Ji Han Da Sima

Discussing the agricultural changes in China

Since I started studying history, I have studied the princes and generals in the early days, discussed the economic system, studied the geography of mountains and rivers, and finally understood the history of Chinese agriculture.

I deeply feel that the historical context is actually closely related to the changes in crops.

For example, in the early days, I didn't understand why during the Eastern Han Dynasty, Kansai began to decline and Kanto began to rise.

Later, when I learned about the history of agriculture, I learned that the widespread cultivation of Sumai in Guandong may be one of the core keys.

Kanto has three crops in two years, while Kansai has one crop in a year. This gap will undoubtedly become huge as time goes by. With a good economic foundation and feedback from the superstructure, the Kanto gentry could have a huge say in the Eastern Han Dynasty.

The stone mill, a seemingly small tool, is difficult for ordinary people with single households to use, but only clans and powerful people can master it.

As time went by, these clans and powerful men held scriptures in their hands and transformed into noble families and noble families. On the land of Guandong over there, a large number of Guandong noble clans such as Cui, Xun, Fan, and Huan may have been just ordinary clans hundreds of years ago. However, with the accumulation of economy, they had time to read scriptures and practice, and gained the right to speak, they gradually became A formidable gatekeeper.

When wheat spread to the south, it was cultivated in rotation with rice, resulting in a terrifying two crops a year. In the Ming and Qing Dynasties, double-cropping rice began to spread, and even triple-cropping agriculture of double-cropping rice + wheat was formed.

Such a terrifying economic generation gap, and it was no accident that the South dominated the North during the Ming and Qing Dynasties.

Even the collapse of the military system was related to the large-scale planting of wheat in Guanzhong.

The historical context may be hidden in our food today!

My personal knowledge is shallow and I am just a history buff.

It would be my honor if the content of Rice-Wheat Rotation can make some readers who like to read history think about it.

(End of this chapter)