After the establishment of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang established a system of sub-feudalism, and divided his sons into various places to be the kings of the clan, and after his son Zhu Di usurped the throne, he reformed the system of the clan king, and from then on, the clan king of the Ming Dynasty could no longer lead the army, nor could he participate in local governance, and even the imperial examination was not allowed to be an official, and he could only live with dignity and leisure. By the end of the Ming Dynasty, after the efforts of more than a dozen generations of emperors, there were already dozens of clan kings in the country, and the most legendary one at the end of the Ming Dynasty was probably the Fu King.
Zhu Changxun
Zhu Changxun, the Fu King, was the third son of Emperor Wanli of Mingshenzong, and his mother was the wanli emperor's favorite Concubine Zheng Guifei, just as the so-called love house and Wu, the Wanli Emperor also loved Zhu Changxun very much and wanted to make him the crown prince, but Zhu Changxun was not a concubine, nor was he the eldest son, and he was preceded by Wanli's eldest son Zhu Changluo (that is, the father of the later Ming Guangzong, Tianqi and Chongzhen), Zhu Yuanzhang had the ancestral motto "There is a concubine, no concubine standing long", Zhu Changluo, although not a concubine, is older than Zhu Changxuan. Therefore, the Wanli Emperor had no way to cross Zhu Changluo and make Zhu Changxun crown prince. However, Wanli is not dead-hearted, but finds ways to find opportunities.
Statue of the Wanli Emperor
However, at that time, many people in the court disagreed with Zhu Changxun, such as the Donglin Party, who boasted of being a moral defender and resolutely opposed the Wanli Emperor's abolition of Chang Liyou, and they firmly sided with the Emperor's eldest son, Zhu Changluo, and resolutely fought against the Wanli Emperor. In the end, after 15 years of debate, the matter came to an end, and in the twenty-ninth year of the Wanli Calendar, the emperor made Zhu Changluo the crown prince, and at the same time crowned Zhu Changxun as the Prince of Fu, and several other princes as princes, and this event, known as the "struggle for the country", was declared over.
Zhu Changxun did not receive the throne, and his father, who loved him, could only compensate him financially, and Wanli sealed King Fu to Luoyang and gave him good land and manor, and King Fu was also happy to be a prince of Peace. However, the good times were not long, and during the Chongzhen years, there were many outcasts, which also affected the kings of the various clans, at first it was only property losses, and later even the safety of his life was threatened, and King Fu paid for it. In the first month of 1641, Li Zicheng's troops attacked the city of Luoyang, and King Fu did not have time to escape, and was killed by Li Zicheng, and the wild history records that King Fu was stewed by Li Zicheng and a pot of sika deer to make a "Fulu Feast", but this is just a rumor.
Lee Zicheng stills
When the Fu King's mansion was destroyed, Zhu Yousong, the son of the Fu King, climbed the wall and escaped, taking advantage of the chaos to flee to Meng County north of the Yellow River, where King Fu and the more than two hundred people who escaped from the palace had no financial resources and lived a very miserable life. Later, local officials reported the situation of Fu Wang Shizi to the Chongzhen Emperor, and Chongzhen was very sympathetic to this cousin, and in February of that year, he ordered Ran Xingrang, the eunuch of Si Li, and other eunuchs to bring silver to Henan to comfort Fu Wang Shizi. In 1643, Chongzhen ordered Zhu Yousong to attack the Fu King.
It is suspected that Zhu Yousong is a portrait
Chongzhen was also kind to this cousin, but he certainly did not expect that a year later, this cousin would actually become the emperor of Daming after himself. In March 1644, Li Zicheng broke beijing, the Chongzhen Emperor was hanged, the country could not be without a monarch for a day, the ministers of the Ming Dynasty supported the king of the near branch in Nanjing to inherit the throne, and the Xiaofu king Zhu Yousong was the first candidate, although it experienced some twists and turns, but in the end, the Fu king was proclaimed emperor in Nanjing in May, and the throne was still in the Fu wang's branch.
Southern Ming lineage table
References: "Ming Ji BeiLuo", "Ming Ji Nan Luo"
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