Famous generals of the past generations - Yuwen Tai, the founder of the Northern Zhou Dynasty

Yuwen Tai (507–556), courtesy name Black Otter, a native of Wuchuan, Dai Commandery, descendant of the Xianbei Yuwen Clan, a vassal of the Western Wei Dynasty of the Northern and Southern Dynasties, and the founder of the Northern Zhou regime, reigned for more than twenty years.

In the "Six Towns Rebellion" that occurred in the last years of the Northern Wei Dynasty, Yuwen Tai joined the rebellion with his father Yuwen Qiu. After the uprising was suppressed by Erzhu Rong, Yuwen Tai became his subordinate general He Bayue. In the third year of Yong'an (530), Emperor Xiaozhuang of Northern Wei killed Erzhu Rong, and soon after, the Erzhu clan was defeated, and Gao Huan took the position of chancellor and thus took power. Emperor Xiaowu of Northern Wei secretly commanded He Bayue to use it to restrain Gao Huan.

In the third year of Yongxi (534), He Bayue was killed, and Yuwentai was naturally pushed to the forefront of history: Yu Wentai was elected as the commander. Later, Yuwen Tai and Emperor Yuan xiu of Wei Xiaowu united to support the royal family, and Yuwen Tai successively became the governor of Dadu, the assassin of Yongzhou, and The Shang Shu Ling. In the same year, Yuwen Tai pacified Qin and Long, and Emperor Xiaowu made him a servant, a general of the Horse Riding, a kaifu Yi Tongsan division, the governor of Kansai, and the duke of Luoyang County, second only to Gao Huan. Later, because Emperor Xiaowu defected to Yuwen Tai, the State of Wei was divided into two parts, East and West.

Yuwen Tai was resourceful and had a strong command ability, because the Western Wei army and national strength were not as good as the Eastern Wei, Yuwen Tai adopted many policies to develop the army and the state. In many confrontations with eastern Wei, there were mutual victories and losses. In the spring of the third year of the reign (537), Eastern Wei attacked Tongguan, and Yuwen Tai was defeated. In the autumn, 100,000 people of Eastern Wei entered Shayuan (沙苑, in modern Dali, Shaanxi), and Yuwen Tai, with less than 10,000 people riding on the light enemy of the Eastern Wei army, personally fought with drums and won a great victory, capturing 70,000 people, known in history as the "Battle of Shayuan". In this battle, Gao Huan fell ill and died soon after, and Western Wei was able to stand side by side with Eastern Wei.

Ideologically, Yuwen Tai pursues the principle of "moral rule and enlightenment" and "law."

Governance" is supplemented by the principle of rule. It is to require officials at all levels to return to the people to use Confucian doctrine to cultivate themselves and abide by these Confucian moral norms. In Chang'an, the capital of the capital, guozixue was established, and the Confucian master Lu Shi was worshipped to offer wine to the guozi, and through school education, a large number of people with Confucian ideas were trained as the pillar of the regime.

In the employment of people, the pursuit of meritocracy is a move, do not avoid the height of the door, and national origin, and achieve "employment without doubt". As a result, talents gathered, the Western Wei government worked together from top to bottom, and internal unity ensured the smooth implementation of various policies and measures. Yuwen Tai also paid more attention to listening to the different opinions of his subordinates and had the courage to take advice. In terms of law, on the one hand, Yuwen Tai advocated not being harsh and not violent, not only that "the law is not noble", and that officials should treat those who break the law equally; on the other hand, they also demanded that those who adjudicate cases be punished with caution, and that they should make painstaking efforts to prevent self-inflicted self-deprecation under the influence of poison, and minimize unjust, false and wrongly decided cases. In the thirteenth year of the reign (552), Yuwen Tai ordered the abolition of the palace punishment that had been circulating for more than 2,000 years. Economically, based on the Confucian traditional concept of getting rich first and then teaching, Yuwentai actively advised farmers to teach mulberry, rewarded cultivation, and formulated and adopted some measures accordingly, in addition to clearly stipulating the responsibilities of local officials in the development of production. Therefore, most of the local officials attached great importance to the production of nongsang, and the economy gradually developed, and by the time of Yuwen Tai's death, there had been a well-off situation in which the warehouse was full.

Diplomatically, Yuwen Tai adopted a policy of attacking the south with the north, and had good relations with the Turks and Ruoran in the north, but took offensive measures against the southern dynasty, and successively occupied Yizhou and Jingyong.

Yuwen Tai restored the old surname of Xianbei and maintained the unity between the nationalities. In fact, on the other hand, this move has also inhibited the historical process of Sinicization of ethnic minorities to a certain extent.

In the third year (556) of Emperor Gong of Western Wei, Yuwen Tai toured the north and contracted disease at Mount Zhaotun (in present-day western Guyuan County, Ningxia). Yuwen Tai knew that he was seriously ill, and sent someone to urgently recruit his nephew Yuwen Hu and take care of him. In November, he died in Yunyang (present-day northwest of Jingyang, Shaanxi), at the age of 50, and was buried in Chengling (成陵, in present-day northern Fuping County, Shaanxi Province).

In October of that year, Taiko took the throne as Taishi, Otsuka Zai, and Yuwen Goku. The following year, Yuwen Jue was proclaimed emperor for Emperor Xiaomin, beginning with northern Zhou.

Looking at Yu Wentai's life, he was in a period of historical transition from great chaos to great rule, and he was able to grasp the situation, watch the times change, follow the changes in the heavens, and finally take the power of the hegemony and turn the weak into the strong. Embracing Jianghan in the south, Bashu in the west, and holding the desert in the north, although Yuwen Tai did not become emperor when he was alive, he laid the foundation of the Northern Zhou Dynasty like Cao Cao.

The military system promulgated during his reign, the law of electing officials, and so on, became the source of various systems in the Sui and Tang dynasties. Therefore, Yuwentai can be called an outstanding figure of ethnic minorities in Chinese history, laying the foundation for the emergence of the cultural peak of the Sui and Tang dynasties in the later Middle Five Thousand Years civilization. From this point of view, Yuwen Tai is really indispensable as a descendant of the Xianbei clan!