Zhen Mi is Yuan Xi's wife and a married person. As the victor, Cao Pi made sense to take Zhen Mi as his concubine. After all, in ancient times, it was common for the victor to take the wife of the defeated as his concubine. However, there are very few cases in which the wives of the defeated are regarded as regular wives. Then, why did Cao Pi directly take Zhen Mi as his own wife?
(Zhen Mi stills)
I think there are three main reasons.
First, the aristocratic background of the Yuan family.
The Yuan Shao family was the "Fourth Dynasty and Three Dukes", which was very prominent at that time and was a typical nobleman.
During the Wei and Jin dynasties, it was very particular about the door to the door. In the entire history of ancient China, when it comes to the most serious class confrontation, except for the Western Zhou Dynasty, that is, the Wei and Jin Dynasties. This is particularly demanding when it comes to getting married.
Although Cao Cao already controlled the entire imperial court at that time, Cao Cao's father Cao Song himself was not surnamed Cao, but only because he became Cao Teng's adopted son. What his own ancestors were, it is not clear. Second, although Cao Teng claimed to be a descendant of Cao Gan, this Cao Teng was a eunuch. That is to say, Cao Cao's ancestors who were related by blood were not famous, and those who were not related by blood were eunuchs. In short, although Cao Cao became a chancellor, the Cao family was not a prominent family at that time.
Obviously, as an aristocrat, the Yuan family's prominent position was very attractive to Cao Pi. Cao Pi took Yuan Xi's wife Zhen Mi as his wife, and psychologically he would not feel very disadvantaged.
(Cao Pi and Zhen Mi)
Second, Zhen Mi looks very beautiful.
The reason why Cao Pi would see Zhen Mi as soon as he saw him, he decided to take him as his wife. It is not unrelated to Zhen Mi's beautiful looks.
At that time, there was a folk song: "There are two Qiao in Jiangdong, and Zhen Mi in Hebei is pretty." Whether this sentence was circulated before Cao Pi met Zhen Mi, or whether it was passed down after seeing Zhen Mi, or a kind of appendage in the future, we do not know now. However, it is obvious that Zhen Mi is beautiful, which is very certain.
In addition to the sentence "Jiangdong has erqiao, Hebei Zhen Mi is pretty", later generations will also append the words of "one woman chaotic three Cao", which is because Zhen Mi looks very beautiful, so it has caused a dispute between Cao Cao, Cao Pi, and Cao Zhi. Although this is not true, any legend left over from history cannot be empty. Cao Cao's recognition of Zhen Mi and Cao Zhi's "LuoshenFu" that Cao Zhi once wrote contain a very special feeling that Cao Cao and Cao Zhi had for Zhen Mi.
Third, Zhen Mi has very good virtues.
Zhen Mi was born into poverty, but she showed good virtue at a very young age.
She once persuaded her mother to use the family's money to help the victims. Although the family is obviously not rich, Zhen Mi still does this, which shows that she has a generous and benevolent heart. Zhen Mi's second brother died relatively early, and Zhen Mi's mother was very picky about the widowed daughter-in-law, and Zhen Mi repeatedly persuaded her mother to be kind to her daughter-in-law. Another thing is that when zhen mi was a child, someone outside Zhen Mi's house sang a play, and the children in the family were very curious to climb upstairs and look down. But Zhen Mi was unmoved and had been there concentrating on doing handicrafts. Everyone in the family thought she was so strange and asked her why she didn't go to see it? Zhen Mi said, looking at this kind of thing, is it what a girl should do?
It is precisely because Zhen Mi, although born poor, has shown good virtue since she was a child, so Yuan Xi will not care about her status and marry her as his wife.
(Cao Cao stills)
Fourth, Zhen Mi is very likable.
Zhen Mi is very likable.
Cao Cao and his wife recognized Zhen Mi very much, and when Cao Cao heard that Cao Pi liked Zhen Mi very much, he asked Cao Pi to marry Zhen Mi, which also shows that Cao Cao was very agreeable with Zhen Mi.
In history, there is a record that Zhen Mi was very fond of her mother-in-law, Lady Bian, saying that when Lady Bian was ill, Zhen Mi cried all day because she could not go to the front to take care of her. Although this is what happened later, it can also be seen that Zhen Mi is indeed very pleasing to people.
Zhen Mi was also very pleasing to Cao Pi. When Zhen Mi became Cao Pi's wife, she repeatedly persuaded Cao Pi to be kind to those concubines and to have more children with those concubines. Although these records are also after she had married Cao Pi. However, it was obvious that this quality of hers was quickly revealed when she met Cao Pi.
Therefore, even if Zhen Mi was already married, with the support of all parties, Cao Pi resolutely married Zhen Mi as a wife. Unfortunately, Cao Pi could not start from the beginning to the end, and he was a little confused with Zhen Mi, and in the end, he not only gave Zhen Mi death, but also when Zhen Mi was buried after her death, he also "covered zhen mi with hair and plugged her mouth with chaff", which was too different from the situation when he first married Zhen Mi.
Is it because Cao Pi's status has changed? It's really hard to say.
(References: Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Wei Luo, etc.)