It is said that Zheng Zhuanggong was a small overlord in the Spring and Autumn Period, where to start? The first three monarchs of the Zheng State were all secretaries of the Zhou Dynasty and had great power. By the time of Duke Zhengzhuang, King Ping of Zhou wanted to give some of his rights to the State of Xiyu in order to weaken ZhengZhuang's rights. Zhuang Gong was resentful, King Ping smiled and said, "There is no such thing", so the Zhou Dynasty and Zheng Guo exchanged hostages with each other, which is the origin of the idiom of Zhou Zheng's hostage-giving, in the past, all the princes unilaterally submitted hostages to the Zhou Dynasty, and this time the hostage swap, Zheng ZhuangGong subverted the previous political rules, which shows that Zheng Zhuang Gong no longer respects the royal family.
In 720 BC, after King Huan of Zhou succeeded to the throne, he entrusted political affairs to Duke Yu, which once again caused the dissatisfaction of Duke Zhengzhuang, so he ordered the army to harvest the wheat of the Zhou royal family in Wendi, and harvested the seedlings of Zhou in the autumn. The peaceful situation before Zhou and Zheng Yiyi began to fight, and this confrontation led to the emergence of the idiom of Zhou Zheng's evil. King Huan of Zhou was very angry that Duke Zhuang was harvesting his own crops, and in 719 BC, Zhou Tianzi joined forces with Wei, Song, Chen, and Cai to fight Zheng, besieged the capital of Zheng guo for 5 days and withdrew, showing that Zheng Guo was indestructible. However, in the autumn, the combined forces of the princes once again attacked Zheng, this time defeating Zheng Guo, and treating his body with his human way, harvesting Zheng Guo's crops. Zheng Guo not only had increasingly tense relations with Zhou, but also forged a relationship with the surrounding princes.
In 718 BC, Zheng Zhuanggong's pilgrimage to King Huan of Zhou did not treat him with courtesy, because of this matter, in 715 BC, Zheng Guo sent people to the State of Lu to exchange land to show his dissatisfaction with Zhou Tianzi, because the exchange of land between the princes required the consent of Zhou Tianzi. At this time, the relationship between Zheng Guo and the Zhou Dynasty was already quite tense. In 707 BC, King Huan of Zhou tried to divide the power of Duke Zhuang again, Duke Zheng Zhuang no longer went to see Tianzi, this tianzi was faceless, King Huan of Zhou led Wang Shi and Cai Wei Chen to jointly attack Zheng, the two sides fought at Qiangge (Changge, Henan), and finally Zheng Guo defeated the coalition army and won a complete victory, and King Huan of Zhou was shot in the shoulder by a bow and arrow. This is the famous Battle of Qiangge, which ended with the overall victory of Zheng Guo.
From the last year of The Zhou Ping King's Zhou Zheng jiaojiao to 720 BC When Zheng Guo harvested Zhou's crops to form a situation of Zhou Zheng's viciousness, which lasted until the Battle of Tange in 707 BC, ending with Zheng Guo's defeat of Zhou Tianzi and his allied forces, it can be said that the majesty of Zhou Tianzi fell sharply and the Central Plains countries were also surrendered, and zheng Zhuang's domineering arrogance leaked sideways, marking the great increase in the power of the princes and the beginning of the era of competing for hegemony.
All of the above is Zheng Guo's handling of relations with Zhou Tianzi to achieve the status of small hegemony, and we will look at how Zheng Zhuanggong did in terms of honoring the king. At the Battle of Qiangge, King Huan of Zhou was shot in the shoulder by a bow and arrow during his escape, at this time one of Zhuang Gong's fierce generals Zhu Yun requested to pursue King Huan of Zhou, Zhuang Gong dissuaded: "The offender is still blamed, let alone Tianzi", at night Zhuang Gong sent a priest (zha) Zhong to visit Zhou Tianzi and greet The King of Zhou's entourage, presumably sending some money to say something good, saying that Zhuang Gong still respects Tianzi, but you first attack Zheng Guo just for self-defense. This shows that although Zheng Guohao is arrogant, he still superficially respects Zhou Tianzi.
In 706 BC, Beirong invaded the State of Qi, the State of Qi asked zheng for help, Zheng Zhuang sent the prince to defeat the Army of Beirong, Beirong refers to the northern ethnic minority tribes or uncalivated tribes often harassed these Central Plains princes, put in the past if they were harassed later, they reported to Zhou Tianzi for instructions, and Zhou Tianzi uniformly arranged to directly recruit or convene a coalition of princes to expel Rong Di, but this time the State of Qi directly asked Zheng Guo for help, indicating that the Zhou royal family was unable to support the world, and Zheng Guo's strength actually exercised the authority of Tianzi.
On the road to realizing Xiao Hegemony, Zheng Zhuanggong mainly completed the transformation of maintaining political order on behalf of Zhou Tianzi for more than ten years, mainly through the intercourse between Zhou zheng and Zheng zheng and then to Zhou Zheng, and began to explore the hegemonic politics of the Spring and Autumn Period through Zun Wang, laying the foundation and providing a model for the maturity of the hegemonic politics of later generations and the hegemony of Qi Huan, so why is zheng Zhuanggong called the Spring and Autumn Xiaoba in history and not the real hegemon? I think there are several reasons for this:
1. The strength of the Zhou royal family still exists. After King Zhou Ping moved east, the royal family did not decline to the bottom, from Zhou Tianzi weakening zhengzhuang's power and convening many princely states to jointly cut down Zheng, indicating that Zhou Tianzi still had some strength and a few loyal fans.
2. King Zunyi was a little reluctant. In terms of honoring Zhou Tianzi, Zhou Tianzi seemed to be dissatisfied, and it can be seen from the repeated zhou-Zheng relations that Zhou Tianzi did not recognize the hegemonic position of Zhuang Gong.
3. The princes who defeated were all small states. During the Zhengzhuang period, the targets of wars were all small countries such as Chen, Cai, Wei, Lu, and Song, who were not fought, and the disparity in strength was very large. Of course, during this period, only Zheng Guo was a big country, and the others did not rise. Unlike the later Five Hegemons, the great powers have a long-term struggle for hegemony almost at the same time.
Therefore, history's evaluation of Zheng Zhuanggong is the Spring and Autumn Xiaobawang, but this does not mean that Zheng Zhuanggong is inferior to the later Qi Huan Gong and Jin Wengong, because this has historical limitations.