Prime Minister Bizen

Chapter 306 Ukita's Samurai Class

Hearing Xiujia's opinion on Iyozhong's treatment, Togawa Hidean and Ukita Kanjia said in surprise, "Should I reduce the points by half again? Is this kind of treatment too extreme? In addition, His Royal Highness requested that the principal and accessory Beheading all of them and sending them to Osaka may cause dissatisfaction among the wealthy local clan in Iyo."

Since the beginning of manor culture, Japan and Europe have embarked on a similar path.

If the Lang party in the Kamakura period was considered a semi-professional soldier, by the time of the Muromachi shogunate, the samurai class called "samurai" had been completely called the embodiment of an army's combat effectiveness, similar to the knight class in the European Middle Ages.

The former semi-professional Lang Party gradually degenerated into an underground peasant and soldier organization, and served more as a background board on the battlefield.

That is, from this time on, the warrior class seems to have an alternative gold medal for avoiding death. As long as they do not make too many mistakes, as long as they are not beheaded on the battlefield, they can be forgiven and treated preferentially after surrendering after the war.

After all, for a daimyo, it takes decades to train a samurai from scratch, but accepting the local nobles and servants in place can quickly become his own armed force and contribute to the next war.

So you will find that in the early and middle period of the Warring States period, there were many samurai families, and they would jump back and forth between the two daimyos, but the double-haired daimyos had very ambiguous attitudes towards them, and they seemed to acquiesce in this kind of stupidity at both ends of Uncle Snake. Make pie.

This trend continued until the middle of the Warring States period, until the introduction of the European matchlock guns made the Sengoku daimyos suddenly realize that the samurai class that took decades to cultivate had no power to fight back against this weapon.

It doesn't matter whether you are a master of war art or a master of spear skills, no matter how fierce your reputation was before, all living beings are equal before the arquebus.

As a result, the daimyo, dominated by the Oda family, began to change, and the peasants and soldiers who used to serve as background boards were re-elevated to the status of the Lang party in the past. This was the birth of Ashgaru.

However, even if the ashigaru at this moment have begun to serve as the main force on the battlefield, their identities are still civilians.It was not until the Edo shogunate period that the ashigaru became a samurai class recognized by the public.

As an old man who got up early in the Warring States Period, Togawa Hidean's understanding of the Warring States Period has changed, but in his bones he still regards warriors who can fight well as the key to victory on the battlefield.

That's why Togawa Hidean opposed Hideka's decision so fiercely.

As the elder of the writer's family, Togawa Hidean had no choice but to advise the Hide family: "Although they betrayed the family and fought against the family, many of them were deceived and coerced by the treacherous officials headed by Kaneko Yuanzhai. .Your Highness, think about it from time to time?"

However, the Xiu family abnormally picked up the teapot, poured a cup for themselves, and said slowly, "Higou Mamoru, you also said just now, they are the ones who betrayed the family, and chose to fight against the family. After being defeated, they still Shouldn’t such a punishment be appropriate for resisting?”

Togawa Hidean still didn't give up, Quan Jian said, "But His Highness has asked their family members to cut seppuku. This is already a very severe punishment. Now they have to cut their knowledge and behavior in half. I am worried that it will cause harm." There will be criticism."

"Criticism? What criticism? Are you saying that I am mean and ungrateful?" Xiujia responded in a slightly mocking tone, "The kindness of my Yuxi Family is only imposed on warriors who are loyal to their clan. For those who betray their clan, how can He De be able to enjoy the bath?" My kindness?"

"Besides, without reducing their territory, what will I use to reward the soldiers who fought for justice in this battle? Do I want to cede part of the knowledge and practice of Hihou Shou to reward them?"

Speaking of this, Xiujia's eyes suddenly became sharp, and he looked at Togawa Hidean like an eagle, and said in a very cold tone, "It's not important to criticize or anything. They can say what they want. I have more than ten thousand With Samurai Ukita as the backing, are you still afraid of these small troubles?
If they don't have a long memory this time, they are welcome to continue to make waves next time. We suppress them once, and we can suppress them a second time. "

Just like what Xiujia said in his answer, Xiujia's confidence comes from the nearly ten thousand warriors registered in the Yuxi Family, and the more than ten thousand people that Xiujia said included quasi-samurai like the second son in the family.

Yu Xijia, who mastered the knowledge of millions of stones in the seven countries of the Western Kingdom, is such a volume.In other famous families, the second son in the family wished to be counted as a samurai, but it was not counted in the Yuxi family.

In the Yuxi family, warriors are not only hereditary, they must be recommended by a guarantor, and they must have good performance in military art, internal affairs, and military strategy before they can be registered and recognized as a warrior class.

And every warrior class will receive a small wooden plaque with a border to prove their identity.

Receiving the wooden sign also means that he has become a member of the Yuxi family's military service and needs to help the Xiu family to kill the enemy.

Correspondingly, the ashigaru and standing staff directly under the establishment received the second-class bamboo cards.As for the peasants and soldiers in the countryside, because the organization and mobilization are still lagging behind, every time they go to the battlefield, they just randomly recruit people. The Xiu family did not make such a request.

In the Yuxi family, only adult men who have received a small wooden token are allowed to carry three swords (ribcha, dao, and Taidao) at ordinary times, and those who have not obtained a small wooden token, even if they are from a samurai family with a long history, are allowed to carry three swords on weekdays It is also allowed to walk with ribs at most.

The Xiu family's regulations have invisibly raised the status of the samurai class and effectively condensed the centripetal force of the samurai class towards Ukita.

1 samurai are a minority even in the whole country. I am afraid that only Toyotomi and Hojo have such a strong mobilization ability in the whole world.

Although it is now in the late Warring States period, due to the appearance of the arquebus gun, the status of the ashigaru has been improved, but the poor maintenance and high price of the arquebus gun make it only used as a support weapon by the daimyo of various countries.

The warrior class who are proficient in bow and horse and are proficient in fighting on the battlefield is still an existence that can determine the outcome.

At the same time, it is also because of the improvement of Ashgaru's status that he has become the main force on the battlefield.

With a huge existence like Ukita with more than 5 samurai, when mobilizing troops, these samurai can be used as the backbone to quickly fill in ashigaru and peasant soldiers to form an elite army of more than [-] people.

This is exactly where Xiujia's confidence lies!
There are so many samurai and quasi-samurai in the Uki family, so naturally they don't know the group of backward rural wealthy families in Toiyo country.If you want to follow Yuxi's family, you will naturally welcome them, but if you want Uncle Snake's two ends, the Xiu family is worried that they don't have enough knowledge and deeds to reward the meritorious soldiers.

Hideka just took the opportunity to shuffle Iyo's entire deck, and filled Iyo with samurai from Bizen, Misaku, and Bichu.

The Xiu family wanted to let this group of obstinate old stubborn know that the times had changed, and the earth would continue to revolve without them.

Hidean Togawa was left speechless by Hideka's words, especially the last sentence, "Reward part of his own knowledge and deeds to reward meritorious soldiers", which directly knocked him back.

Hideyasu Togawa is an old politician, so he naturally knew that Hideya was reminding him to be careful.

Now the entire Uki Family is like a war-hungry machine. If you must stop it, Hidean Togawa will fight against those low-level samurai who are eager to know and do, and be careful not to be torn to pieces by the angry [-] samurai.

Although there are some differences in philosophy, Togawa Hidean had no choice but to compromise after being threatened by Hideka, and apologized to Hideka.

After all, Hidean Togawa is the writing boss of the Yuki family. Although the Xiu family warned him, they still gave him face and didn't hold on to such trivial matters, and let him continue to report the next thing.

After seeing the forgiveness from the Xiu family, Xiu'an relaxed what she had just mentioned, and continued to report to the Xiu family, "The time when His Highness left happened to be the autumn harvest, and we will also use these two months to deal with various areas under the control of our family. The country re-inspected the territory."

"This is the knowledge and practice data from various places." After finishing speaking, he handed over a thick account to the Xiu family.

Hideka took the account and slowly opened it, and said to Hidean Togawa, "Higou Mamoru, I'll read the details on it later, let's pick up the important ones first."

Hideyasu Togawa introduced to Hidejia step by step, "After the 13-year inspection by Tensho, the subtotal of Zhixing in the 8 counties of Bizen was 25.4 shi, a slight increase from the previous year, mainly because Takatsu and Oku counties reclaimed the most wasteland. Due to the mountains in the north of Waqi, Akasaka, and Banli counties, it is difficult to reclaim wasteland.

According to His Highness's idea, terraced fields have been reclaimed along the mountain, but they have encountered the problem of how to transport the water source.This year, the crops in the terraced fields are growing a bit difficult, and many people are unwilling to continue to cultivate the mountains. "

Hideka interrupted his continuation here, and said, "Has Higo Mamoru ever tried the method of diverting water from a mountain spring?"

"I tried it, but unfortunately the situation was not ideal, and it also triggered the issue of water source competition between the terraced households on the mountain and the Hirata households at the bottom of the mountain, especially Mr. Dazai's Hoki, which also triggered a war between the villages."

Xiujia frowned when he heard this. Boqi is located in Sanyin, and the low number of knowledge and actions is not only due to the accumulation of volcanic ash. The most important thing is that the Chinese mountains block the warm Pacific Current, so that Boqi cannot get enough rainfall throughout the year.

Sanuki has many plains, but the main reason why agricultural development is hindered is also because of this.From this point of view, the Sanyin kingdoms, like Sanuki, are very similar to the west of Taihang in the Ming Dynasty, which is determined by natural conditions.

Hideka could only sigh helplessly when he heard that, he knew that what Togawa Hidean said was true.

The biggest reason why hilly terraced fields are popular in Cainan and Minyue in southern China is that they are affected by the warm current from the south and have sufficient precipitation, which can provide natural precipitation for terraced fields, but this is what Japan desires. not thirsty.

Suddenly, Xiujia had a flash of inspiration and remembered that the reason why the later Sanuki Kingdom became a big country with 40 koku in the hands of the Takamatsu Domain was the result of extensive water conservancy construction.

The water conservancy in Sanuki is quite different from that in other countries. In other countries, the flooding of rivers makes both sides of the precipitation a useless silt swamp.Water conservancy was built in order to reclaim the fertile soil on both sides of the river into fertile fields and to curb the flooding of the river.

But Sanuki is different. Sanuki is blocked by the Ryuo Mountains and Sanuki Mountains in the south, which blocks the warm current from the Pacific Ocean, making the local precipitation very little. There are many rivers in Sanuki, but the amount of each river The water flow is very small, and many rivers can even cross the river directly.

The way Takamatsu Fan came up with after being entrusted with Sanuki was to dig water holes widely, gather the precipitation resources in the sky, and draw water directly from these water holes when irrigation is needed.This is why Sanuki is now known as the "Land of Thousand Ponds".

Of course, there is also a problem with such a pool of water, that is, most of the water in the pool is stagnant water and cannot be used by people.

So after several generations of tinkering, narrow ditches were used to connect adjacent pools of water together, and they were connected to nearby rivers. Every quarter, no matter what the water level was stored, the gates would be released once a year. Every year before the rainy season, there would be There was a big release of water.

At the same time, the smart Sanuki people raise fish and shrimp in these ponds, and use fish and shrimp to verify the activity of the pond water. Every autumn and winter, nodules are harvested on a large scale. This has also become a precedent for fish farming in artificial ponds in Japan. .

Before the Takamatsu Domain dug the pond, generations of Sanuki people stayed on reclaiming wasteland for the increase of knowledge and practice.The land of Sanuki has many plains, which should have been the best area to cultivate, but after several generations of cultivation, the number of Zhixing of about 17 shi was reduced.

It wasn't until Takamatsu Fan changed his mind, bought back some fields with low yields, and re-dug them into ponds.

Although it will affect the number of local knowledge and practice at the beginning, after a few years, the knowledge and practice of the Takamatsu Domain has grown by leaps and bounds. By the end of the Bakumura, the total number of knowledge and practice in Sanuki was as high as 45 shi, and it was no longer the empty plain. But it is an extremely barren country.

Hideka thought of borrowing this 2.0 technology to improve the agricultural level of Sanuki, and then Hideka dragged his idea to Hidean Togawa. "Since Higo is the lord of Sanuki, then this plan should be handed over to Higo. Just before the spring of this year, we can dig some pools to see the effect.

Time is really tight, and the general request for the diversion canal has been temporarily postponed. Let's dig out the pond first.

As for the problem of terraced fields, in fact, a similar method can be used. Let them dig a large pond on the top of the mountain to store water, and wait until it is needed for irrigation. Can it be used soon? "

At this moment, Hideo and Togawa Hidean were immersed in the joy of the problem being solved, and did not notice the problem in the plan at all.

Hideka just copied the experience of the Ming Dynasty to Japan, but ignored the geographical differences between the two places.In the Ming Dynasty, most of the areas where terraced fields could be planted were in the southern hilly areas.

Although there are many mountains here, there is a thick layer of accumulated soil on the outside of the mountain, so it is easier to excavate.However, most of the mountains in Japan are formed by volcanic eruptions, and most of the mountains are hard rocks.

Thousands of years of wind, water and rain have only caused a small amount of desertification on the surface, and most of the things that can end up on the mountain are shrubs, coniferous trees and bamboo. It is indeed difficult to grow cash crops.

Especially the problem of excavating terraced fields, due to the lack of accumulated soil outside the mountain, only rocky mountains can be excavated, which is time-consuming and labor-intensive.

In a neighboring country like Hoki, which is dominated by volcanic ash and mountains, a large mountain occupies half of the territory, and the real agricultural development will wait until after the Meiji era.

It was the appearance of artificially built ponds that made it possible for Boqi to store rainwater, and the soil suitable for farming was transported from neighboring countries, which made it possible for people to cultivate terraced fields around the mountains.

(End of this chapter)