On June 13, the fourth year of Jianwen (1402), Zhu Lu, the king of the valley, and Li Jinglong, the duke of Cao Guo, opened the gate of Jinchuan Gate to welcome the Yan army into the city, and the Jingshi fell.
They had already learned the news that King Yan's soldiers were coming to the city, and they knew that Emperor Jianwen would be defeated, and now when they saw a large group of soldiers appear in front of them, they suddenly rose with infinite fear, thinking that Emperor Jianwen was going to kill them before the defeat of the army, and the two of them wept bitterly and wailed.
Yongle the Great
And after learning that it was Yan Jun in front of him, he couldn't help but cheer, not only glad that he had saved his life, but also cheered that he could go back to be the vassal king who called for wind and rain.
But will Zhu Di do what they want?
Zhu Di was a vassal king who raised troops to become the emperor, and he naturally understood that the vassal king with military power and inheritance rights was an unstable factor that threatened the throne.
He raised troops because he opposed the cutting of the domain, but he actually supported the reduction of the domain very much in his heart, but now that he has just ascended the throne, the imperial power is unstable, and he is not suitable for a full-scale opponent, otherwise it will shake the correctness of Jingnan, and after the imperial power is stable, he will find an appropriate time to cut these feudal kings and completely cut off their thoughts of rebellion.
As for Emperor Jianwen's cutting of the domain, it was like child's play in Zhu Di's eyes, and he had just ascended the throne and even cut the three princes of Qi, Xiang and Dai, and then cut King Min.
Cutting four kings in a row in a year, isn't this forcing other vassal kings with military power to raise troops and make trouble, which is really not advisable.
King of the First Ming Dynasty
Zhu Di is a person who understands, the most important thing at the moment is to stabilize his position, not only can he not cut the feudal domain now, but also give these feudal kings some sweetness, stabilize them, and occupy the righteousness.
In the first year of Yongle (1403), Zhu Di restored the titles of Zhou Wanglu, Qi Wangyu, Dai Wang Gui, and Min Wanglu, as for Xiang Wangbai, he had self-immolated and had no heirs, and this vein was considered an absolute heir.
However, Zhu Di still did his best within his ability, and changed the "戾" of Emperor Jianwen's posthumous words to "dedication", which can be regarded as correcting his brother's posthumous name.
At the same time as restoring the title of King of Zhou, Zhu Di also intimately added 5,000 stone to this younger brother, you must know that the prince's salary in the early Ming Dynasty was only 10,000 stone a year, which increased by 50% all of a sudden, which is very interesting.
As for Zhu Lu, the king of the valley, when he opened the Jinchuan Gate and successfully let Zhu Di enter the city, Zhu Di also reciprocated the favor, gave him seven pieces of music and three hundred guards, and at the same time changed his fiefdom to Changsha, and Sui Lu added 2,000 stones.
Zhu Di's various overtures brought the illusion to some vassal kings who didn't understand things very well, thinking that they were still doing whatever they wanted like during the period of Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang.
But now the situation is completely different from the Taizu period, the reason why Zhu Yuanzhang let his sons guard the frontier is to prevent these founding heroes who follow him, but they are watching how Zhu Yuanzhang rises step by step, and it is not impossible to imitate Zhu Yuanzhang to start a business.
Therefore, Zhu Yuanzhang was very suspicious of these heroes, and after the world was stable, he gradually withdrew the military power of the generals, and replaced them with his own son, and gave the kings great power, nominally guarding the frontier, but in fact it was just to prevent these heroes and generals.
Before and after the Jingjing, the founding generals had already entered the ground, and most of the generals with military power had a wait-and-see attitude during the Jingnan period, which also proved that they had recognized the fact that the Zhu family was the son of heaven, and the difference was who became the emperor.
At present, including Zhu Di's restoration of the fiefdom of the same generation of vassal kings, Zhou Wang Zhu Hu, Chu King Zhu Zhen, Qi King Zhu Rong, Shu King Zhu Chun, Dai Wang Zhu Gui, Su Wang Zhu Ao, Liao King Zhu Zhi, Qing King Zhu Chang, Ning Wang Zhu Quan, Min Wang Zhu Lu, Gu Wang Zhu Lu, the rest have not been vassal, of which Qing Wang Zhu Chang was only in the third year of Jianwen, and there is no foundation, and there are only ten vassal kings that need to be dealt with.
Strategist Yao Guangxiao
Of course, these vassal kings didn't know Zhu Di's thoughts, and they thought that Zhu Di had really restored the ancestral system, and the first to emerge was Zhu Rong, the king of Qi.
Easily cut off King Qi
The King of Qi was very arrogant during the period of Zhu Yuanzhang, and after the restoration of the prince, he was still the same, and the impeachment of the King of Qi was numerous.
But the king of Qi didn't know if he didn't understand or just did it on purpose, he didn't repent at all after returning to the fiefdom, continued to recruit troops, and sent troops to garrison Qingzhou.
Of course, Zhu Di still wanted to give King Qi a chance to reform himself, after all, Jing Nan had only been a few years old, and he was not good at attacking his younger brothers, so he brought him King Zhou's recital of apology.
King Qi didn't even read a word
Speaking of King Zhou, he is still relatively smart.
In the third year of Yongle (1405), Zhu Di took the matter of the long history of the palace:
than the prefectures and counties recorded the Zhou governor Shi Si Bang Wen to play. The court and the palace are different in nature, and the Changshi Division is in charge of the affairs of the palace, so how can it be ordered all over the world to be outside the seal, and the court and so on? A family has the respect of a family, a country has the respect of a country, the world has the respect of the world, the humility does not exceed the respect, and the ancient system is also. If the traitor creates such a discord, it will be heard of the truth, and it should be investigated, and if the virtuous brother orders it, he will quickly send someone to return it, and still strictly prohibit the long history of acting, and keep it in general, and no one will ridicule him
What does this mean? Zhu Di said that the chief of the palace can only be in charge of the affairs of the palace, but now some people have "impeached" other prefectures and counties near the king of Zhou for openly posting the order of the chief history, and this kind of behavior is no different from that of the imperial court, and it is inevitably suspected of exceeding the system.
Then let King Zhou check himself, if there is no such thing, it means that someone "separates" the feelings of the brothers, if there is, the elder brother of King Zhou will go to standardize the history of the palace, do not overstep his authority.
King Zhou naturally understood Zhu Di's thoughts, and immediately went to the table, deeply stating his intention to repent and reform, Zhu Di gave King Zhou's letter to others to read, and openly and secretly asked these younger brothers to regulate the issue of their palace governors overstepping their powers.
Of course, King Qi is also an example, but King Qi just doesn't listen, but becomes more and more rampant.
In the fourth year of Yongle (1406), the king of Qi entered Beijing to worship, and a minister impeached the king of Qi for his illegal acts.
"When the traitor chatters, and wants to follow Jianwen's example, he will kill this generation."
These words, the choked Zhu Di was speechless for a long time, comparing Zhu Di to Jianwen, wouldn't the King of Qi want to be appeased, and ordered to cut off the guards of the King of Qi on the spot and detain them in Beijing, and then found out the over-made items in the palace of the King of Qi, and now it has to be dealt with if it is not dealt with.
Emperor Longwu of the Southern Ming Dynasty finally gave him the nickname "Gong".
In August of that year, Zhu Di summoned all the heirs of the prince of Qi to the capital and abolished them as concubines together, thus ending the line of the king of Qi.
Kill the king of the valley in righteousness
With the example of King Qi, other vassal kings should be honest, but there is someone with an iron head, and this person is Zhu Lu, the king of the valley.
The king of the valley thought that he had made a great contribution to Zhu Di's opening of the door, so he was arrogant and indulgent, and in the fiefdom he plundered the people's land and embezzled taxes, and also killed innocents indiscriminately.
If this is at most, it will be rampant, but the king of Gu secretly learns from the king of Qi, recruits outlaws, learns the art of war, builds warships and crossbow equipment, and conspires with Zhang Cheng, eunuchs Wu Zhi and Liu Xin day and night, and even forges a letter to show that he inherits the mandate of heaven.
even planned to summon strong men into the palace at the time of the Lantern Festival celebration, waiting for the opportunity to act, and it was almost an open rebellion.
Ming Dynasty
And after doing this, King Gu felt that the success rate was not high, and began to look for his alliance again, and after looking for it, he found his brother King Shu.
But how to tell the king of Shu his plan? It is too clear to write, too obscure and not good, and finally writes a hidden letter that is not straightforward but can explain the problem.
After learning about the actions of the king of the valley, the king of Shu was very surprised, and planned to denounce his younger brother, but after all, he thought that he was born to a mother and gave him a chance, so he wrote a letter to persuade him to dispel this idea, but the king of the valley was bent on usurping the throne and did not listen at all.
Soon the son of the king of Shu, Zhu Yuexian, the king of Chongning, was scolded for the matter, and ran to the house of the king of Gu in a fit of anger.
But there is no impermeable wall in the world, and the plot of the king of the valley was still told to Zhu Di by the king of Shu, but Zhu Di had long known that the king of the valley was plotting wrong, after all, Zhang Xing, the guard around the king of the valley, was afraid of causing trouble, and he had already reported it to Zhu Di, but Zhu Di was not sensible and just wanted to finish his work.
Now that the King of Shu is in the book, Zhu Di can no longer pretend to be stupid, and must make a clear statement, but there are also skills in how to express his position.
Zhu Di said that he was so good to the king of the valley, why did he rebel, Zhang Xing, the governor of the guard, had reported this matter, and he didn't believe it, but now even the king of Shu has denounced it, and he can't help but believe it and get righteousness from public opinion.
Then Zhu Di ordered the lieutenant to summon Zhu Lu into the court with an edict, and after Zhu Di entered the court, he was frightened when he saw the denunciation letter of the King of Shu, and many ministers also impeached the King of Gu and asked Zhu Di to kill the King of the Valley.
But Zhu Di said that King Gu was his younger brother, and it was not easy for him to deal with it alone, so he asked other vassal kings how to deal with it.
What can the other vassal kings do? The kings of Zhou, Chu, and Shu wrote one after another, saying that the king of Gu had violated the teachings of his ancestors and plotted against him, and that he should be punished for his crimes.
In the first month of the fifteenth year of Yongle (1417), Zhu Di ordered the king of the valley and his son to be abolished as concubines, and the line of the king of the valley ended.
Portrait of a Ming Dynasty official
King Min, King Dai, King of Zhou, King of Liao
King Min's fief is in Yunnan, and Yunnan is the fief of the Duke of Qianguo, so that the contradictions between the two sides will inevitably occur frequently, if it were not for the death of Zhu Yuanzhang, Mu Chun, the Duke of Qianguo, would really not be able to fight the King Min who was the prince.
After Zhu Di became the emperor, he naturally would not change the title of other places, and put King Min back in Yunnan, but he also knew that King Min would inevitably fight with the Duke of Qianguo, so he wrote a letter to persuade peace, and the contemporary Duke of Qianguo Mu Sheng stopped, but King Min himself began to do it.
Not only did he collect the seal letter from Zhu Si, but he also slaughtered the people, and the angry Zhu Di directly snatched his book treasure as a punishment, and returned it to him not long after.
But King Min did not repent and still went his own way.
In the sixth year of Yongle (1408), Zhu Di cut off the guards and dismissed the officials, and in the Zhu Gaochi period, it was renamed to Wugang.
As for the acting king Zhu Gui, he is also an arrogant vassal king, and he doesn't want Zhu Di to grab the handle in the feudal country, and the impeachment of the acting king is piled up on Zhu Di's desk like snowflakes, and Zhu Di takes the opportunity to cut off the acting king's guards.
However, the younger sister of Princess Dai and Queen Xu, King Dai and Zhu Di are both brothers and brothers-in-law, and they didn't deal with it much, just punished them a little, and the acting king was just arrogant, which was not enough to threaten the imperial power.
As mentioned earlier, King Zhou can see it more clearly, but Zhu Di didn't let him go.
King Zhou compiled the "Materia Medica"
In the eighteenth year of Yongle (1420), someone accused the king of Zhou of rebellion, the king of Zhou was summoned to the capital, the king of Zhou saw the letter accusing him of rebellion, and immediately knelt down and kowtowed to the capital crime, Zhu Di did not deal with it, put it back in the fiefdom, and it did not take long for the king of Zhou to write a request to cut off his three guards.
As for Zhu Zhi, the king of Liao, the vassal king who was a vassal in Guangning, was also a capable lord, and he once trained soldiers and horses in Liao and made many military exploits.
During the Jingjing period, Emperor Jianwen was afraid that the King of Liao and the King of Yan would collude together, so he summoned the King of Liao to the capital and changed the title to Jingzhou.
Compared with other vassal kings, the King of Liao is a more real vassal king, let him do whatever he wants, if Emperor Jianwen asked him to lead the army to fight, he was also willing, but Emperor Jianwen was afraid that the King of Liao would become bigger, and refused to let him lead the troops, but let the King of the Valley at both ends of the head rat guard the door, if the King of Liao led the Liao army behind the battle, the outcome may change.
Since the King of Liao and Jianwen were so "friendly", Zhu Di naturally would not be polite to him, and in the tenth year of Yongle (1412), he cut off the guards of the King of Liao, leaving only 300 military academy cooks.
King Ning, who keeps to himself
Unlike King Liao, King Ning really helped Zhu Di conquer the world, and Zhu Di may have promised to share the world equally with King Ning, but it is one thing to say that it is another thing to do, and after Zhu Di ascended the throne, King Ning was renamed to Nanchang.
The descendants of King Ning are still reversed
Even so, there were still people who "accused" King Ning of rebellion, but Zhu Di checked and found nothing abnormal, so it passed.
King Ning also knows what kind of person his brother is, and he also understands his current situation, he reads and plays the piano in Nanchang all day long, and does not ask about world affairs, so knowledgeable, Zhu Di is naturally very satisfied, and naturally he will not deal with it too much, as for the other vassal kings, they will either be renamed to the mainland during the period of Emperor Jianwen, or they are too young to succeed.
In this way, Zhu Di easily completed the great cause of cutting the feudal domain that Emperor Jianwen failed to complete, compared with Emperor Jianwen's naïve means of cutting the domain, Zhu Di didn't know where Gao Ming wen, but unfortunately Emperor Jianwen couldn't see it.
Of course, the core of Zhu Di's cutting of the feudal domain is to move with the times, and he knows that almost none of his brothers are honest, and they are more or less arrogant and lawless to oppress the people.
His approach is to ignore it in the early stage, and even reward items to express his love for these vassal kings, but deliberately conniving at these vassal kings to have grudges with the local people, and dealing with them when the grievances are monstrous, which not only stabilizes people's hearts, but also subtracts the sorrows, killing two birds with one stone, no matter the righteousness or public opinion, he will not say a word.
As for Emperor Jianwen, as soon as he ascended the throne, he began to cut down the feudal domain, so as to accumulate strength and stabilize his imperial power.
As soon as the feudal domain came up, he cut the wise King of Xiang, the King of Xiang and the princess of Xiang, Qin Se and Ming En, who loved each other, never did evil, and did not have a son, no matter from any point of view, he would not rebel, but Emperor Jianwen took him and forced the King of Xiang to self-immolate, such a virtuous king can be forced to self-immolation, and other vassal kings will have to rebel if they do not rebel.