People in the Song Dynasty were lawless

Chapter 312 Leaving Yongji Pass and going straight to Shenglong

Ordinary people cannot see the impact and use of the vernacular after the reform. Feng Jing, as a highly intelligent person, can naturally see the inside.

A very simple truth is that the knowledge level of the people is uneven. Some people are completely illiterate, some know a few words, but not many, and some know common words but do not know obscure words.

Therefore, sometimes when the imperial court promulgates policies and announces them to the lower counties, even if announcements are posted at the government offices, city gates, and even at the entrances of villages, the people should not be able to understand them.

At this time, they either asked the village's talented people to teach them, or they asked the landlords and gentry who knew how to read. On their own, it's difficult to understand what the newly enacted policy means.

This leads to another problem.

If there were too few people who knew how to read, the landlords and gentry could gain a monopoly on knowledge and interpretation of words by wooing those talented people who knew how to read.

For example, the imperial court will reduce some taxes this year. Landowners, gentry, and rural intellectuals who can read together will unite to explain to the people that the imperial court will collect taxes normally this year, and hope that everyone will prepare the taxes to be paid in advance.

At that time, counties were short of manpower, and the tax system was progressive.

The county government officials would instruct the officials to collect taxes, and the officials would go to towns and villages to find local clans, landlords, and wealthy households, and ask them to organize people to pay taxes. At the same time, the officials would also collude with these local gentry.

The three parties seemed to be supervising each other, but in fact they colluded with each other. This formed the mercenary method in the early Northern Song Dynasty, which deceived the superiors and concealed the inferiors, and continued to exploit the bottom.

Therefore, despite the fact that the court's way of controlling local areas is very simple, central officials control various roads, each road governs the states, and the states are responsible for the counties. Finally, officials in each county govern the grassroots, achieving the purpose of layer-by-level jurisdiction. .

But in fact, the power of governance at the grassroots level is not in the hands of county government officials. They are separated from ordinary people by local clans, landlords, wealthy households, and police officers.

As long as these parties unite, there is no problem if they want to oust a local county magistrate.

Now under the imperial examination law, only the officials have been managed well. Now the officials are paid by the government and have channels for promotion. The situation has also improved slightly. However, the imperial court has been unable to do anything to deal with the grassroots clans, landlords, and wealthy households.

Therefore, Feng Jing immediately realized that the deep-seated meaning of the imperial court's reform of the vernacular system was to break the monopoly of local forces on knowledge and written interpretation.

Although people who are completely illiterate still can't understand it, this can take care of a large number of people who know a little bit about characters and know common characters.

Through the vernacular, these common people who know the common characters can read it, which is easier for the people who do not know the characters to understand.

This is undoubtedly a major reform.

So under what circumstances would the court suddenly do this?

Of course, there are more important reforms to be put in the back. It is estimated that after two months, when the requirement for vernacular writing spreads throughout the Song Dynasty, new policies will follow.

Feng Jing rolled his eyes.

It’s hard to say.

Among the imperial examinations, there was the court's interpretation of current affairs.

If you can answer it well, you will be favored by the academy.

Maybe it's not necessarily a success.

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At the end of June, many major events happened in the Song Dynasty.

There are many important ones. For example, due to rising temperatures in May this year, a severe drought occurred in Shaanxi Road in June, and the court actively provided disaster relief.

In early June, an indigenous rebellion broke out in Qiongzhou, and the imperial court sent Xiang troops stationed in Guangdong to suppress it.

In the middle of the month, Goryeo sent envoys to pay tribute, and the court gave more generous gifts in return.

In addition, all local government affairs, large and small, must be handled one by one, so that the machine of the central court can always operate efficiently.

But these can only be said to be normal state affairs.

Qiongzhou was a land of transformation in the Song Dynasty, just like Taiwan. The difference is that Qiongzhou was slightly developed, but the local indigenous people rebelled repeatedly.

Therefore, during the Shenzong period, when they used troops against Vietnam, they simply set up the Zhuya Army, Changhua Army, and Wan'an Army in Qiongzhou to harass Vietnam from the sea and suppress the local indigenous people.

Although Zhao Jun complained about the issue of sending envoys to worship the vassal state, the Song Dynasty would give back several times the gift to someone who brought a small gift, which was really a bit of an insult.

However, this is an extremely important tribute system in ancient Chinese civilization. In it, it is not just the younger brother who makes offerings, but also the elder brother who gives them some reward. There is also a deeper level of determination of upper and lower relationships, alliance attributes and a complete etiquette culture.

In this way, Chinese civilization determined the status of the Celestial Kingdom, and then exported Confucianism to neighboring countries, gradually converging their cultures, thus causing the entire East Asian civilization to be influenced by Chinese civilization.

Therefore, although the tribute system caused a lot of losses to the Song Dynasty and sent a lot of things back to the younger brothers every year, it also gave these younger brothers a considerable amount of cultural output, expanded the influence of Chinese civilization, and benefited the people of surrounding countries. Worshiping the Han people can be considered a win-win situation.

So in general, these are things that happen every year, and there is no change.

There are only two real big changes.

The first thing is that the imperial court is preparing for the reform of the vernacular, requiring official documents from various places to no longer be in the form of classical Chinese, but in the form of folk vernacular.

The second thing was naturally to use troops against the Yue and Li Dynasties.

After Yang Cha arrived in Guangxi, he immediately started making arrangements before Di Qing arrived.

In addition to internal food and grass, concentrated troops and horses, weapons and equipment.

He also actively contacted neighboring countries, hoping that East Asian kingdoms including Dali, Champa, Angkor, Lamphun and Bagan would send troops together.

Except for Dali, which responded positively, the other Southeast Asian countries basically did not respond.

The main reason is that although these countries have all fought wars with the Li Dynasty, these countries are basically separated from the Li Dynasty by the Changshan Mountains, and they are even further away from the Song Dynasty.

Therefore, they often choose to ignore foreign affairs, play in their own small circle behind closed doors, and rarely pay tribute to the Central Plains dynasty.

Dali is different.

They actively maintained a good relationship with the Song Dynasty, and they also had a feud with the Li Dynasty of Vietnam. When they heard that the Song Dynasty was preparing to use troops against the Vietnam Dynasty, they naturally wanted to beat up the lost dog, and followed behind their eldest brother to say something about the disastrous defeat in the Jinhuabu Battle. Bad breath.

By June, Di Qing led tens of thousands of troops and finally arrived in Yongzhou with great force.

Yang Cha took officials from Guangnan West Road to greet him.

It was evening, but it was not dark in summer. The sun was still hanging over the mountains in the west, and the moon in the east had already risen. It was almost six to seven o'clock in the evening.

The gorgeous sunset was picturesque, and under the burning clouds, groups of dusk crows circled in the sky, and then flew back to the mountain forest, causing a whirling sound in the forest.

A gentle breeze blew over the hills, and in the dense jungle outside Yongzhou City, countless black spots loomed on an official road.

After waiting for almost two or three quarters of an hour, the sun completely set, and the sky and earth were gray. Nong Zhigao and others looked out and saw a neatly-dressed team, lined up in a long queue, approaching step by step. The general at the front is riding a horse. He is about thirty years old, with a resolute face, and is looking ahead.

When he saw Yang Cha, he slowly rode his horse over, reined in his horse and stopped ten meters away, then turned over and dismounted with a beautiful movement, walked closer to Yang Cha and cupped his hands and said, "I've seen the Commander-in-Chief."

"General Di is polite."

Yang Cha returned the courtesy. He was a transport envoy, not a strategic envoy. He did not have the power to coordinate the entire army like Fan Zhongyan did.

Moreover, when Di Qing came out this time, in addition to his own official position, he was also temporarily awarded the title of Commander-in-Chief of the Military and Horse Command of Guangnan West Road, which is also the highest military officer along the way. He was on the same level as Yang Cha, so Yang Cha came out to greet him in person.

This time the imperial court sent troops to Vietnam, and its meaning was very clear. Yang Cha is responsible for logistics and overall planning, and Di Qing is responsible for main military strategy and tactics. The two men, one civil and one military, divided their labors and cooperated to deal with Li Chao.

"General, you have been tired of traveling all the way, but it is hard work. Please enter the city first and then talk about it."

"it is good."

Di Qing nodded.

At that moment, he ordered his soldiers to camp outside the city, and he brought a few personal guards into the city.

Nong Zhigao glanced at the imperial soldiers outside the city.

An army of tens of thousands.

Among them, there were only 10,000 regular troops.

The rest are civilian husbands.

The Tang Dynasty stipulated that a troop of 10,000 soldiers must be equipped with ten to eight horses and mules, carrying a large amount of grain, grass and baggage.

The Song Dynasty was basically the same, so if 10,000 people were dispatched, at least 20,000 to 30,000 civilians would be needed to help escort grain, grass and weapons.

These civilian men did not come from Kaifeng, but the imperial court issued an official document to allocate money, and the various roads hired civilian men to help escort them to the border of the road, and then transferred them by other roads.

Therefore, the team outside seems to be very large, with no end in sight. But the only ones who can actually fight are those neatly dressed regular troops.

only.

Nong Zhigao saw that the soldiers all carried a long pole on their backs and had short swords hanging on their waists. They had no armor and no cavalry.

After Di Qing issued the military order, he went to an open space outside the city in twos and threes to prepare to set up tents.

Although the military appearance is quite neat.

However, there is only a ring-headed dagger all over his body.

Can such a force really easily destroy the Yue and Li Dynasties?

Nong Zhigao only had questions in his mind.

During this time, Yang Cha led Di Qing into the city and went to the only restaurant in the city for dinner.

The two parties chatted happily, and by the time the banquet was over, the sky had completely darkened.

Originally, Yang Cha meant to let Di Qing take a day off and start talking about business again tomorrow.

But Di Qing was obviously very interested and rejected Yang Cha's proposal, hoping to discuss sending troops as soon as possible.

Seeing his persistence, Yang Cha did not object, so he left Zhao Wenzuo and Nong Zhigao behind, and the four of them discussed together in the backyard of the Yamen of the state capital.

In the backyard room, Yang Cha sat in the main seat, Di Qing sat in the first seat below, Zhao Wenzuo and Nong Zhigao sat in turn.

Candles were lit in the room, and after the attendants served strong tea and closed the door, Di Qing said, "Commander Commander, I believe you understand what the court means this time. I wonder what the situation is like?"

"During this period, I coordinated some troops and horses, stored some food and grass, and also sent spies to the border to investigate the situation, and found two possible attack routes."

Yang Cha spread out the map and said to Di Qing: "Since the imperial court changed this year, the Li Dynasty must have noticed this and deployed a large number of soldiers and horses on the border, led by their Taiwei Guo Shengyi, stationed in the Langzhou area."

He pointed to the dots on the map and said: "The road from the Song Dynasty to Jiaozhi is rugged and difficult. Even the best road is not easy to walk. The Yongji Pass Ancient Road is the only road. But besides Yongji Pass, there are This road goes south from Siling Prefecture, passing through Siming Prefecture and Lu Prefecture, and leads directly to the Li Chao Beijiang River!"

Di Qing scanned the map and found that Yongji Pass was the Friendship Pass in later generations and was called Zhennang Pass in the Ming Dynasty. Since ancient times, it has been the best way for the Central Plains dynasties to send troops to Vietnam. The Han Dynasty destroyed Jiaozhi and the Sui Dynasty destroyed Jiaozhi.

But it is foreseeable that since this road is the best road to take, then the Li Dynasty will inevitably choose to station a large army here when they are already vigilant.

"General."

Yang Cha added: "I thought that the Li Dynasty must guard the Yongji Pass ancient road. Although we control Yongji Pass, if we send troops south, we will be ambushed by Jiaozhi soldiers and horses. Therefore, what I think is that if we pretend to attack here, the elite soldiers will be able to defeat them from a young age." The road goes south.”

Di Qing thought for a while, turned to look at Nong Zhigao and said, "Nong Tongzhi, I heard that you are familiar with the local roads and have traveled between Jiaozhi and Guangxi many times. What do you think of this?"

Everyone introduced themselves at the dinner table just now, so everyone knows each other now.

Hearing Di Qing's question, Nong Zhigao quickly replied: "General, I also think it is best to do this. This road is very rugged and difficult to walk. If you get caught in an ambush, you may be in danger. Only a group of people can cross the mountains and ridges." The elite men can only bypass the Yongjiguan Ancient Road."

"I don't think so."

Di Qing shook his head and said: "This is a war to destroy the country, not just going south to attack Jiaozhi. If we bypass the highway, how will we supply food and grass? Once the opponent garrisoned the city, how can our army still be stationed in Jiaozhi? So the only way is to open up the road. This avenue requires a steady stream of supplies, allowing us to march straight in and conquer Thang Long!"

"This"

Everyone looked at each other, and everyone had considered this issue.

This trail is no worse than the Shu Road. The soldiers under Master Nong Zhi are originally ethnic minorities living in the mountains, so climbing over the mountains is certainly not a problem.

The problem is what to do if we take the trail to Jiaozhi?

If you want to cross mountains and ridges, you must travel lightly. The carriage cannot pass, and the only result is that they can only be beaten and harassed. Once the food and grass they carry with them are eaten up, they still have to retreat, and they cannot pose too much threat to Jiaozhi.

Therefore, if we want to destroy the Li Dynasty, we still have to open up the main road.

It's just that Nong Zhigao imagined that in order to open up the main road, the imperial court would have to send at least 200,000 troops over, but he only sent 10,000 troops. How could he fight?

Therefore, he could only say tactfully: "General, it's not that we don't want to open the ancient road to Yongji Pass, but that there are too few soldiers and horses."

"How many troops do you have on hand now?"

"There are more than 8,000 Guangnan West Road Xiang troops, plus the many tribes on the border who are willing to send troops, it is only 20,000 to 30,000. Dali is willing to send 30,000 troops, but they will definitely not charge forward."

"enough."

Di Qing smiled faintly, pointed at Yongji Pass and said: "Leave Yongji Pass, sweep across the enemy Langzhou, and then go south to Beijiang Prefecture. I checked the documents before coming and knew that this is an endless plain. Once here, the army can Go all the way south and go straight to Thang Long!"

(End of this chapter)