For a long time, the people's comments on "Swallow Li San" were obviously polarized, and people in different regions had mixed reviews of him.
The land of Pingjin praised him as a heroic and righteous man who robbed the rich and helped the poor, but the people of Shandong hated "Swallow Li San" to the core, and criticized him as a thief who did all kinds of evil.
is also Yanzi Li San, and the evaluation gap in another place is so huge.
And in today's film and television works, Yanzi Li San is a positive image and is constantly praised by others, does that mean that the people of Shandong have a misunderstanding of him?
In 1949, the legendary "Swallow Li San" was officially arrested and executed in Jinan in October. After that, doctors performed an autopsy on his body and finally found the truth that he was as light as a swallow and walked on the ground everywhere.
The real hero "Swallow Li San"
In fact, it is normal for such different evaluations to appear, because "Swallow Li San" is just a title, and it is never limited to a specific person.
It is reported that during the period of the late Qing Dynasty and the Republic of China, at least a dozen people used this title before and after.
According to the research of relevant scholars, there are two influential "Swallow Li San", namely Li Jinghua, who is active in Hebei, and Li Shengwu, who is active in Shandong.
The former is a chivalrous thief in the public perception, and the latter is a heinous criminal.
Among these two people, Li Jinghua, who is really recognized as "Swallow Li San" by the historians, is Li Jinghua, who is active in Hebei, so today's film and television works are based on him.
Li Jinghua, also known as Li Hong, was born in Zhuozhou, Hebei Province in 1895.
Cangzhou has been the hometown of martial arts since ancient times, and the atmosphere of learning martial arts is strong, and Li Jinghua was also deeply affected after coming here, and worshiped a famous teacher to learn martial arts.
It is reported that Li Jinghua has an excellent talent in martial arts, and he can wear walls and trees when he is very young, and he has the effect of getting twice the result with half the effort when learning light skills.
However, learning martial arts did not immediately change Li Jinghua's fate, and his life was still poor.
In order to improve the life of his family, Li Jinghua finally decided to take a risk and use his excellent light skills to steal "extra money" from the rich family.
Swallow Li San in film and television dramas
Once, when passing through Luoyang, Li Jinghua saw that the local garrison commander Bai Xianwu was full of evil and had done all the bad things, so he decided to let him bleed profusely.
That night, Li Jinghua "patronized" the Bai family, not only stole the gold and silver treasures, but also took Bai Xianwu's gun, and left a note that "'Swallow Li San' came here for a visit".
Since then, the title of "Swallow Li San" has become famous, and then Li Jinghua has stolen the property of several wealthy families one after another.
Finally, when passing by Songshan, he went incognito to the famous Shaolin Temple, where he stayed for several years.
In this process, Li Jinghua learned a lot of excellent kung fu, and light kung fu has improved by leaps and bounds. After leaving Shaolin, he returned to Hebei and eventually started stealing in the Pingjin area.
In the following years, the name of "Swallow Li San" became more and more resounding, and was praised by many local people.
Because this thief only robbed the rich and the rich, never plundered the poor, and sometimes even gave the stolen property to some poor people.
It is rumored that every time Li Jinghua steals, he will imitate the tokens left by the chivalrous thieves in the novel, and he chose paper swallows as a mark, which aroused more people's curiosity.
Many newspapers also published reports about "Swallow Li San", and for a time, his popularity quickly increased and spread throughout North China.
The thief died, and the scum stole the prestige
However, as the saying goes: "How can you walk by the river for a long time without getting your shoes wet", Li Jinghua was finally arrested by the authorities at the end of 1934 and subsequently sentenced to 12 years in prison.
Less than two years later, however, he died in prison from a tuberculosis attack.
But the deeds of "Swallow Li San" did not end abruptly because of Li Jinghua's death, and a few years later, this name was re-active in Shandong.
Only this time, "Swallow Li San" became the representative of the thief.
Soon after Li Jinghua's death, another "Li San" who also had supernatural light skills entered the rivers and lakes, and then became famous in Shandong, he was the aforementioned Li Shengwu.
Li Shengwu
Li Shengwu, once known as Li Tianyi, was a native of Lijiazhuang, Yucheng County, Shandong Province.
He had a stubborn personality since he was a child, disobeyed the discipline of his parents, and was sent to Tiantai Temple in Jinan early to become a Taoist priest.
But it's a pity that this expectation was not realized in the end, after Li Shengwu entered the Taoist temple, instead of reining in, his personality became worse and worse, escalating from stubborn to bad, and he had no compassion for people and things.
What's even worse is that after apprenticeship with Tianchizi, Li Shengwu learned a skill, especially in light skills, and made rapid progress.
After Tianchizi's death, Li Shengwu left Jinan, traveled to the north, and finally found a master in Wutai Mountain, and learned from the other party a rare powerful light skill, almost comparable to Li Jinghua.
It is reported that Li Shengwu can jump one zhang five (about 5 meters) in the front and one zhang two (about 4 meters) in the back, which was almost unmatched at that time.
In 1936, Li Shengwu officially left Wutai Mountain, and then he returned to Jinan all the way, and began to use the powerful light skills as a traitor.
Li Shengwu is completely different from Li Jinghua, he is ruthless, tyrannical and cruel, has no mercy at all, and has no morality to speak of when stealing.
Whether it is a dignitary or a poor person, he will not hesitate to start.
Not only that, Li Shengwu was extremely ruthless when stealing, and even directly committed evil deeds when he met a beautiful woman.
If someone finds out when stealing, Li Shengwu will also brutally "harvest" the other party's life, whether he is innocent or not.
Therefore, at that time, the rivers and lakes called it "Black Swallow", and neither the underworld nor the white way wanted to offend this ruthless demon.
After coming and going, his nickname gradually spread to the people, and under the false rumors, he was regarded by many people as "Swallow Li San".
In this way, Li Shengwu became more and more arrogant, relying on his invincibility, and even dared to steal from the Japanese military police headquarters.
Later, he was successfully captured by the Japanese, but it was already 1945, and Japan surrendered soon, so Li Shengwu escaped smoothly.
Former site of the Fubei Command
After Shandong was recaptured by the Kuomintang, Li Shengwu continued to live as a traitor, and his crimes caused boiling public resentment.
But because he actually has a lot of treasure in his hands, he can escape smoothly every time, and even if he misses occasionally, he will be secretly let go quickly.
In 1948, the whole territory of Shandong was liberated, and Li Shengwu did not care about it at all, and continued to be a traitor according to the past ideas.
But this time, the people's police did not give him a chance to continue to go unpunished, and they formulated an extremely complete arrest plan. Although he was accidentally escaped by Li Shengwu, he was soon captured at the residence of a courtesan in Xuzhou.
Subsequently, the local government held a public trial, and it is reported that 35 cases of theft were handed down for clear evidence alone, as well as 10 life lawsuits.
In October 1949, Li Shengwu, who was full of evil, was executed in Jinan.
The doctor came up with the truth after the autopsy
It is reported that after Li Shengwu was shot, because he was full of evil during his lifetime, no one was willing to come forward to help him collect his body.
At this time, someone suggested that Li Shengwu's body should be studied to see what kind of body structure it was, so that he had the ability to "fly on the wall".
If there is any major discovery in the process, it can be regarded as making this heinous bastard make a little contribution to society.
As a result, Li Shengwu's body was handed over to the local medical school, and then it was dissected by professional doctors.
After some in-depth research, the doctors found a completely different place on Li Shengwu's body from ordinary people.
At that time, doctors dissected his thigh, and after studying, they found that the man's leg was completely free of any fat, and all of it was muscle.
And his calves and feet also have dense muscle fibers, which together constitute his powerful talent for light power.
After analysis, the doctors believe that Li Shengwu's situation should be the result of congenital factors and acquired exercise.
His well-developed muscles provide him with incredible explosiveness, which is why he is able to easily navigate through the deep mansion compound and look at the high walls as if they were nothing.
Of course, the doctors also pointed out that Li Shengwu's "abnormality" is still in the category of science that can be explained by science, and it does not go much beyond ordinary people.
Perhaps, he can indeed be as light as a swallow, but as depicted in some folklore, Li Shengwu can't do the kind of light skill that is almost "against the sky" of "Swallow Li San".
After the autopsy, Li Shengwu's thigh was made into a specimen by the doctors so that future generations could study it.
It is reported that this specimen was also placed in the exhibition hall at that time, and it was originally intended to be visited and analyzed by more medical experts.
Who knows, this news accidentally leaked, and many ordinary people poured into the exhibition hall out of curiosity, and even almost caused a stampede.
In desperation, the exhibition hall immediately chose to close, and then donated the specimen to the Jinan Police Museum, which has preserved it to this day.
epilogue
Although there are many characters who share the name of "Swallow Li San", in later film and television works, only Li Jinghua is recognized as the only "Swallow Li San".
On the one hand, it is because he has a chivalrous style, and he is the first among all to call himself "Swallow Li San". On the other hand, Li Jinghua had an official endorsement, after all, all the media in Peking at that time and the arrest documents of the Nationalist government called him "Yanzi Li San".
In fact, Li Shengwu's deeds have not been wasted, in the film and television dramas about Yanzi Li San produced a few years ago, the villain in it is based on Li Shengwu.
Reference:
"The story of Swallow Li San is a household name, but what is the real history?"
-- The Paper
"Shandong's "Swallow Li San" did all kinds of evil, which frightened the Kuomintang police"
- Qilu Evening News