I want to be emperor

Chapter 855

The fifth day of February in the 36th year of Chengshun, the day of Zhongchun Hai.

Luo Zhixue got up early in the morning and first simply dealt with some accumulated affairs. Then, under the service of a group of court ladies, he put on complicated dragon robes and winged crowns, and sat on the seat under the protection of the imperial guards from the guards of the palace hall. A full four-ton multi-purpose four-wheeled carriage.

The Great Chu Empire is different from the traditional dynasties. The upper class doesn't like to ride bridges, but rides in horse-drawn carriages... not only the official upper class, but also ordinary officials at the grassroots level and even the ordinary upper class.

In fact, in the early years, the dignitaries of the Great Chu Empire still mainly rode sedan chairs, and Luo Zhixue himself had 36 dragon sedan chairs.

It's just that with the development of the times, especially the rapid development of domestic animal husbandry, especially the empire has successively seized and controlled traditional animal husbandry areas such as Monan, Mobei, and Moxi, as well as Liaohetao in the northeast, which in turn allowed the empire to gain enough horses.

In order to raise horses, the Great Chu Empire even vacated the entire Jeju Island on the Koryo Peninsula as a military horse farm. The Liaoxi horses produced in Jeju Island are of extremely high quality and are the main source of horses for the army.

At the same time, large-scale reclamation and land reclamation in the country, and the large-scale planting of various pastures in Dingmu areas have all contributed to the explosive growth of the horses of the Great Chu Empire.

As there are more and more horses, their application fields will naturally expand from traditional military and cargo transportation to general transportation and agricultural fields.

The Great Chu Empire carried out large-scale horse farming in the northern region, especially the horse farming in the northeast region, which gradually developed and became popular during this period.

At the same time, the southern region, which traditionally lacked horses, also began to influx a large number of horses. At the same time, the new southwestern horses bred and bred in the southern region were also widely used in the southwest region.

The rapid increase in the number of horses eventually led to the rapid development of the number of carriages, especially in urban areas.

And this point is more obvious after the emergence of trains and ships, because it is more convenient and cheaper to transport horses from the north to the south after being transported by trains and ships.

The number of horses in Songjiang City has rapidly expanded in the past ten years... The growth rate of its horse-drawn carriages is comparable to the development speed of trains and ships to some extent.

Before the large-scale application of high-pressure steam engines, there were not so many horses in Songjiang City... Of course, there was not so many people at that time. Although the economy was very good, the number of factories and workers were not as many as they are now, and the overall situation is not so big. Traffic pressure, don't need so many horses.

The number of horses is increasing, and the application of horse-drawn carriages is becoming more and more widespread... Well, along with it, more and more official roads are built, and the better they are, at the same time, cinder roads and gravel roads are gradually popularized in urban roads, and asphalt appears in big cities one after another. Road, cement road and so on.

These eventually led to a seemingly unrelated industry gradually withdrawing from the stage of history.

This is the sedan chair industry!
When the rich and powerful went out, they began to choose to ride in the more comfortable, faster, and more decent new-style four-wheeled carriages, instead of sitting in small sedan chairs as before...

At the same time, this also has something to do with the guidance of the upper echelons of the empire... For example, Luo Zhixue himself, used to seldom ride a sedan chair, and went out on a daily basis, even in ceremonial occasions. In his early years, Luo Zhixue tended to ride a horse directly to reflect his status as the emperor on horseback. Then I started riding in a horse-drawn carriage...

As for the sedan chair, in the first few years, he took a few ceremonial 36 large sedan chairs. In daily life, he basically did not take a sedan chair, but basically took a carriage...

There is something good on the top, and something on the bottom.

Luo Zhixue himself doesn't take sedan chairs very much, who among the officials of the empire would dare to say that he is more honorable than Luo Zhixue and enjoys it more?
Therefore, in the early days, the bureaucratic class of the empire also turned to horse-drawn carriages one after another. In the early years, there were not many horses, and officials in many poor places still rode in donkey carts when they went out.

But then the number of horses increased... About 15 years after Chengshun, all officials traveled in horse-drawn carriages. In addition, quite a few military officers and generals and a few civil servants would also choose to travel directly on horseback.

And these bureaucratic groups are also the real ruling class of the Great Chu Empire, the upper class... When they choose to ride a carriage, it means that the upper class of the whole society also chooses a carriage... Later, it gradually spread to the middle class ... As for the low-level civilians, they don't even sit in sedan chairs!
Around the 30th year of Chengshun, in the society of the Great Chu Empire, except for some special occasions, it was actually rare to see people from the middle and upper classes traveling in sedan chairs.

However, in some traditional occasions, sedan chairs are still the mainstream. For example, when getting married, women still take eight-carried sedan chairs when they get married!

It's just the same sentence, these are special occasions, and in daily life, except for a few cases, it is generally invisible.

This is the result of economic development, a substantial increase in the number of horses, road conditions have improved, and technological development has led to better carriages.

It is not the result of official prohibition or deliberate guidance.

Or to put it more simply, this is an inevitable situation of social progress after the industrial revolution.

Against such a background, Luo Zhixue, as the emperor, naturally traveled in a special imperial carriage when traveling.

The carriage was built by Yingtian Carriage Company, a subsidiary of the Royal Assets Division. The frame was made of the most advanced steel at that time, and it underwent extremely complicated and expensive anti-rust treatment, and the outer layer was subjected to complex chemical gold plating!
The main material of the body is top-grade precious wood, which has also undergone a series of advanced anti-corrosion treatments.

The windows are made of large pieces of natural transparent crystal windows specially polished and produced by Zhenjiang Optical Instruments!

All over the body, there are a large number of various gemstones as embellishments.

The carpet in the car is the fur of a large polar bear that the navy sent warships to hunt in the North Pole.

In addition to being luxurious, this carriage actually embodies the technology of the Great Chu Empire!

Not to mention anything else, just the lightweight, high-strength, and very tough steel on the frame, this thing has to kill all other contemporary countries!
As for the various anti-rust treatments and chemical gold plating at the back, they are all incidental small processes.

There are only a few steel materials on this frame, not to mention the contemporary period of the seventeenth century, even in the first half of the twentieth century in the original time and space, few countries can produce it.

This is the top embodiment of the metallurgical technology of the Great Chu Empire.

There are also natural crystal car windows... It looks like an ordinary crystal glass, but in fact this thing is a serious piece of ultra-precision optical glass. It is not a whole plane, but actually has a dip And ultra-high machining accuracy.

This crystal car window reflects the top level of optical equipment manufacturing in the Great Chu Empire.

There are also various parts and components. Many things look ordinary, but they are actually the embodiment of the top industrial level of the Great Chu Empire, such as some small parts in the carriage... These are not made of steel or wood, but contemporary Very rare aluminum!
It is not easy to produce aluminum these days, and only chemical methods can be used for laboratory preparation. Aluminum is more precious and expensive than gold these days, and the annual output of the empire is only a few dozen kilograms.

The wheels are made of rubber tires. This solid rubber tire is a rubber tire specially developed by Nanyang Rubber Company. It was a sensation at the time. The first batch of products were used on this imperial carriage... Now this rubber tire It has gradually spread to mid-to-high-end carriages.

Almost every detail on this imperial carriage is actually a manifestation of the top industrial strength of the Great Chu Empire.

As for some gold plating on the surface and various gem decorations... Many places in the car body are gold-plated, not even for luxury or beauty, but more for anti-rust treatment...Gold plating is a very good anti-rust means.

To be honest, gems and the like are all insignificant gadgets!

After so many years of overseas expansion, the Great Chu Empire brought back countless kinds of messy gems from overseas. Some of these gems were big and good-looking, and most of them ended up in the hands of the royal family.

For example, a super-large ruby ​​that was mined in Myanmar weighed more than 40 grams (1 carat = 0.2 grams). As soon as it was mined, it was sent directly to the Jinling City Palace, and then processed into an egg round pattern giant ruby.

where are you now?
On the armrest of the Dragon Chair in the Imperial Study where Luo Zhixue often sits, on the other side is an equally rare emerald.

So rubies, emeralds, and even diamonds are abundant in the royal family of the Great Chu Empire, and they didn't cost much... because these gems are not expensive these days.

What are expensive are all kinds of rare and famous jade...

For example, traditional Hetian jade and the like, the price of good quality can fly to the sky.

But all kinds of gemstones and diamonds are relatively cheaper, otherwise the royal family would not have collected so many high-quality gemstones.

As for emeralds... In the current Great Chu Empire, this thing is less reliable than diamonds... It was purely operated by the Royal Jewelry Company... Why?Because the Royal Jewelry Company controls almost all the jadeite minerals known so far, and it is the only one that sells this thing...

Mining by yourself, processing by yourself, appraising and giving certificates by yourself, and then hype and sell by yourself...

Not to mention, they are quite successful, they have sold a lot of jadeite, and the price has been copied, but there is no collection value, and second-hand goods are not worth much...

why?Because the Royal Jewelry Company will not recycle jade for you... Once the item is sold, it will not be returned.

Furthermore, the upper class generally didn't like this stuff.

In the upper class, the favorite is still the traditional famous jade... Even some stones are better than jadeite, such as the lake stone that countless literati and scholars especially admire!

This thing is precious!

And extremely scarce!
But, just like the Yangcheng Lake hairy crabs in later generations, all fools know that the number of authentic Yangcheng Lake hairy crabs is extremely limited, but they are everywhere on the market...

Today's lake stones are almost the same... they are all broken stones, who knows where they come from.

Be it all kinds of gemstones, jade, or even lake stones, these kinds of luxury accessories are actually owned by the royal family, and most of them are... for no other reason, because the royal jewelry company is the largest gemstone manufacturer in the Great Chu Empire. Mining, processing and sales enterprises.

All kinds of good things were found by the Royal Jewelry Company, and then they changed hands and sent them to the palace.

And this is also the main and even the only core business of the Royal Jewelry Company, which is to collect all kinds of gemstones for the royal family and make jewelry.

As for the business of mining and selling jewelry, it's just to earn money...

This is also the reason why Luo Zhixue's imperial carriage has a large number of rare gemstones... mainly because there are too many gemstones in the royal warehouse. If they are not used, they can only be thrown in the warehouse for ashes How about taking it out to decorate the carriage.

This is also the difference between the royal family and ordinary people, and even those powerful people.

Some things that are very precious in the eyes of ordinary people, even the rich and powerful, are actually ordinary small objects in the royal family... especially luxury accessories.

Not only gems, but also other calligraphy, painting and antiques.

In the imperial palace of the Great Chu Empire, there are countless calligraphy and painting collections of celebrities... There are piles of authentic calligraphy of various celebrities that are rarely seen outside. In the collection of calligraphy and painting of the royal family, there are dozens of them... Luo Zhixue When several of my children used to learn calligraphy, they copied the authentic works of famous masters directly, and they damaged a lot.

In the end, Luo Zhixue felt that although he didn't really care about these things...but they were considered Chinese traditional culture anyway, and they should have a lot of cultural value for future generations, so if they can be kept well, they should be kept well. Protection of calligraphy and painting.

Otherwise, it would be better to be ruined by those ignorant princes and princesses who don't know the importance.

----

The luxurious imperial carriage traveled all the way from the imperial palace, and then, escorted by the imperial guards and accompanied by many ministers, went to Xiannong'an in the southern suburbs.

Today, I went to Xiannongtan to hold the emperor's plowing ceremony.

As a traditional feudal dynasty, the Great Chu Empire naturally followed many ancient traditions, such as emphasizing agriculture!
The emperor's plowing, a typical ceremony to show his importance to Nongsang, is even more indispensable.

Luo Zhixue started from his ascension to the throne, and every year thereafter, he would perform the emperor's plowing ceremony on the first Hai Day in the second month of the lunar calendar.

No exceptions!

After Jinling City was established as the capital, due to financial constraints, the palace was built slowly, but the construction of Xiannongtan was extremely fast, and it was completed that year, and the emperor's plowing ceremony was successfully held in the spring of the following year.

Today is no exception, and the overall emperor's farming ceremony is even more grand. The emperor includes the emperor, a few adult princes, and a large number of important court officials in Gyeonggi. Everyone has to participate in it.

The emperor's plowing ceremony, developed to the present, has become a very important political ceremony for the Great Chu Empire.

(End of this chapter)