Sentence / Kodama
The period of the Two Song Dynasty was essentially a period between the North and the South, and it was only a matter of time before the Southern Song Dynasty, which was partial to the south of the Yangtze River, was annexed by the North, but the demise of the Southern Song Dynasty also had its own problems that led to the acceleration of this process.
The Three Kingdoms period was the first period of the Northern and Southern Dynasties in history, Wu Shu formed a Southern Dynasties community in the form of an alliance to confront Cao Wei in the north, when Cao Wei eliminated internal contradictions, integrated northern resources and used population advantages to restore the economy, its military advantages can be maximized, and the fate of the Southern Dynasties naturally entered the countdown.
The same is true of the Northern and Southern Dynasties after the Wei and Jin Dynasties, when the Northern Dynasties complete the cultural integration, their military and economic advantages can be brought into full play, so as to complete the historical task of mixing the North and the South.
Similarly, the Song and Song dynasties were also a process of continuous expansion and integration of northern powers. The Liao State advanced its sphere of influence to the Yellow River Valley, the Jin State further advanced to the Huai River and Yangtze River Valley, and Mongolia, which had swooped down from the Mongolian Plateau, became the role of integrating the resources of the north, and when the north formed a stable community, the fate of the Southern Dynasty had already been decided.
This is the general trend of history, and it is not subject to human will.
However, unlike the Three Kingdoms and the Northern and Southern Dynasties, when the Southern Song Dynasty was peaceful, the economic center had moved southward, and the Southern Song Dynasty not only had the Yangtze River natural hazards, but also had strong economic strength as support, so the demise of the Southern Song Dynasty also had its own reasons.
In essence, the demise of the Northern Song Dynasty was because the resources were too concentrated, and the elite troops and wealth of the empire were concentrated in Bianjing, so when the Jin army defeated Bianjing, the Northern Song Dynasty collapsed in an instant, and it was unable to return to the sky. In the subsequent anti-Jin struggle, local forces have taken advantage of the situation to rise, and Yue Fei, Han Shizhong and other ministries were able to complete the important task of independent anti-Jin and take charge alone. However, in order to concentrate the imperial power, Song Gaozong cut the feudal domain again, concentrated the local superior forces in Lin'an and incorporated them into the forbidden army system, and at the same time shocked the feudal group by killing Yue Fei, resulting in the Southern Song Dynasty's military force value being artificially reduced from the beginning.
And the Southern Song Dynasty originally had no war horse resources, not the opponent of the northern cavalry, and now the Zhao and Song Dynasty officials continue to implement the ancestral training of Taizu Zhao Kuangyin to emphasize literature and light martial arts, and the south is not the opponent of the north at the level of force, which is equivalent to abandoning martial arts.
Until the eve of the fall of the Southern Song Dynasty, the imperial court was still carrying out various attacks on local forces, for example, in April 1260, Jia Rudao implemented the "plan law" to audit the army's property and thus achieve the goal of suppressing local military leaders. Although this move was conducive to the emperor's centralization of power and the solution of some financial problems, it also led to some military elites being taken advantage of or idle.
As we all know, since the fall of the Jin State in 1234, the Mongols have begun to use troops against the Southern Song Dynasty, and now at the most critical moment, the imperial court is still playing the card of cutting the domain, and it is impossible to distinguish the main contradictions.
The two Song Dynasty are essentially civil government Image source/stills
As a result, the contradictions between the military and the government were further aggravated, and local generals could easily fall into the infighting of the imperial court and could not devote all their attention to resisting the Mongolian army. Moreover, because the high-quality resources are concentrated in Jianghuai and Lin'an, when the Yuan army takes Xiangfan, it can quickly advance to Jiangdong and directly kill the command center of the Southern Song Dynasty, just like the Jin State destroyed the Northern Song Dynasty, which is essentially a beheading operation.
When Boyan defeated Lin'an, the Southern Song Dynasty basically perished.
The reason for this is that resources are too concentrated, and local generals are affected by infighting.
The second is the financial issue. The Southern Song Dynasty had limited income due to its preference for the south of the Yangtze River, but its expenses remained high. The biggest expense is to feed the troops. According to historical records, during the Chunyou period (1241-1252), there were 720,000 regular troops in the Southern Song Dynasty, plus militia and township soldiers, the total amount was definitely about one million. The huge army made the annual expenditure of the Southern Song Dynasty remain high, and at the same time, the phenomenon of land annexation became more and more serious, and the wealth was concentrated in the hands of local tycoons, landlords, and merchants, so the Southern Song Dynasty court often had a financial deficit. According to the minister Gauss in his recital to the emperor, "The annual income of the imperial court is only more than 120 million, but the expenditure is as high as more than 25,000 yuan." ”
Severe fiscal deficits.
For this reason, the imperial court had to collect taxes in advance, even after six or seven years. And this has undoubtedly increased the burden on the common people and greatly depleted the wealth of the people.
At that time, inflation and prices soared, and the price of rice in Lin'an Mansion was as high as 600 wen per bucket, which was twice as high as before the fall of the Northern Song Dynasty.
What made the Southern Song Dynasty court even more troublesome was that since the fall of the Jin State, the Mongolian army's war against the north has not stopped, and the war is essentially burning money, which makes the financial problems of the court more and more serious. Since ancient times, most dynasties have died due to financial collapse, and there is nothing wrong with saying that the Southern Song Dynasty died due to financial collapse.
To add a little more here, the Yuan Dynasty also had financial problems at that time, which was serious inflation, and Kublai Khan's strategy was to solve the financial problems by waging wars to destroy the Southern Song Dynasty to obtain a sharp increase in wealth.
Later, the huge wealth of Jiangnan did alleviate the fiscal deficit of the Yuan Dynasty to a certain extent.
For this reason, the Southern Song Dynasty court had to implement financial reform, allowing Jia Rudao to carry out the land reform of "buying public land": the number of fields owned by ministers was stipulated according to official ranks, and then the excess part was purchased according to one-third of the amount, used as public land, and then leased to the common people to increase fiscal revenue.
According to statistics, at that time, the six counties in western Zhejiang alone bought 3.5 million mu of public land, and the three counties of Zhenjiang, Dantu, and Jintan also bought 170,000 mu... To a certain extent, the financial crisis of the imperial court was alleviated, but the seriousness of the land annexation phenomenon in the Southern Song Dynasty can also be seen.
But after all, this reform was implemented a little late, and Jia Rudao's move not only pushed himself to the target of the public, but also offended many soldiers and landlords, further diluting the cohesion between these people and the imperial court, which was also one of the reasons why local officials and squires competed to surrender on the eve of the fall of the Southern Song Dynasty.
Of course, although science has been deeply rooted in the hearts of the people in the Southern Song Dynasty, it has not formed a full coverage of the bureaucracy, resulting in the late Southern Song Dynasty, many people surrendered to the Yuan army-
After the battle of Xiangfan, Zhide'an Mansion came to Xingguo and took the initiative to sacrifice the city; Huangzhou defender Chen Yi surrendered; Qizhou defender Guan Jingmo led the crowd to surrender; Jiangzhou defender Qian Zhensun sent a surrender table; Anqing's Fan Wenhu asked Boyan to come quickly; Nankang Army asked to surrender; Chizhou surrendered...
After the battle of Dingjiazhou, the cities of Taiping Prefecture (now Dangtu, Anhui), Jiankang, Ningguo (now Anhui), Pingjiang (now Suzhou), and Changzhou all fell to the wind.
Some people even left the garrison to surrender directly to the Yuan army on the grounds of defending Lin'an, for example, Lu Wenfu, the envoy of the five counties and Zhiyuan Prefecture, was ordered to serve the king, but when he went to Raozhou, he killed the imperial envoy and surrendered the Yuan army to Jiangzhou.
Of course, this is also related to the surrender of the Yuan army to the Xiangyang defender Lu Wenhuan, and Lu Wenfu, as the Lu family, will definitely follow in the footsteps of Lu Wenhuan. However, the phenomenon that the army and localities of the Southern Song Dynasty were controlled by big families can also be seen.
If there were a few more disciplined people like Wen Tianxiang in the Southern Song Dynasty, they would not die so quickly.
Wen Tianxiang was the last stubborn of the Southern Song Dynasty Source/Internet
And the fact is that the so-called elites all surrendered to the Yuan army in time, and although the remaining Wen Tianxiang, Zhang Shijie and others were full of loyalty indexes, their abilities were really average, and they did not have the ability to command the army to deal with the crisis at all.
How to say it, the performance of the Southern Song Dynasty scholars and doctors is not even as good as that of ordinary people, and after the fall of Lin'an, hundreds of palace maids committed suicide by jumping into the water to martyr the Southern Song Dynasty. Just like the shame of Jingkang, the eunuchs committed suicide without being humiliated, but Song Huizong's father and son chose to live.
At the same time, there was also the phenomenon of imperial power falling in the Southern Song Dynasty. Song Duzong reigned for ten years, and he couldn't do without Jia Nidao for a moment, which caused the power of the court to fall to Jia Nidao alone. How deep Duzong's dependence on Jia Nidao is, one thing can show that when Jia Nidao proposed to resign, Duzong cried and begged Jia Nidao to stay. Once, there was even a strange incident where Du Zong knelt down in front of everyone because of his weak legs because of nervousness.
The Duzong Dynasty has simply become the world of Jia Nidao, and the history books record: "Tai Zhi obeyed the orders of Dao." ”
The power was monopolized by the ministers, so the Southern Song Dynasty could not concentrate resources to do great things, let alone resist the Yuan army.
Of course, the reason why the Southern Song Dynasty had the phenomenon of imperial power falling was because there were too many Yongjun, and Song Xiaozong had already been lying flat after trying the Northern Expedition to no avail, and the quality of successive emperors since then has fallen off a cliff. The emperor's qualifications are mediocre, and his power will naturally be eroded by shrewd ministers, and powerful ministers are born.
In addition, the strategy of the Southern Song Dynasty to deal with the Yuan army was also problematic. Initially, the Southern Song Dynasty established a mountain fortress defense system based on Dongchuan and made Xiangfan a strategic town, but the Southern Song Dynasty did not continue to build a strategic town to limit the Yuan army's power to the Han River valley when the Yuan army broke through Xiangfan.
Obviously, the strategy of the Yuan army was to take Xiangfan, then enter the Yangtze River, and then go down the river to destroy the Southern Song Dynasty. Therefore, the Southern Song Dynasty should not concentrate too many resources on the Yangtze River, but should appropriately allocate it to the middle reaches of the Yangtze River and continue to build a strategic town. As long as the Yuan army can be blocked in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, then the downstream Jiangdong can be safe. But the result was that after the fall of Xiangfan, Boyan almost destroyed and quickly advanced to Jiangdong.
However, this should not be too harsh on the decision-making level of the Southern Song Dynasty, after all, it was only a matter of time before Jiangdong downstream was taken after the fall of Xiangfan.
On the fifth day of February 1276, Emperor Gong of Song led hundreds of civil and military officials to surrender to the Yuan army, and the Southern Song Dynasty was legally destroyed. At the end of the day, the Yuan army continued to sweep the localities, further integrating the resources of the south and incorporating them into the governance system of the Yuan Dynasty.
Three years later, on the sixth day of the second month of February 1279, with the crushing defeat of the Song army at Yashan, Lu Xiufu committed suicide by jumping into the sea with Emperor Zhao Hao on his back in desperation.
The Southern Song Dynasty was completely wiped out after the Battle of Yashan Naval Source/Internet
There was no Huaxia after Yashan, this was the first time that the Han people lost power in the whole territory, and the limits of the east, west, north and south were included in the territory of the Yuan Dynasty.
Although this is a proper tragedy, the evolution of history is inherently full of cruelty. However, because the Yuan Dynasty could not be compatible with Han culture, it only stayed in the Central Plains for more than 90 years before Zhu Yuanzhang drove back to the grassland.
History, and become the dominant role of the Han people.
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