The Mongol rulers took note of Yunnan's strategic position early on. Genghis Khan once asked Guo Baoyu how to attack the Central Plains, and the answer was that "the Central Plains are powerful and cannot be ignored." The southwestern clans, brave and brave, should be taken first, so that they can be gold, and they will be determined. ”
In 1235, Wokoutai attacked the Song jingxiang and Sichuan regions, and the Song-Mongol War began. In order to attack the Southern Song Dynasty from the flank, in 1244, the Mongol army attacked Dali for the first time. In 1253, Möngke Khan ordered Kublai Khan to go south, and Dali was determined. Yunnan "heavy mountains and mountains, steep streams and deep forests, thick bamboo and trees, all have long thorns, the military road lies in the middle, the narrow place only allows one person to ride, up as if ascending to the sky, down like entering a well, and its poisonous fog and smoke miasma, can hurt people."
Because the Dali Kingdom's administration of Yunnan was very loose, the war did not stop like this. Between 1254 and 1261, the Mongols conquered the Golden Tooth Divisions of Southwest Yunnan and the Ziqi Kingdom in Eastern Yunnan and Western Yunnan.
Kublai Khan attached great importance to the personal pacification of Yunnan, and after ascending to the Khan's throne, he made his fifth son Ku Gechi the King of Yunnan and guarded the southwest gateway. Four years later, Kukochi died in a conspiracy. As a result, Kublai Khan decided to establish the province of Yunnan, and in 1274 appointed the "prudent" minister Sai Dianchi Zhan Siting (1211-1279) as the governor of Pingzhang, the first "governor" of Yunnan.
Sai Dian Chi Zhan Si Ding, full name Sai Dian Chi Zhan Si Ding Wu Ma Er. Son of the Tajik Kurumartin, his ancestral home is Buhua thorn (present-day Bukhara) in Central Asia. Sai Dianchi, Arabic for noble. In fact, his family was indeed a local nobleman. In 1221, Genghis Khan marched west, and the father and son of Kuru Martin led thousands of horses to descend. Seeing that Sai Dianchi Zhan Si Ding was clever and heroic, Genghis Khan ordered him to be the front guard of the tent and follow him in the southern conquest of the northern war.
During the reign of Wo Kuotai and Möngke Khan, Zhan Siting served as the political secretary of Pingzhang Province in Shaanxi Wulu Western Shu Sichuan Province. As an institutional innovation, the provincial system of the Yuan Dynasty centralized local administrative power in one body: "All money and grain, armor, tun seeds, water transportation, and military and state affairs are all taken." ”
After the establishment of Yunnan Province, he served as the first chief executive. During his tenure, he promoted the advantages and eliminated the disadvantages, and was deeply loved by the people. He carefully understood the geography and people of Yunnan, then resolved the contradictions between the Mongol royal family and administrative officials, appointed Duan Shi as the governor of Dali, and limited his authority to Dali, thus achieving the unification of government decrees.
Then he embarked on a radical reform. The administrative system, he "for the road thirty-seven, the second house, the third place, the fifty-four belong to the state, the county forty-seven, the rest of the Dian, Zhai, military and civilian and other provinces are not counted here." In 1276, he moved the capital of Yunnan from Dali to Kunming, further strengthening the Yuan Dynasty's rule over Yunnan. In terms of taxation, Sai Dianchi insisted on giving lightly to thin taxes, allowing people to use cattle, horses, and as taxes as possible according to the actual local conditions, and also tried to use the ownerless wasteland to establish civil tuns.
To prosper the economy, we must emphasize agriculture, and heavy agriculture must build water conservancy. Dianchi Lake floods occurred frequently, So Sai Dianchi dredged the river and set up a Songhua Dam upstream to save water and flooding; the Jinju River and the Silver Juice River excavated during the Dali Kingdom fell into disrepair, and he organized manpower to re-cultivate the dredging, not only the farmland was irrigated, but the flood was also controlled; in order to make the water of Dianchi Lake flow smoothly into the Jinsha River, he also organized the people to remove the silt and sand from the outlet of dianchi Lake, and after 3 years, the project was completed, and "more than 10,000 acres of land were all fertile fields." Since then, the area around Dianchi Lake has been as rich as the land of fish and rice in Jiangnan, and there are many fish and shrimp, which can be used to fertilize the field.
Sai Dianchi also attaches great importance to cultural construction. He actively ran schools, established Confucius Temples, and spared no effort to spread culture.
The first Confucius Temple in Yunnan, the Kunming Confucian Temple, was established in 1276 by Sai Dianchi Zhan Si Ding
In the 16th year of the Yuan Dynasty (1279), Sai Dianchi Zhansiding died, and the mourners "wept and shook the wilderness". To this day, there are still poems and operas in Yunnan, praising his political achievements and merits, and there are still Zhong'ai Fang at the intersection of Kunming Sanshi to commemorate it.
Kublai Khan heard the news of great compassion and remembered his great deeds, "Zhao Yunnan Province's ministers did their best to abide by the rules of the race. In the first year of Emperor Chengzong's reign (1297), Yuan Ting posthumously awarded Sai Dian Chi the title of "King of Shangzhu Guo, King of Xianyang, And Zhonghui of Xianyang".
Sai Dianchi had five sons. His descendants are divided into Sai, Na, Ha, Su, Ku, Ma, Sa, Sha, Bao, Ding, Shan, Mu, Yang, Hao and other "thirteen surnames", who have lived in Yunnan for generations. The Ming Dynasty navigator Zheng He was his descendant.
As we all know, the rulers of the Yuan Dynasty came from the northern grasslands, which gave them little orthodoxy of "Inner Huaxia, Outer Yidi", and did not discriminate against the ethnic minorities in the frontier; compared with the previous generation, grain production in Yunnan has increased, and mineral deposits such as silver and copper have been developed to a certain extent; especially the development of the timber industry, which also provides raw materials for shipbuilding, which in turn promotes the vigorous development of the navigation industry. All of this has strengthened Yunnan's economic ties with the mainland.
The Mongol rulers were ambitious to conquer the world, and Kublai Khan waged war against it. Yunnan was the gateway to the southwest and the base for the conquest of Southeast Asia, so after Sai Dianchi, the Yuan Dynasty still attached importance to running Yunnan. In the "History of the Yuan", there were 100 generals (31 Mongols, 32 Semu people, 37 Han chinese or other ethnic groups) and more than 100 officials in Yunnan, accounting for one-seventh of the "Yuan History".
It is worth noting that in addition to setting up provincial institutions, the Yuan court also sent a number of Mongol emperors to the local area. Among them, the King of Liang had the highest status, ranking in Zhongqing in eastern Yunnan, and the king of Yunnan was second in the position of the king of Yunnan, living in Dali in western Yunnan. Among them, the King of Liang not only held a heavy army, but also had the right to supervise the administrative affairs of the province. In the later period, the King of Liang completely controlled the power of Yunnan.
According to the Yuan Shi, the province of Yunnan included the province of Present-day Yunnan, western Guizhou, southwestern Sichuan, northern Burma, southwestern Vietnam, Laos, and northern Thailand.
In fact, for many areas, the Yuan court did not have actual control. By the 23rd year of the Yuan Dynasty (1286), the Yuan court established the Burmese Province of Burma, which was abolished four years later, and the Burmese Bagan Dynasty came under the jurisdiction of the Yunnan Province; in the middle of the Yuan Dynasty, the Lanna Kingdom in northern Thailand harassed the Yunnan border. In the fourth year of Taiding (1327), his king turned to the Yuan court for a reward, and the ruler of the Yuan Dynasty, due to the distance and difficulty in sending troops, pushed the boat along the water and placed the Marshal's Mansion of The Commander of the Sidu;
Chiang Rai in northern Thailand, the capital of the Lanna Kingdom
In 1340, Si Khanfa led a rebellion of the Golden Tooth tribes, and the Yuan court was repeatedly defeated, and in 1355 it was recognized as independent. SiHanfa thus became the founding prince of the Luchuan Kingdom. At this point, the area of Yunnan Province has shrunk by more than half.
The Yuan Dynasty implemented the system of tuguans in the southwest region, including Yunnan. It is through the appointment of local ethnic minority leaders as officials, and their power is used to rule. Local officials can be hereditary, provided that hostages must be taken. For officials at the state and county level, the province can choose to use it independently, but officials with more than six pins must report to the imperial court for approval. In addition to local chiefs, old Semu and Mongol officials can also be hereditary.
As mentioned earlier, Duan Shi, a descendant of the Dali state, was appointed as the governor of Dali. After The duan clan surrendered, it was quite favored by the Mongols, and its position of governor was passed down until the beginning of the Ming Dynasty. The Book of Dian records eleven duanshi governors. As one of the most important people in the Yuan court's rule of Yunnan, the Duan clan always had an independent tendency. Especially in the middle of the Yuan Dynasty, the Duan clan and the Liang kings were in the same water and fire, and the two were not inferior.
After the establishment of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang repeatedly persuaded the King of Liang to surrender, but was rejected. In 1382, the Ming army invaded Yunnan, and Liang Wang Jujia committed suicide in Dianchi. Soon, the Ming army marched into Dali, duan surrendered, and Zhu Yuanzhang ordered the relocation of duan.
Since then, Zhu Yuanzhang has taken a series of measures to strengthen the central government's jurisdiction over Yunnan. The history of Yunnan has turned a new page.