Dig a new big pit: starting from the "Zizhi Tongjian" to talk about Chinese history, today I open a piece, I hope you will urge me to dig this pit to the sky and the earth, digging through the earth.
One of the "Zizhi Tongjian" Long Talks
King Weilie of Zhou twenty-three years Peng Yin 403 BC
At the beginning, the Jin dynasty masters Wei Si, Zhao Yuan, and Han Qian were appointed as princes
【Interpretation】
Wei, Han, and Zhao, the three great rebels who plotted against and usurped power, were officially recognized by the King of Zhou and became princes. Mr. Sima Guang said that he could not bear this, can this thing of righteousness and fame be given to people casually? No, I have to say, so I wrote a long speech at the end of this matter, and stressed again, if we want to learn from history, let's start with this matter. Since his tirades are not easy to read at all, I will not repost them.
The point here is to talk about how the once-prosperous Huanghuang Great Jin was divided by these three courtiers?
I. Quwo Daiyi: Starting from a metaphysical beginning
This story is a long story, and there is a metaphysical beginning four hundred years ago: in 805 BC, the ninth monarch of the Jin Dynasty, The Wife of The Marquis of Jin, Jiang Shi, gave birth to a prince during the Battle of Tiaodi and took the name Qiu. Qiu's brother was born during the Battle of Qianmu, so he was named Chengshi. At that time, a doctor named Shifu in the Jin Dynasty predicted that husband and wife would love each other as concubines, and husbands and wives would hate each other, which was the naming method of the ancients. Now the monarch named the prince Qiu and his brother Chengshi, which was a sign of trouble. I am afraid that the brother will be deposed! ”
In 784 BC, Marquis Mu of Jin died, and his younger brother Uncle Jin briefly usurped the throne, and four years later he was seized the throne by Gongzi Qiu, the eldest son of Marquis Mu of Jin, who was the eleventh monarch of the Jin Dynasty. Marquis Wen of Jin reigned for 35 years, and after Marquis Wen of Jin's son Marquis Zhaohou of Jin ascended the throne in 745 BC, rebellion broke out near Quwo. Marquis Zhaohou of Jin called his uncle Chengshi, the brother of Marquis Wen of Jin, Uncle Quwo Huan. However, Quwo was a larger city than the capital of the Jin Dynasty at that time (Shanxi Wing City). Thus the trouble came: after that, Chengshi, who had no less than the strength of the monarch, and his descendants, began to compete with the descendants of the enemy for decades, that is, the Jin Dynasty Emperor, for the throne of the monarch.
By 679 BC, after 67 years of civil war, the grandson of Chengshi, Duke Quwowu, finally eliminated the descendants of Marquis Ji of Jin and turned himself into duke Wu of Jin. The Jin dynasty was temporarily stable, and the history was called "Quwo Daiyi". At that time, the King of Zhou actually admitted this usurpation very bloodily.
You know, the foundation of the Survival of the Zhou Royal Family is the set of ritual law system. The blatant usurper of the Duke wu of Jin could actually get official recognition from the King of Zhou, which made people feel that the Zhou royal family was already very unhappy at that time, and the broken jar was broken? Stomp on your feet at will. From this point of view, nearly 300 years later, it is not surprising that the more powerless Zhou royal family recognized the status of the three thieves of the Jin Dynasty as princes.
Second, learn the lesson of QuwoDaiyi: kill all the clans
Ruins of the Jin Dynasty of Houma, Shanxi
Speaking of the Jin dynasty after the "Quwo DaiYi", the Duke of Jinwu went there within two years after he successfully ascended the throne. He was succeeded by the Duke of Jin, and his name was also very strange: Wei Zhu. Mr. Ji Weizhu was a fierce and ambitious lord, but at the same time he encountered a group of ambitious clan members, who were the sons and grandsons of their great-grandfather Chengshi, known in history as the "Huanzhuang Clan", who continued the fierceness and greed of Qu Wo's line, and wanted to kill Jin Xiangong all the time. It makes Jin Xian's public bed restless and the food is not good.
At this time, the Grand Master Shi Hagi offered a very vicious plan: to separate the princes of the clan room. He said to Jin Xiangong, "If you get rid of the rich sons first, then the princes will be easy to deal with." Jin Xiangong said, "You try to do this." Shi Bao said bad things about Fuzi among the princes, and then tried with the gongzi to get rid of Fuzi. So, the clan named Fuzi was the first to receive a box lunch.
Next, Shi Bao once again plotted with the princes to kill the two sons of the You clan. The following year, the You family also collectively received a box lunch, and then other clan princes built a city in a place called "Ju". In the winter of that year, Jin Xian sent people to surround the city, and all these remaining clans were "clicking and clicking".
Starting from the "Quwo Dai Wing", the Jin Dynasty slaughtered the entire clan room, which is the second ring of this great historical cause and effect.
Third, even his own son was not spared
Northern Song Dynasty Li Tang Painting "Jin Wen Gong Fu Guo Map"
The Ben family had killed almost everything, and the throne of the Duke of Jin xian was basically no longer threatened. But Jin Xiangong seems to be addicted to playing bloody palace fighting, or perhaps in too cruel killing, human nature has been completely distorted and perverted. In 672 BC, Duke Xian of Jin attacked Li Rong and included the beautiful li ji sisters in the harem.
In order to seek the right to inherit for her son, Li Ji went through a series of conspiracies to seize the concubine, superimposed on the cruel nature of the cunning, and finally forced the death of the crown prince Shensheng in 655 BC, and the princes Zhong'er (Jin Wengong) and Yiwu (Jin Huigong) ran away. Li Ji also made an alliance between Wei Zhu and the Jin dynasty ministers: neither of them would accept or help the princes who went out.
In 651, Duke Xian of Jin died, and the State of Jin fell into civil strife again, another round of fierce fighting, and finally ended with the return of Duke Wen of Jin in his twilight years to succeed him. Although Duke Wen of Jin was a generation of overlords, he left a new hidden danger during his reign, that is, because the clan had been weakened in the previous killings, there was no way to weaken anymore, correspondingly, those foreign-surnamed heroes who followed Duke Wen of Jin for nineteen years in exile, Hu Yan, Zhao Wan, Qianjie, Wei Yi, Xu Chen, and The Ancestors and Luan Zhi promoted after the Return of Jin Wen Duke, filled the power gap in the Jin Dynasty.
The essence of power lies in balance, and at this time, the Jin Dynasty court is obviously that the power of the foreign-surnamed gongqing is far greater than that of the clan. Moreover, after the Jin Dynasty, a tradition was formed, that is, the sons of the monarch were generally not left in their home countries until they were about to succeed to the throne. This further exacerbated the imbalance of power in the Jin Dynasty.
This is the third link in the cause and effect of this great history.
Fourth, the consequences of power imbalances
Stills from "The Orphan of Zhao"
After that, these foreign-surnamed secretaries of state developed and maintained the hegemony of the Jin state. Of course, at the beginning, there were not only three families of Han Wei and Zhao, but as many as a dozen: Fox, Xian, Hao, Xu, Luan, Fan, Zhonghang, Zhi, Han, Zhao, and Wei. In accordance with the principle of "making up for the long death", they took turns to govern, went in and out of the country, and for more than a dozen consecutive generations under the banner of the Jin Dynasty, they "honored the king and defended the Chinese civilization" under the banner of the Jin Dynasty.
But on the other hand, the Jin dynasty was always thin, so these foreign-surnamed princes continued to encroach on the power of the Jin Marquis. Generally speaking, since the father and son of The Duke Wen of Jin and the Duke of Xiang of Jin successively dominated, the state affairs of the Jin State were basically in the hands of the gongqing with different surnames. At the same time, these princes with different surnames are not constantly fighting and fighting, and some families have been killed by the whole family, and finally the so-called "six secretaries" are left, that is, the six major families of the Fan family, the Zhonghang family, the Zhi family, the Han family, the Wei family, and the Zhao family.
As for the fate of the Six Qings of the Jin Dynasty, the military scholar Sun Wu had made predictions as early as 512 BC. At that time, when King Wu asked Sun Wu to predict the situation in various countries, he pointed out that the situation of the six secretaries of the Jin dynasty would not last long, because the land was too small, the taxation was too heavy, and the squeezing was excessive, the Fan and Zhonghang clans would perish first, and the Zhi clan would be the second to squeeze the people, but they were too arrogant and belligerent, and would perish after the Fan and Zhongxing clans. Only the Zhao family's taxation is not heavy, and the leniency of the government is obtained, and it is bound to prosper.
Sun Wu expected it to be no worse. By the end of the Spring and Autumn Period and the beginning of the Warring States Period, the six major families continued to fight, and finally the four major families of the Zhi family, the Han family, the Wei family, and the Zhao family were left.
Fifth, from the six major families to the four major families
Schematic diagram of the three branches of Jin
The fight between the jinguo gongqing family is another story full of bloody and strange things, and the excitement and intensity are no less than the fights between countries. Skipping the previous one or two hundred years of fighting, here is a brief history of the last battle of the Six Qings.
In 497 BC, the Zhao clan was infighting, and the Fan and Zhongxing clans jointly attacked the Zhao clan, and Zhao Martin was defeated and retreated to Jinyang. The three families of the Zhi, Wei, and Han clans rebelled against the Fan and Zhongxing clans, forcing them to go out of the chaoge.
In 493 BC, the Fan and Zhongxing clans joined forces with the Zheng and Qi states to attack the Zhao clan. Before the war, Zhao Martin announced the policy of rewarding merits and deeds, won the support of the people of all walks of life, and won victory.
In the spring of 490 BC, Zhao Martin led the Jin army to attack the Fan and Zhongxing clans again, the latter were completely defeated and fled to the State of Qi, the Fan clan and the Zhongxing clan were destroyed, and the remaining four families divided the land of the two families.
In 475 BC, Zhao Martin died of illness, Zhi Yao came to power, and the Zhi family became increasingly powerful. When the family Zhi Yao was extremely intelligent, but his eyes were higher than those in the top eyes, as a result, in 453 BC, when he joined forces with the Han and Wei families to attack Jinyang, the Zhao base area, the Han and Wei families repelled the entire clan from behind. This is the story we'll tell in detail in our next article.
In 403 BC, the three families of Han, Zhao, and Wei sent emissaries to Shangluoyi to see King Weilie of Zhou and ask for the title of prince. King Zhou Weilie felt that it was useless not to admit it, so it was better to be a shunshui person, so he agreed. Later, Han, Zhao, and Wei became the great powers of the Central Plains, and with the addition of the four great powers of Qin, Qi, Chu, and Yan, there was the well-known name of "Seven Heroes of the Warring States".
(To be continued)