Zhuge Liang (23 July 181 – 28 August 234), courtesy name Kong Ming, was an outstanding statesman of the Three Kingdoms period. This is today Xiaobian prepared an article for everyone, interested partners come to see it!
After the Three Gu Maolu, Zhuge Liang went out of the mountains to assist Liu Bei, and joined forces with Sun Quan of Eastern Wu to defeat the Cao army at the Battle of Chibi, forming the momentum of the Three Kingdoms and capturing Jingzhou. In 214, Zhuge Liang assisted Liu Bei in capturing Yizhou. In the first year of Shu Zhangwu (221), Liu Bei established the Shu Han in Chengdu, and Zhuge Liang was appointed as a chancellor. In 223, the later lord Liu Chan succeeded to the throne, and Zhuge Liang was made the Marquis of Wuxiang (武乡侯) and the leader of Yizhou Mu (益州牧). On this basis, zhuge liang personally handled the affairs of the imperial court of the Shu state, and rewarded and punished them severely. Zhuge Liang sent people to the Eastern Wu alliance, and after pacifying the southern central region, Zhuge Liang went north to the Central Plains five times, and most of them ran out of food. Eventually, due to overwork, he died of illness in Wuzhangyuan (in present-day Baoji Qishan, Shaanxi) in the twelfth year of Shu Jianxing (234) at the age of 54.
After Zhuge Liang's death, his chosen successors Jiang Huan and Fei Yi became the de facto chancellors of the Shu state, thus helping the later lord Liu Chan to handle the politics of the Shu state. As for the military general Jiang Wei, he continued his northern expedition to the Central Plains, hoping to support the Han Dynasty. However, it is worth noting that before Jiang Wan, Fei Yi, and Jiang Wei, Zhuge Liang had carefully cultivated two successors. So, the question is, who are the two successors that Zhuge Liang originally selected?
One
First of all, as far as Zhuge Liang is concerned, the two successors initially selected are Ma Chen and Zhuge Qiao. On the one hand, as far as Ma Mo is concerned, this is a historical figure of the Three Kingdoms that everyone is very familiar with. Ma Mo (190–228), courtesy name Youchang, was a native of Yicheng, Xiangyang (present-day southern Yicheng, Hubei), and the younger brother of Ma Liang. Ma Mo initially followed Liu Bei into Shu territory as a jingzhou official, and successively served as Mianzhu County Ling, Chengdu County Ling, and Yue Yue Taishou. Ma Mocai's qi apparatus exceeded that of ordinary people, and he liked to discuss war strategy, and Zhuge Liang, the chancellor, was deeply attached to him. It is worth noting that Liu Bei said to Zhuge Liang on his deathbed: "Ma Mo's words are exaggerated, beyond actual talent, and cannot be entrusted with major events, you must observe him more." ”
However, Zhuge Liang thought that this was not the case, and let Ma Mo join the army, and often met and talked about combat strategies, from day to night. From this, it is very obvious that Zhuge Liang was very attached and trusted to Ma Chen, and even did not heed Liu Bei's advice. In 225 AD, Zhuge Liang led an army to pacify Nanzhong. In this regard, Ma Mo put forward the principle of fighting with troops, with the attack of the heart as the top and the siege of the city as the bottom; Psychological warfare is the top, and the short soldiers are connected as the bottom, so that the people of Meng Yue and others in Nanzhong are satisfied and convinced.
Two
However, for Ma Mo, he was more inclined to give advice to the military division, rather than the military generals who came to the front line, that is, Ma Mo was more powerful on paper, and it was difficult for a strong man to really lead the army to the south and the north. Although Zhuge Liang wanted to train Ma Mo as his heir, in the Battle of the Street Pavilion, Zhuge Liang clearly put Ma Mo in an inappropriate position. In the sixth year of Jianxing (228), Zhuge Liang sent troops to Qishan to northernly attack the State of Wei. At that time, there were veteran generals such as Wei Yan and Wu Yi, who had been in the battlefield for a long time, and many people said that these people should be taken as the vanguard, and Zhuge Liang promoted Ma Mo against the opinions of the people, appointed Ma Mo as the vanguard, and led the various armies forward.
As a result, in the Battle of Jieting, Ma Mo violated Zhuge Liang's combat instructions, resulting in the loss of Jieting. Because the strategic location of Jieting was conquered by the Cao Wei general Zhang Guo, this led to Zhuge Liang's first Northern Expedition to the Central Plains and he had to choose to withdraw his troops. After Zhuge Liang withdrew, Ma Mo was beheaded by Zhuge Liang, and there is another theory that Ma Mo eventually died in prison. However, in any case, Ma Mo died in 228 AD, which meant that Zhuge Liang's careful cultivation was eventually put into vain. Moreover, what made Zhuge Liang even more sad was that in the same year that Ma Mo was killed, another heir he had cultivated died young.
Three
On the other hand, the heir who died young was Zhuge Qiao. Zhuge Qiao (204–228), courtesy name Bosong and Zhongshen , was a general of the official Zhiyi Wu. Zhuge Qiao was originally the son of Zhuge Jin, the chancellor of Eastern Wu, and Zhuge Qiao and his elder brother Zhuge Ke were both famous at that time, and commentators believed that Zhuge Qiao's talent was inferior to that of his brother, but his own personality surpassed Zhuge Ke. Although Zhuge Liang had a son, Zhuge Zhan, Zhuge Zhan was born relatively late. That is, at the beginning, Zhuge Liang did not have a son, and asked Zhuge Jin to let Zhuge Qiao be his adopted son, and Zhuge Jin told Sun Quan to let Zhuge Qiao go to Shu Han, and Zhuge Liang regarded Zhuge Qiao as his concubine and stayed around to cultivate carefully.
In this regard, in the author's opinion, Zhuge Liang's emphasis on Zhuge Qiao's adopted son is not weaker than that of Ma Chen. After Zhuge Qiao arrived in the Shu Kingdom, he served as a lieutenant of the horse. Zhuge Liang regarded him as his own son, deeply afraid that he would become a mediocre and disciplined him very strictly. On this basis, when Zhuge Liang went to Hanzhong to prepare for the first Northern Expedition against Cao Wei, he let Zhuge Qiao follow him to the front line.
Four
Finally, in this regard, Zhuge Liang also wrote to Zhuge Jin, saying: "Zhuge Qiao should have returned to Chengdu, but the sons of all the generals were involved in the Northern Expedition to the Central Plains, and I think Zhuge Qiao should also share happiness and suffering. Today he was asked to lead five or six hundred soldiers and to garrison the valley with the sons of the generals. On this basis, Zhuge Liang asked Zhuge Qiao to participate in the hard work of transporting grain and grass. As we all know, the Shu Road is difficult, it is difficult to go to the qingtian, and the mountains and rivers in the land of Bashu are steep, although it brings the conditions for the Shu Han to be easy to defend and difficult to attack, but this also makes it very difficult for the Shu state to transport grain and grass. Therefore, for Zhuge Qiao, the work of supervising the transportation of grain and grass can indeed be called extremely arduous. Of course, from Zhuge Liang's point of view, it is the so-called "Therefore, the heavens will descend upon the Si people, and they must first suffer their hearts, strain their bones and bones, starve their bodies, empty their bodies, and act in a disorderly manner. ”
That is, Kong Ming hoped to take this opportunity to hone Zhuge Qiao, so that this adopted son could later become a pillar of the Shu kingdom. However, it is a great pity that in 228 AD, Zhuge Qiao died of illness at the age of twenty-five. For Zhuge Qiao, who died at the age of 25, it can obviously be called an untimely death. In summary, the two heirs originally selected by Zhuge Liang both died in 228 AD, that is, Ma Mo was beheaded by Zhuge Liang's own orders, and Zhuge Qiao unfortunately died young. Of course, after this, Zhuge Liang also cultivated talents such as Jiang Huan, Fei Yi, and Jiang Wei, and waited until 234 AD, after Zhuge Liang died of illness in Wuzhangyuan, Jiang Huan, Fei Yi, Jiang Wei and others assisted the later lord Liu Chan and became the ministers of the middle and late Shu Han Dynasty.