Yang Zhen once wrote a letter to impeach Wang Sheng. As a result, because Wang Sheng opened his mouth, Yang Zhen was directly dismissed and went home. After returning home, Yang Zhen was angry and committed suicide by drinking poison.
This result undoubtedly exceeded Wang Sheng's expectations.
After that, it happened that Emperor An of Han gave Wang Sheng a mansion. At that time, in order to repay Wang Sheng's nurturing kindness, Emperor An of Han directly took out a large amount of money from the treasury to repair Wang Sheng's house. This incident undoubtedly aroused everyone's anger again.
Because of the Eastern Han Dynasty at that time, the war with Xiqiang had just ended, as well as the continuous natural disasters for more than ten years before. At this time, there were occasional wars on the northern border, and there were occasional natural disasters in the country, and money was needed everywhere. At that time, the treasury of the Eastern Han Dynasty had already been empty!
Therefore, the money given by Emperor An of the Han Dynasty to Wang Shengxiu for the house was originally supposed to be used as military expenses for the Eastern Han Dynasty, or as money for disaster relief. But now, after Emperor An of the Han Dynasty waved his pen, all the money was taken to Wang Shengxiu to repair the house.
And then, after the turn of the year, in 124 A.D., something even more outrageous happened.
To put it simply, at that time, the son of Emperor An of the Han Dynasty, the crown prince Liu Bao, was sick. Then the prince's nurse thought that it was Wang Shengxiu's house that damaged the feng shui of the capital, so it caused the prince to fall ill. For this matter, the two nurses also quarreled, and many people behind them also began to quarrel because of this.
This incident was originally a short quarrel among parents. But when it comes to this special person, the situation is different.
Next, in order to vent his anger, Wang Sheng began to go to Emperor Han An to complain. And Emperor Han An, out of trust in his nursing mother, finally waved his pen and directly imprisoned the prince's nursing mother and the little eunuchs around him to death, and exiled the whole family at the same time.
This incident made the enmity between the two sides greater.
It is estimated that even Wang Sheng did not think that the consequences of the matter would be so serious. But after the verdict came down, Wang Sheng suddenly found that he had offended the prince at this time. In this way, once the future prince ascends the throne, how can he still have good fruits to eat?
Since then, Wang Sheng directly united with some eunuchs in the palace and continued to speak ill of Emperor Han An, and finally let Emperor Han An directly abolish the crown prince Liu Bao!
Of course, Emperor An of Han chose to abolish the crown prince, not only because of Wang Sheng's slander. A more important reason is that the crown prince Liu Bao at this time, his position as the crown prince was determined by Deng Sui before. Therefore, Emperor An of Han was also worried that after the crown prince ascended the throne, he would not be of the same mind as himself.
But in any case, it was indeed Wang Sheng's slander that triggered this incident.
And when these things are connected, the high-level leaders of the Eastern Han Dynasty in recent years seem very magical.
In other eras, the abolition of the crown prince was a major event. For example, in the era of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, if you wanted to bring down the crown prince, you had to first create a witch curse and make countless people's heads fall to the ground! But when you get to Emperor An of the Han Dynasty, it really seems to be a playhouse! A nurse said a few words casually, and let the prince be replaced!
In short, in the past few years, Wang Sheng has become the most special person in the entire Eastern Han Dynasty. On the one hand, she has no real power in her hands and cannot directly intervene in government affairs. But on the other hand, the emperor listened to her very much, and almost obeyed her words. This led to countless officials at that time starting to go through the back door frantically and befriend Wang Sheng. If you can't reach Wang Sheng, then go to Wang Sheng's two daughters and send them crazy money.
In this way, in the past few years, Wang Sheng's power has been monstrous, and everyone has to slap her. But at the same time, anyone with a discerning eye knows that she is actually not terrible, because she does not have any real power in her hands. Once Emperor An of Han died, Wang Shenghui instantly lost all power and was not worth a penny.
Sure enough, as everyone expected. Wang Sheng's fate next is indeed not very good. But what everyone didn't expect was that retribution would come so quickly. In 124 AD, because of the impeachment of Wang Sheng, the crown prince Liu Bao was deposed. In April 125 AD, before a year had passed, Emperor An of Han died directly.
After the death of Emperor An of the Han Dynasty, his empress Yan took over the power. And after Empress Yan took power, she immediately ordered that Wang Sheng and her two daughters be exiled directly to the border, and they were never allowed to come back!
In the face of Empress Yan's exile, Wang Sheng couldn't even resist at this time. Because she did not make any friends with courtiers, nor did she have any powerful generals to support her. All her previous power was built on the body of Emperor Han An. And without Emperor Han An, she really has no power at all.
It is hard to imagine that such a woman would turn the entire Han Dynasty upside down before. Those extremely smart ministers were stunned that there was nothing they could do with her. And when Emperor Han An died, any person who came could easily clean her up.
In this way, Wang Sheng and her two daughters were eventually exiled to Yanmen County in the north of Shanxi. Later, nowhere to be found, no one knows how she died.
In the later history books, everyone's description of Wang Sheng was very poor, and she was directly beaten into the ranks of traitorous villains. But at the same time, if we only look at Wang Sheng's story, we will feel that Wang Sheng doesn't seem to be so bad.
At least, she didn't want to kill anyone from the bottom of her heart. The real Wang Sheng in history seems to be a person who doesn't understand politics at all, but by chance, she suddenly got the highest power in the Han Dynasty.
But if we look at it from the perspective of those disaster victims or border soldiers, we may see something different.
Suppose we are a victim of a disaster who has just experienced a natural disaster, and our family has suffered heavy losses and is in urgent need of national assistance. At this time, someone told you that the emperor had used the disaster relief money that should have been given to you to repair the house for his nurse. This directly led to the death of your relatives one by one from hunger and cold, leaving you alone to live.
Another example is that we are a border soldier who is fighting desperately for the country. Then suddenly someone told you that there was no logistical supply recently, because the money to buy supplies was used by the emperor to repair the house of his nurse. This caused the soldiers to go to the battlefield hungry, and in the end, a large number of brothers who were born and died around them lost to the enemy because they did not have enough to eat, and then died on the battlefield.
If we bring this perspective, we may be able to understand how much people hated Wang Sheng at that time.
Regarding the matter of Emperor Han Andi repaying his nursing mother, everyone can actually understand and is willing to support it. But if your reward is to break the rules, take the state's public funds to repay the favor, take the life-saving money that originally belonged to others, and give others the kindness, this will create evil.
It's hard to say for sure.
We can only say that under the highly centralized system of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the work of the emperor is too demanding for people. Once the emperor himself made a mistake, it was up to the whole country to pay for it. And if you encounter a person like Emperor Han An, who does not distinguish between public and private and does not understand the essence of power at all, becomes the emperor, it may be a disaster.