Written by | Shassie
In the ninth year of the Reign of the Ming Dynasty (1496), a horrific bloody case occurred in Guangping County, Guangping Province, which was directly under the northern province: Fang Rujin, the son of Fang Youwen, the owner of a grocery store outside the county town of Xiguan, had long insulted and beaten his stepmother Xuanniang; the stepmother was so humiliated that she killed herself with a knife. Fang Rujin was furious when he saw this, and accidentally killed his father Fang Youwen when he grabbed the knife, and then hacked his stepmother to vent his anger with a knife.
The complainant of this case of manslaughter killing of his biological father and stepmother was Ouyang Daxian, the brother of one of the deceased, Xuanniang, and the person who took over the case at that time was a twenty-year-old young Zhixian Gu Xuan who had just taken office.
Gu Xuan is a native of Changzhou (Wu County, Jiangsu), who once lived in Nanjing, and was very talented from an early age, famous for his poetry, not only known as the "Three Talents of Jiangdong", but also known as the "Four Great People of Jinling", and one of the "Ten Talents of Hongzhi".
In the ninth year of Hongzhi, Gu Xuan, who had just turned twenty years old, entered the high school and was appointed to Guangping Zhi County. Who knows, as soon as he took office, he encountered this tricky and exterminating case of killing his biological father and stepmother.
After Gu Xuan received Ouyang Daxian's complaint, he deeply felt that the case was serious, did not dare to be careless in the slightest, and hurriedly sent someone to detain the important suspect Fang Rujin to the public court for interrogation. When asked, people were stunned, and what they heard was a completely different statement.
Fang Rujin was nineteen years old, born heroic, Yushu Linfeng, and now he has not yet married a wife and is still studying in a private school. According to his confession, his father, Fang Youwen, is forty-five years old this year, and his stepmother, Xuanniang, has just turned twenty-six, and belongs to a typical old husband and young wife. However, since his stepmother entered the door, because of her violent personality and fierce jealousy, she made the chickens and dogs in the family uneasy, and finally held a sharp blade and even cut off her father's neck, causing him to die on the spot, and when he saw his father die tragically, he was angry for a while, so he desperately went forward to grab the knife and killed her to avenge his father.
Gu Xuan saw that the two sides had their own opinions, each had its own reasons, and did not dare to make a judgment, and thought to himself: This bloody case, whether it is the killing of the husband by the wife or the killing of the mother by the son, is a heinous and serious crime of human morality, not only the murderer will be sentenced to Ling Chi's big punishment, but if there is a slight difference, he will also be implicated, and the light punishment will be punished, and the heavy will be dismissed from his post and lose his official position.
Thinking of this, Gu Xuan couldn't care that it was late, and he rushed to Fang Rujin's house with ya servants overnight to investigate. However, what he could never have imagined was that the time of the crime had passed more than half a month at this time, and the scene had long been destroyed, not only the victims Fang Youwen and XuanNiang had been buried, but even the house had been carefully cleaned, and there was no trace at all.
Gu Xuan saw the situation, and had no choice but to return to the county court sadly, after a whole night of deep thinking, he decided to open the coffin for autopsy, must find clues from it, in order to clear this fog.
Early the next morning, Gu Xuan took a group of servants and servants and hurried to the Fang family's cemetery to investigate the body. As soon as the coffin was opened, a strong bloody gas came to the nose, which showed the tragic state at the time of the crime.
After carefully examining the body, he came to report to Gu Xuan that there were a total of eleven knife marks on Fang Youwen's body, all of which were caused by the indiscriminate cutting of the neck and neck from behind, one of which cut off the neck artery, so that he bled too much and died of fatal injuries; while Xuan Niang had only one knife wound on her body, which directly cut the trachea and killed him on the spot.
Subsequently, Shu Zuo checked the sealed knife, which was a common kitchen knife, and after comparison, the scars on Fang Youwen and Xuan Niang's bodies were caused by this knife, and there was no other murder weapon.
Gu Xuan listened to the report made by Gong Zuo, nodded, and pondered for half a moment, believing that Fang Rujin's testimony had a high degree of credibility, but whether it was he who took the knife and killed his father Fang Youwen by mistake, and then killed his mother Xuanniang; or his mother killed his father, and he took the knife and killed his mother without anyone knowing, and the case was still confusing.
At this time, Gu Xuan suddenly thought of a suspicious point, that is, Fang You died of eleven knives in the tattoo, and should call for help due to pain, moreover, the Fang family is a small family, there are neighbors on the left and right, and they are very close, and someone will definitely hear it. However, neither Ouyang Daxian nor Fang Rujin mentioned this.
Thinking of this, Gu Xuan hurriedly asked people to send the neighbors for questioning, but they were all silent and couldn't ask anything at all. Finally, only one woman revealed a message, saying that Xuan Niang was also a remarried person, and Fang Youwen also knew that she had an ex-husband, but she and her ex-husband had a son, but they did not explain until they married in, so Fang Youwen was a little displeased in his heart, thinking that Xuan Niang was deliberately deceitful.
With this clue, Gu Xuan quietly went to investigate and confirmed that XuanNiang had an eight-year-old son who lived in the home of her brother Ouyang Daxian. At that time, he wanted to marry his sister to Fang Youwen, and he was worried that Fang Youwen knew that his sister had a son and did not agree to marry, so the two deliberately concealed this matter.
Gu Xuan thought to himself: Fang Youwen is already forty-five years old, XuanNiang is only twenty-six years old, originally an old husband and young wife, and Fang Rujin is also nineteen years old, the stepchild and stepmother are not much different in age, the relationship is difficult to harmonize, and Xuanniang has concealed the fact that she has a son, once people know, it will definitely cause contradictions to intensify, and it is inevitable to cause family disputes.
Therefore, Gu Xuan sent Fang Rujin's neighbors, even his second uncle Fang Youwu and Zhiye Enshi to the public court, interrogated them again, and warned them that if they did not tell the truth again, once the truth was found out, they would be condemned according to the law. Everyone was afraid, so they had to tell the truth, and finally found out the causes and consequences of this case, but the results were jaw-dropping.
It turned out that Fang Youwen married Gong shi as a wife in his early years and gave birth to two sons, the eldest son was named Rujin, and the younger son was called Ruxiu. Two years ago, the fourteen-year-old Ruxiu suddenly fell ill and died, and Gong Shi was devastated and left.
Fang Youwen lost his young son, his wife died of illness, the business of the grocery store also had to be taken care of, and the eldest son was still studying, and no one took care of his life, so he acted as a matchmaker and married Xuanniang, the sister of Ouyang Daxian, who was ten miles outside the city, as a step-room.
Who knows, after XuanNiang just entered the door, she immediately revealed her original form and had a violent personality, not only daring to scold Fang Youwen, but even abusing Fang Rujin, making a quarrel for three days and making a fuss for five days, just like a common meal.
At this time, Fang Rujin was an adult, because he could not stand the noise of his stepmother, he moved into the school in a huff, and only returned home once a month to visit his father for one night.
On that day, Fang Rujin happened to be home, and when he met his father and stepmother arguing, he went up to ask and learned that his stepmother Xuanniang originally had a son who lived in her brother's house, and although her brother was thirty-six years old, he still did not marry and only lived by hard work. Because of her heartache for her son, Xuan Niang often stole some money from Fang Youwen's house and sent it to her brother, but she did not expect to be discovered by Fang Youwen, so the two quarreled again.
After Fang Rujin knew the original commission, because he was a junior, it was not easy to go up to persuade him, so he went out and called the second uncle Fang Youwu to the house. Who knows, Xuan Niang didn't even give the second uncle's face, and even scolded him with a stink.
Fang Youwu was furious, but he had no choice but to go with Fang Rujin to invite the old patriarch of the Fang family to preside over justice. After the patriarch learned the details, he accused Xuan Niang in person that she was not, saying that she should not steal the family property, and asked Fang Youwen to leave her according to the clan rules.
Xuan Niang was furious when she heard this, and went forward to scold the patriarch, saying that he was an old immortal. The patriarch was very angry, pointing at her and saying to you, "Youwen, you useless thing?" Even his own wife can't control it, what qualifications do they have in the future to bury them in the graves of their ancestors and face the patriarchs? ”
As soon as Fang Youwen heard this, he was in a hurry, picked up the feather duster on the table and went to fight Xuan Niang. But Xuan Niang was not a fuel-saving lamp, rushed into the kitchen, took a kitchen knife, and slashed at Fang Youwen, which stunned everyone.
Fang Youwen screamed bitterly and immediately fell to the ground and died. The patriarch shouted, "Ru Jin, you filial beast, your father was killed by a wicked woman, are you still standing on the side watching the hilarity?" Don't kill this slut yet! ”
Fang Rujin was originally a scholar, and he was already frightened when he saw this kind of thing, however, he personally saw his father killed, and he was provoked by the patriarch, and he was suddenly red-eyed, and he couldn't help but be angry, and he rushed up desperately, grabbed the kitchen knife in XuanNiang's hand, smeared it on her neck, killed her on the spot, and stayed where he was.
The patriarch was dumbfounded at first glance, he had only said those words in a hurry, but who knew that in an instant, it suddenly led to a human tragedy in which his wife killed his husband and his son killed his mother, and he didn't know how to deal with it for a while.
Everyone looked at the patriarch in horror, and the patriarch fixed his mind and thought to himself: He is the head of a clan, and if there is such a big thing in the clan that hurts the customs and customs and kills two people in a row, he will inevitably be punished for instigating Fang Youwen to beat his wife and Fang Rujin to kill his stepmother. Moreover, if the matter is publicized, others will also say that they have no way to govern the clan and will be laughed at.
Therefore, the patriarch held a meeting overnight, explained the stakes of the matter, asked everyone to speak in unison, and no one was allowed to reveal the matter for half a sentence, saying only that Fang Youwen and Xuanniang and his wife suddenly had an emergency and died, and let people quickly take the two people to death, and cleaned up the scene of the crime.
At this time, the patriarch asked Fang Youwu to personally go to Ouyang Daxian's house and ask him to come and handle Xuanniang's affairs together. Ouyang Da saw that his sister had entered the coffin, and he couldn't help but be very suspicious in his heart, shouting that he wanted to open the coffin to see his sister for the last time. However, the patriarch refused on the grounds that the coffin was not auspicious and could not be reincarnated after death, and promised to let Fang Rujin compensate him with a sum of money. When Ouyang Daxian saw that he had money to take, he no longer insisted, so he agreed to let Xuanniang be buried with Fang Youwen.
A few days later, Ouyang Daxian heard that his sister was actually killed by Fang Rujin, so he came to Fang Rujin again to blackmail money. However, although the Fang family had a grocery store, in order to compensate Ouyang Daxian, it had been sold, so that it had lost the way to make money, and Fang Rujin refused where he still had money to give him.
Ouyang was furious when he saw the situation, so he asked someone to write a complaint and went to the new Guangping Zhi County Gu Xuan to accuse Fang Rujin of exterminating renren, personally killed his stepmother, and asked the government to help him administer justice. In the end, Gu Xuan found out the truth.
After the truth of the case came out, Gu Xuan couldn't help but sigh with emotion, these seemingly ordinary family trifles, but they intensified, and eventually led to the extinction of human tragedy, which was really regrettable.
After thinking about it, Gu Xuan felt that Xuanniang had killed her husband, and according to the law, Ling Chi should be sentenced, but she was already dead, and she could no longer be judged as guilty; and just by Fang Rujin's killing of her stepmother, he was also the one who should be executed by Ling Chi. However, Gu Xuan saw that Fang Rujin's age was almost the same as his own, and he had also read the Book of the Sages, and he intended to exonerate him. In the name of killing the guilty at the instigation of the patriarch, he was sentenced to sixty scepters and then released; the patriarch killed the guilty people for committing the crime of instigation, and also sentenced him to eighty sentences, and thought about it behind closed doors; and Ouyang Daxian, because he had privately collected the property stolen by Xuanniang, and constantly asked for money, should have been reprimanded for seventy and exiled for two years, but considering that Xuanniang's son wanted him to raise him, he was sent down lightly and also punished with eighty canes.
After Gu Xuan's verdict was made public, his superiors thought that although others were young, they were old and law-abiding officials, and they greatly praised him; when the people heard about it, they were also convinced and highly praised him, believing that his judgment of the case was not only legal and reasonable, but also had feelings and righteousness. Since then, the folk customs of Guangping County have also been greatly improved.
Fifteen years later, Gu Xuan was promoted to prefect of Kaifeng Province for his merits, and participated in the suppression of the rebellion of Liu Liu and Liu Qi, and then served as the prefect of Taizhou, the envoy of Zhejiang Province, the inspector of Huguang, and finally entered the dynasty as an official, all the way to the Shangshu of the Ministry of Works, to the Shangshu of the Nanjing Punishment Department, and finally returned to the countryside, leaving a legend of life.
@ Dong You Lou Gongji: This case warns everyone that people must be frank and calm when things happen. Ouyang Daxian and Xuanniang concealed the fact that they had children, and after marriage, they repeatedly stole the property of their husband's family, which caused disputes, and they killed their husband by mistake due to personality reasons; and Fang Rujin saw that his father was killed, and at the instigation of the patriarch, he angrily killed his stepmother, which eventually led to the massacre of humanity and the destruction of the family. Fortunately, the twenty-year-old young Zhixian Gu Xuan had a compassionate heart and gave him a way to live, otherwise, if he met a confused official who would only arbitrarily sentence the Gourd case, he did not know that several more people would die under the harsh punishment and cruel law!
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