People in the Song Dynasty were lawless

Chapter 460: The Tenth Year of Qingli
At the end of the ninth year of the Qingli period of the Great Song Dynasty, the old year came to an end amidst joy and happiness.

This is the tenth year of the Qingli period.

It was also the year 1050 AD, the 14th year since Zhao Jun came to the Song Dynasty.

In just 14 years, the Song Dynasty underwent comprehensive reforms in politics, economy, military, culture, education, and more.

The national strength has shown a qualitative leap.

Judging from the GDP data, the gross domestic product has more than doubled compared to the Jingyou year.

Based on the tax revenue during the Jingyou period and the tax rate at the time, it can be roughly calculated that the GDP of the Song Dynasty at that time was about 3-4 million guan.

But by the fourth year of the Qingli period, it had grown to 16 billion guan. By the eighth year of the Qingli period, with the full development of the steel industry and various construction projects driving economic development, GDP reached 30 billion guan.

Moreover, the taxation in Jingyounian was very high. The official tax rate was 10%, but with various levies and exploitation at all levels, it generally reached about 20-30%, which was particularly severe for the oppression of the lower-class people.

Now the agricultural tax has been greatly reduced, and only landlords with more land and wealthy people with more assets are subject to higher tax rates. The overall tax rate remains at 12%, and the tax rate for the poor with less assets has been reduced to below 7%.

In this way, the total annual income of the Song Dynasty court could reach more than 3 million guan, but about two-thirds of it would go to the central treasury, and the local governments would only retain one-third.

It can be said that the current Song Dynasty is already the best era among the feudal dynasties and the most prosperous era in the true sense.

It was not the Northern Song Dynasty in history that was poor and weak and only used higher taxation to keep the financial revenue of the central court of the Song Dynasty high, but the lower classes lived a very difficult life, leading to endless rebellions.

of course.

The ninth year of the Qingli period in 1049 AD was naturally not completely smooth sailing. It is impossible for there to be a historical dynasty in this world in which there was good weather everywhere in the country and without any natural disasters.

In essence, the harm caused by some corrupt officials in a place is far less serious than a natural disaster, such as drought, flood, insect plague, etc.

No matter how greedy the corrupt officials are, it is impossible for them to embezzle all the food that everyone in the county depends on for survival. That is unrealistic.

But natural disasters can.

Overnight, a county, a state, or even an entire area can be left with no harvest, and the people without food can become victims of the disaster. The disaster can eat up all the food available like a swarm of locusts passing through a territory.

However, there is almost no large-scale turmoil in the Song Dynasty due to natural disasters. Even if there are disasters, they will be quelled quickly.

For example, in the ninth year of the Qingli period, drought occurred in the Sixteen Prefectures of Yanyun, including parts of Hebei.

This disaster involved three routes and more than 20 states, affecting millions of people. It was enough to shake an ordinary dynasty, and could even be the last thing that broke the camel's back at the end of the dynasty, but it did not cause much splash.

Almost as soon as the signs of the crisis appeared, the Song Dynasty court immediately mobilized food and supplies to rescue the enemy, and then quickly eliminated them.

It lies in the strong national strength of the Song Dynasty.

From this we can see that the Song Dynasty’s comprehensive national strength has now surpassed that of the Qing Dynasty, which is recognized as the peak of the feudal dynasty, and has entered a new era - the industrial age.

The productivity of the industrial age is enormous, and the ability to resist disasters is much stronger than that of the feudal dynasty.

Even though trains were not yet a popular means of transportation, grain could be mobilized through the Grand Canal to complete disaster relief work and stabilize the domestic situation as soon as possible.

Just based on this point, the Song Dynasty's political coordination ability, macro-control ability, and grain storage ability have all reached an extremely high level, completely surpassing the feudal dynasties!
All of this is inseparable from Zhao Jun's transformation of the Song Dynasty over the past decade, from top to bottom and then from bottom to top, a plowing-like innovation back and forth.

But this is only the Song Dynasty.

Firstly, although the literati and officials of the Song Dynasty seemed powerful, in fact the military power was always firmly in the hands of the emperor. As long as he held the gun, even the most stubborn class could be wiped out.

Secondly, the literati in the Northern Song Dynasty were not as spineless as those in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. Although they might have some spinelessness, they still retained their moral bottom line.

Lu Yijian, Wang Zeng, Yan Shu, Fan Zhongyan, Bao Zheng, too many capable and famous officials in history.

Many times, with Zhao Jun as the core, if things are discussed and spread out, then many things will naturally follow smoothly, and there won't be too many shackles and constraints.

Otherwise, in the middle and late Ming Dynasty, people like Yan Song, Xu Jie, and the Donglin Party owned so much land and property in Jiangnan and were absolute interest groups.

Even if you explain all the pros and cons to the emperor, I'm afraid it will be difficult to break through the blockade of the literati.

Therefore, it was fortunate that Zhao Jun, as a political strongman, appeared in an era when the emperor was relatively weak, the literati had a relatively moral and just atmosphere, the private business atmosphere was strong, and the country was not closed to the outside world.

Zhao Jun spent the New Year in Jiangxi. He had originally planned to visit his hometown in Hunan, just like the last time he toured the country. But unfortunately, plans cannot keep up with changes, and there are always delays.

In contrast, Zhao Zhen was much more comfortable. Although he still could not leave the palace and was confined in a small place, he could climb up the city wall and see the lights all over the city.

Yes.

At the end of last year, Zhao Zhen used a steam engine to generate electricity to light up thousands of electric lights in the imperial palace.

At the end of this year, the Song Dynasty officially began to build electric poles, lay wires, and generate hydroelectric power through the Bian Canal, Jinshui and other rivers, so that electric lights could illuminate thousands of households.

"Our great Song Dynasty is technologically advanced. We have just established the Song Dynasty Power Grid. Now there are so many electric poles erected in the city. That is a very reasonable thing, right?"

This was an important speech delivered by His Majesty the Emperor Zhao Zhen of the Great Song Dynasty at the end of the year, in the evening, while he was looking at the lights lit up outside the Donghuamen Palace wall and the entire Donghuamen Street, and announcing it to all the civil and military officials.

The smiling expression and the way the corners of his mouth almost reached the back of his head were full of pride and pride.

He is also worthy of pride and honor.

Because throughout history, whether in the past or in the future, there has never been an emperor who was as capable of scientific research as he was, and there has never been anyone in the scientific community who was as capable of being an emperor as he was.

And if nothing unexpected happens, after he recovers the Western Regions, his evaluation among all the emperors of all dynasties will at least be ranked in the top five, and he may even compete for the top three.

If he could accomplish the feat of destroying Liao and unifying most of East Asia, it would be no problem for him to maintain his second place and threaten Ying Zheng's position.

In the current scientific community, even if Newton and Einstein came through, it would be useless. He has already laid the foundation for himself to be the first person in the scientific community and become the founder of the Eastern scientific system. With such a double champion in scientific research and imperial power, Zhao Zhen's historical status is destined to be unprecedented and unparalleled, and his achievements will be unprecedentedly great!
Who knows, in the future Internet era, people will no longer discuss whether Wang Mang was a time traveler, but Zhao Zhen.

Under the brilliance of Zhao Zhen, Zhao Jun seemed to become ordinary.

After all, the prosperity of a dynasty is often attributed to the emperor.

If this emperor happens to be outstanding.

Just like how everyone only thinks that Emperor Wu of Han was wise and brave, but forgets that the people who actually fought on the front lines were Wei Qing and Huo Qubing.

In parallel with the rapid development of technology in Bianliang, there are also changes in the city.

After a year, Kaifeng Bianliang City has changed a lot. The city has started to demolish and relocate buildings one after another, and carry out small-scale modern urban construction.

Just as Zhao Jun had said before, Kaifeng Prefecture must start land acquisition work as soon as possible. Otherwise, the longer it is delayed, the higher the land price in Bianliang will be. By then, the court will need to spend more money on land acquisition, which will be more cost-effective.

Then various bicycles and rickshaws started to run around, and telegraph lines began to be laid. There was a train station outside the south city, which could lead directly to Xiangyang.

The first batch of rubber trees transplanted to Hainan has matured. Although some of them died due to not adapting to the environment or improper planting, the surviving rubber trees quickly took root and grew vigorously. By the eighth and ninth years of the Qingli period, they were almost ready for harvest.

The industry is ready, and many things have already been laid out, except for the raw materials. For example, the design of the bicycle has been completed, and there are no problems with various tests and manufacturing. The only thing missing is rubber tires to start mass production.

There are so many benefits of having a pioneer like Zhao Jun. After the industrial revolution, the development of commodities must be based on demand and innovation. People only started to invent things when they thought that bicycles were useful.

But Zhao Jun didn't need to look at the current market. He knew what would be in the future and could just order construction. Through the court's macro-control, it was almost predicting market demand.

Therefore, with such a vision that was far ahead of its time, the development of the Song Dynasty was naturally far ahead of others, and it soared at a speed that was difficult for ordinary people to understand.

To some extent.

The current Song Dynasty is a bit like the late Qing Dynasty and the Republic of China.

Kaifeng is Shanghai. All kinds of new things will first appear here, colliding with feudal society to create strange sparks.

The rest of the Song Dynasty remained the same as before, with not much change.

Apart from the fact that people live a better life, have enough food and clothing, and there are fewer people being oppressed and exploited, the entire social outlook and overall structure are still those of the ancient feudal dynasties.

The clan power in the south is still strong, local governments still hold enormous power, and feudal superstition is still prevalent in rural social customs.

But Zhao Jun believes that with the passage of time, with the continuous improvement of the scientific and technological level of the Song Dynasty, and with the popularization of educational ideas, these feudal remnants and outdated customs will sooner or later disappear in the long river of history.

Under such circumstances, Zhao Jun celebrated the New Year in Jiangxi and entered Hubei in the first month of the year. Since he could not go to Hunan to celebrate the New Year, he decided to take the long way around and went south from Hubei to Hunan, then to Guangzhou, Guangxi, Guizhou and other places, and finally entered Sichuan from the Yangtze River.

Along the way, he found that the old customs and habits in the north were relatively good, while the south was the worst hit area. There were endless incidents of human sacrifice, drowning of babies, village fights, worship of evil gods, etc.

In many games and movies of later generations, strange things happen frequently in villages. The masterminds behind the scenes are often villagers or village chiefs. They worship gods such as the Six Burial Bodhisattva and the Great Black Buddha Mother, but in fact they are all evil gods. The prototype origin lies here.

Among them, the most famous evil god in ancient times was the Wutong God. In history, a secret shrine dedicated to the Wutong God was uncovered in Kaifeng City in the Northern Song Dynasty. The scene was extremely bloody and terrifying.

Wu Zeng, a contemporary of the time, recorded in his notes "Nenggai Zhai Manlu": "I pushed open the doors of two rooms and looked inside. In one room, there were many women and babies nailed to the four walls; in another room, there were countless prisoners who were being tortured and crying." This shows how rampant this kind of evil god worship was.

For this purpose, Zhao Jun stayed in the south for a long time, going to the grassroots and rural areas of various counties. He not only required each village to put up various anti-cult slogans, but also made many speeches, angrily denouncing the cults for harming people.

This situation continued until the second half of the tenth year of the Qingli period. In October, he finally completed his travels through Zhejiang, Fujian, Jiangxi, Hubei, Hunan, Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou and other places, and entered Sichuan to investigate the situation in Shuzhong.

I originally thought that Sichuan would be a little better, but when I got there I found out that due to the closed information, the situation here is no worse than that in Huguang. In addition to these feudal superstitions, there is even a serfdom system.

They are mainly concentrated in the western Sichuan Plateau west of Sichuan. This area is out of the control of the Song government, but nominally it is the territory of the Song Dynasty. Many of them are local ethnic minorities and chieftain regimes.

Zhao Jun knew that he couldn't solve this problem in a short period of time, so he had to give up.

However, this problem also exists in a few areas of Badong, such as Shizhou, Dazhou, Kaizhou, Kuizhou and other areas. Because of the high mountains and little land, the government lacks control, so the serfdom system is rampant, and even slaves are used for sacrifices.

For this reason, Zhao Jun repeatedly urged local officials to strictly investigate and crack down on such acts. If they resisted stubbornly, the army could be dispatched to directly eliminate these slave owners when necessary.

It’s not that these slave owners rebelled.

Instead, many slave owners were ethnic minorities living in the local mountains and forests, and they retained many bad habits from the Shang and Zhou dynasties, such as burying people alive with the dead, human sacrifice, killing slaves, etc.

The government asked them to correct their mistakes, but they never took them seriously. Only by sending out the army, eliminating their upper-level controllers, and forcibly changing their customs and habits can these bad habits be permanently eliminated.

Zhao Jun stayed in Sichuan for two months and left Sichuan almost at the end of the tenth year of the Qingli period. He took the Chencang Road and arrived in Baoji. He also inspected the construction of the Sichuan-Guanzhong Railway.

As the second railway, it was already under construction at this time, but the mountains and forests were steep and the roads were difficult to travel, so the progress was not fast. In many places, mountains had to be blasted to open the road.

Fortunately, the project was not hindered.

Because the road chosen by the Song Dynasty was actually the first railway from Sichuan to Shaanxi in later generations, the Baoji-Chengdu Railway line, which was started in 1952.

Although there are many difficulties along the way, the construction plans in most areas are relatively smooth, except for some areas where mountains need to be moved to open roads, so the project is progressing steadily.

In this way, after the Guangdong-Hankou Railway is built, another railway will be built from Bianliang to Beijing. This means that Sichuan can go north by rail to Shaanxi and then transport goods to Bianliang by ship along the Yellow River.

Going south, you can go to Zhejiang and Guangdong via the Yangtze River and Xiang River. Guangdong has a railway directly connected to Beijing, and Zhejiang has a canal to Bianliang, which will revitalize the national economy.

It is no longer necessary for goods from Sichuan to be transported to Zhejiang via the Yangtze River and then sent to Bianliang and the north via the canal as before. The overall economic situation, including domestic and overseas trade, can be greatly developed.

On December 16 of the tenth year of the Qingli period, Zhao Jun arrived at Baoji County, Qinfeng Road. Officials of all ranks from the Qinfeng Road Pacification Office, the Transportation Office and other departments all came to greet him, including an old acquaintance.

His former bodyguard - Di Qing!
(End of this chapter)