Ma Chao is a figure quite familiar to fans of the Three Kingdoms, and he was named the "Five Tiger Generals" along with Guan Yu, Zhang Fei, Zhao Yun, and Huang Zhong. In the six battles of Weiqiao, Ma Chao beat Cao Cao and had to cut off his beard and abandon his robe to save his life. It is enough to see the strength of Ma Chao, he is such a tiger general, but he did not end up with a good ending, and he only lived to the age of 47 and died young.
According to the records, Ma Chao died of illness, but the reason why Ma Chao really died was not as simple as simply having an illness. In fact, Ma Chao experienced a rather tragic thing, which was the root cause of Ma Chao's illness and death. But because it is too tragic, the history is not written in detail, so there are not many people who know, now let's uncover the mystery of Ma Chao's death and understand this tiger general from a special side.
In the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Ma Chao was born in a famous general who was both literate and martial. The family is the Xiliang clan, the grandfather is the Fubo general Ma Yuan, his father is the Xiliang Taishou Ma Teng, influenced by the family, Ma Chao has practiced a skill since he was a child, and before he was thrown into Liu Bei's command, he was already famous. People who have seen the Romance of the Three Kingdoms know that Cao Cao is a person who loves talents, and he has invited Ma Chao to defect to his command many times, but Ma Chao has long seen through Cao Cao's true thoughts and directly refused, which makes Cao Cao quite disappointed, and also lays the cause and effect for the subsequent disasters.
In the 16th year of The Han Dynasty's Jian'an, Cao Cao led his troops into Guanzhong, and Ma Chao led his troops to resist Cao Cao, but was defeated by Cao Cao using the "Divisive Strategy". However, after gathering his troops, he once again led an army to attack the counties of Longshang, but unfortunately failed again, after which Ma Chao had to rely on Zhang Lu in Hanzhong. Later, Cao Cao defeated Ma Chao, and Ma Chao chose to defect to Liu Bei, and when Liu Bei learned that Ma Chao was coming to surrender, he happily said: Yizhou (that is, today's Chengdu) can be taken! Liu Bei sent someone to meet Ma Chao and secretly gave him an army of his own, and Ma Chao immediately led his troops straight to Chengdu and garrisoned them in the north of the city. When the people of Chengdu heard that Ma Chao had come, everyone was terrified, and within ten days, Liu Zhang opened the city gate and surrendered to Ma Chao. After averaging Xichuan, Liu Bei promoted Ma Chao to the rank of General of Pingxi.
In the 24th year of The Han Dynasty's Jian'an, Liu Bei led an army to capture Hanzhong, and in the autumn of that year, a hundred Shu Han officials led by Ma Chao jointly wrote to Liu Bei to persuade him to call him the King of Hanzhong, and Liu Bei then called Ma Chao the Queen of Hanzhong and promoted Ma Chao to the rank of General Zuo. In 221 AD, Liu Bei was proclaimed emperor in Yizhou, with the era name "Zhang Wu" and the history books called Shu Han. Liu Bei made Ma Chao the post of Marquis of Liangzhou Mu, and if you want to say why Ma Chao defected to Liu Bei, you have to start from Ma Chao himself, Ma Chao is brave and fierce, but he is far inferior to Cao Cao in terms of planning.
The history books record that after Ma Teng entered Beijing, Ma Chao began to command the three armies, and brought the army with a look. In the 16th year of Emperor Jian'an of The Han Dynasty, Cao Cao wanted to use Ma Chao's territory to attack Zhang Lu in Hanzhong, and Ma Chao not only rejected the sinister and cunning Cao Cao, but also joined Han Sui in the fight against Cao Cao in the battle, and even narrowly killed. Since then, Cao Cao has been completely disappointed in Ma Chao, and even said that Ma Chao's children are not dead, I am afraid that I will not even have a place to bury, and since then, Cao Cao has hated the Ma family to the bone, and even depressed to kill them. Until May 17, when Emperor Jian'an of the Han Dynasty, Cao Cao ordered that Ma Teng and Ma Jiazong's relatives beheaded dozens of people, and also sent the Western Expeditionary Army led by Xiahou Yuan to attack Ma Chao, because the battle was very fierce, Ma Chao's army suffered heavy losses, Xiahou Yuan's reinforcements arrived after Ma Chao had already fled in a daze, and was cornered, so he decided to defect to Liu Bei, after this, I believe that one of the things Ma Chao wanted to do most was to kill Cao Cao with his own hands to avenge his father and family.
In the 16th year of the Han Dynasty Emperor Jian'an, he finally fought against Cao Cao that year, and in late July the two armies fought for more than ten rounds, after Ma Chao led a large army to defeat Cao Jun. Ma Chao, Ma Dai and Pound Led Hundreds of Cavalry directly into the Middle Army of Cao Cao's army, intending to capture Cao Cao alive in the chaotic battle, Cao Cao heard Ma Chao's army shouting, it was Cao Cao who was wearing the red robe, so he hurriedly took off the red robe, and then heard ah, it was Cao Cao who grew a long beard, Cao Cao hurriedly cut the beard with a sword, Ma Chao led the army at this time to shout that it was Cao Cao who had a short beard, and Cao Cao quickly pulled on a flag to wrap his neck and hurriedly drove away on his horse. When he was running away, Ma Chao killed again, intending to chase and kill. After that, Cao Hong and Xiahou Yuan arrived one after another. Ma Chao was worried about being plotted and retreated, which was the "Six Battles of Weiqiao". In the second year of Liu Bei's reign as emperor, that is, in the second year of Zhang Wu, Ma Chao unfortunately fell seriously ill, during which he wrote to Liu Bei, saying that 200 members of his family had been killed by Cao Cao, and only his brother Ma Dai was still alive in the world, and he decided to entrust the clan to Ma Dai to Liu Bei, and there was no other concern.
In December of the second year of Zhang Wu, Ma Chao died of illness at the age of 47, so from another point of view, due to Cao Cao's cunning and treachery, Ma Chao was never able to take revenge as he wished, even if he defected to Liu Bei to fight Against Cao Ke, he did not achieve the ultimate goal. As a result, the depression ended. The cause of Ma Chao's death is inseparable from Cao Cao's massacre of the Ma family, which is also the most excessive thing Cao Cao did to Ma Chao. Ma Chao began to fight against Cao Cao, and later his whole family was slaughtered by Cao Cao. After that, although he repeatedly defeated Cao Cao, strategically, Ma Chao was not at all the opponent of the treacherous Cao Cao. Cao Cao was repeatedly defeated, but he could fight again, because Cao Cao had sufficient troop deployment and logistical support. These Ma Chao did not have any, he failed once he could not make a comeback, therefore, after Ma Chao was defeated by Cao Cao, he chose to attach himself to Zhang Lu, but he never expected that Zhang Lu was actually framed by his colleagues, and even his wife and children were sacrificed by Zhang Lu to Cao Cao, and finally had no choice but to defect to Liu Bei.
It is said that Cao Cao was a generation of tyrants, or even a generation of adulterous males, from the Romance of the Three Kingdoms alone we know that there are countless people who died at the hands of Cao Cao, but in the massacre of the entire Ma family, this method of cutting grass and rooting out the roots is so tragic that even the history of the zhengshi dare not record in detail. In any case, Ma Chao himself is a tiger general, there is no doubt about this, he has a fairly deep martial arts attainment, and historians of successive dynasties have also rated Ma Chao very highly. Luo Guanzhong, the author of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, spoke highly of Ma Chao, looking back on Ma Chao's life, coming from a family of literature and martial arts, and becoming famous as a teenager, even before Liu Bei. However, the whole family was killed by Cao Cao, which deeply affected Ma Chao and changed his future historical direction.
Although Ma Chao was known as the Five Tiger Generals together with Guan Yu, Zhang Fei, Zhao Yun, and Huang Zhong, Xiao Yong fought well for most of his life, but in the end he ended up with a depressed ending, which was really sighing.