My life is like walking on thin ice

Chapter 505: Changing Customs
As Cheng Bushi finished speaking, the heads of various tribes, who originally had different expressions and some were even smiling, all became serious at the same time.

In the blink of an eye, seriousness was written all over the faces of the leaders of each department.

Compared with the more stable Chinese agricultural civilization, the relatively more unstable grassland nomadic civilization obviously has a higher frequency of mutual annexation and understands the key to annexing and annexing other tribes better.

To use the most popular saying on the grassland, if you want to make a tribe completely surrender, you must kill their men, play with their women, exile their elders, and whip their children.

When all the men in the tribe died, the women were pregnant with the children of the new ruler, the elders were too tired to make a living and unable to contribute their wisdom, and the children became slaves and could not have courage;
Then this tribe would no longer exist, which means it would be annexed and absorbed.

Of course, this is a rather extreme statement.

Normally, unless two tribes have a deep hatred for each other and a brutal battle results in one side being defeated and the other side winning, the victorious side will take such extreme measures.

In most cases, violent annexations between nomadic tribes, or even non-violent annexations initiated by the weaker party, can actually be barely considered "mild" for the tribesmen.

Men, you don't have to compare your height with the wheels. If you are taller than the wheels, you will die.

As long as you have the ability, you can become a bodyguard for an important person, or an auxiliary soldier with a relatively lower status than a tribal warrior.

Even if they have no ability, they can still retain their status as herdsmen after giving away most of their wealth and livestock, rather than becoming slaves directly.

Not all women will be abducted and raped.

Except for a few women who are extremely good-looking and will be invited to be one-night couples or even hundred-night couples, other women will most likely retain the right to choose their own partners.

Just like before, when they could decide for themselves whether to continue to follow their husbands - after the tribes were peacefully annexed, the women of the annexed tribes could also follow the rules of the grassland and rely on the strong man they were satisfied with.

The ex-husband will not interfere, and the new husband will most likely not refuse.

As for the elderly and children, it has long been the norm on the grassland for the elderly to be expelled, abandoned, and left out of the tribe to fend for themselves.

Just like in Han areas, the elderly are respected unconditionally;
On the grassland, the elderly will be exiled unconditionally.

This is the primitive group instinct of animals, which allows old and weak individuals to make the decision to sacrifice themselves and contribute to the population.

It can also be considered that the population itself abandons its old individuals in order to continue.

There is nothing to say about this.

-Don't say you are an old den of an annexed and conquered tribe;
——Even our own tribe’s elders, and even the fathers, brothers and elders of the nobles, will be exiled to the grassland to fend for themselves as long as they are old enough.

You are also a nomad. I don't need to explain this to you, right?

As for children, the situation is a little more complicated.

Some tribes value population, so they will absorb the children of the annexed tribes.

Some tribes wanted to obtain more slaves, so they would train the children of the annexed tribes as loyal slaves from an early age.

Some tribes, which value the purity of their tribal bloodline, may sell these children as slaves to other tribes in exchange for some cattle and sheep.

There are also some tribes that simply want to improve their fighting power, so they will gather these children together, hone their fighting skills from an early age, and eventually grow them into armed forces directly under the tribal leader.

The annexing party had various ways of dealing with the people of the annexed tribe.

After the annexation, each tribe had its own way of "digesting" the annexed tribes, and each had its own explanation.

But there is one thing that is a consistent feature recognized throughout the grassland.

——The most essential difference between the annexing party and the annexed party is that after the two tribes merge for various reasons, everything on the annexing party will be retained.

Including beliefs, as well as rules and systems.

On the contrary, everything of the acquired party will be replaced.

The acquired party needs to abide by the rules, systems, and even beliefs of the acquiring party!
For example, last autumn, the Xiutu tribe of Xiutu Ze was ambushed and massacred by the Hunxie tribe.

If at that time, the Hunxie tribe did not "eradicate the roots" but decided to make the Xiutu tribe surrender, then the people of the Xiutu tribe would be incorporated into the Hunxie tribe.

Within the Hunxie tribe, these surrendered Xiutu people were called: Xiutu slaves.

From now on, they need to abide by the customs of the Hunxie people, obey all the rules and regulations of the Hunxie tribe, and believe in the gods believed by the Hunxie tribe.

At this moment, Cheng Buzhi's seemingly nonchalant words of "Three Articles of Agreement" fell into the ears of the leaders of various tribes, and it clearly meant that the Hetao tribes, as the annexed ones, needed to abide by the Han rules from now on.

Although in reality, Hetao was indeed controlled by the Han Dynasty, strictly speaking, the various tribes in Hetao had indeed been annexed by the Han people.

But after all, it was not a annexation between nomadic tribes, but rather the annexation of the grassland nomadic civilization by the Chinese agricultural civilization.

For a moment, the leaders of each tribe looked at each other and instinctively wanted to say something, but they just hummed and hawed for a long time and couldn't utter a word.

Anyone who kills will be put to death, anyone who injures or steals will be punished.

These three "Three Articles of Agreement" are well-known in the Han area and are known to everyone, including women and children. The leaders of various tribes are not completely unaware of them.

If we really talk about the three conventions themselves, there is actually no problem.

On the grassland, although nomadic people follow the most primitive law of the jungle and advocate the survival of the fittest, they are not a group of wild beasts without order or rules.

Moreover, as time went by, nomadic peoples have gradually developed the consciousness of "building order".

For example, thousands of years ago, the survival methods of nomadic people were the same as those of wolves.

——The strongest one becomes the 'Wolf King', that is, the leader, with the power to command all male members, even the power of life and death, as well as the unconditional right to mate with all female members.

At the same time, as a leader, the tribal chief naturally shoulders the survival responsibility of the entire tribe. He needs to lead the tribe to find enough food, avoid risks and increase the probability of survival.

Within the tribe, all male members are eligible to challenge the leader, and the challenge must be a 1v1 battle between real men.

The chief cannot let his guards take action, and the guards will not take action; the challenger cannot engage in a group fight, and the winner of a group fight will not be recognized as the new chief.

It was under this most primitive order of beasts that nomadic people gradually developed the rudiments of civilization.

The landmark turning point in this process is the establishment of order.

For example, women, from the very beginning, had to unconditionally accept the mating requests of the headman and were not allowed to mate with other tribesmen who were not the headman, which became a relatively more advanced polygamy - or a relatively stable and open pairing. For example, men, from the initial simple dependence on the tribe and being ready to stab the headman at any time to replace him, gradually evolved into more civilized: master-servant loyalty, kinship blood, friendship between relatives and friends and other advanced emotions.

As of now, although the Xiongnu Chanyu, as the common leader of the grassland, theoretically still has to accept challenges from anyone, not everyone is qualified to have a 1v1 real man battle with the Chanyu.

In most cases, challengers would attempt to overthrow the rule of the Chanyu or tribal leader by launching a coup d'état.

The "wolf kings" such as the Chanyu and tribal leaders will not foolishly wait for someone to 1v1, but will use close defense forces to prevent possible coups.

Moreover, the criteria for determining the "strongest" such as Chanyu and tribal leaders is no longer simply based on military strength.

Take the current position of Chanyu for example: first of all, you have to be a member of the royal family of the Luandi clan to be qualified to compete for the position of Chanyu.

This is a hard entry condition and threshold.

If you fail to reach this threshold, even if you are recognized as the strongest person in the entire grassland, you will not be qualified to compete for the position of Chanyu.

If you want to become the Chanyu, you cannot and will not achieve your wish by challenging the Chanyu or fighting him in a duel.

Instead, it could only overthrow the Xiongnu's rule over the grasslands, overthrow the Xiongnu Chanyu's court, and overturn the order that "only members of the royal family of the Luandi clan could become Chanyu."

Even if you have the identity of a royal family of the Luandi clan and have the bloodline to compete for the position of Chanyu, it is still not enough to just be able to fight.

You have to be quite good at fighting and have intelligence that is significantly better than that of your competitors.

In addition, in the decades since Maodun became the Chanyu, the qualifications for competing for the position of the Xiongnu Chanyu have gradually been tightened from the original broad "anyone from the royal family of the Luandi clan" to: only the Left and Right Xian Kings, and the Left and Right Guli Kings.

Therefore, as a member of the royal family of the Luandi clan, if you want to become the Khan of the Xiongnu, you must first replace one of the four people, the Left and Right Xian Kings, and the Left and Right Guli Kings, and become one of the 'Four Heirs' of the Xiongnu.

Among them, Zuo Xian Wang had long been recognized as the most outstanding son of the Chanyu, but there were still further and more precise bloodline identity thresholds.

The Right Wise King is either the most outstanding brother of the current Chanyu or the descendant of the most outstanding brother of the previous Chanyu.

If you are neither the son of the current Chanyu, nor his brother, nor the son of the previous generation's Right Wise King, then the only positions you can compete for are the Left and Right Guli Kings.

Then, after the Chanyu dies, you will have to compete with the other three of the Four Successors.

Although it is called competition, it is actually still a ranking process.

With the first-in-line crown prince, Zuo Xian Wang, it would not be the turn of You Xian Wang to become Chanyu.

Unless the Right Wise King could launch a coup, suffer a military defeat, and directly eliminate the Left Wise King.

If the Right Wise King really has this ability, and the Left Wise King is really so incompetent that he cannot defeat the Right Wise King, then he deserves to have his throne taken away from him.

As long as one of the Left or Right Wise King is still alive, it will never be the turn of the next-level Left and Right Guli Kings.

The Left and Right Guli Kings were themselves one of the Eight Pillars of the Xiongnu. Although they were both among the upper four pillars, that is, one of the four reserves, they were also members of the Left and Right Four Pillars under the Left and Right Wise Kings.

As the Left and Right Guli Kings, it is difficult for you to remain loyal to the Left and Right Wise Kings while the Chanyu is alive, and at the same time have the ability to compete with the Left and Right Wise Kings for the throne after the Chanyu dies.

Therefore, the existence of the Zuoyou Guli King is actually a safety lock.

The purpose was to take preventive measures to ensure that the throne would not fall into the hands of outsiders when both the Left and Right Wise Kings encountered problems and were unable to inherit the throne.

At this point, it is not difficult to find that: in theory, the position of the Xiongnu Chanyu is still a wolf-pack-style "one with martial virtue occupies it", but in fact, the scope of challengers has already been defined within the royal family of the Luandi clan.

According to this trend, in another hundred years, the position of the Xiongnu Khan would most likely evolve into the primogeniture inheritance system of the Chinese civilization, where the son inherits the throne after the father's death, and the younger brother inherits the throne after the elder brother's death.

At the very least, it is a hereditary system of "appointing the most virtuous" among the descendants.

From the above, it is not difficult to find that although today's grassland nomadic civilization is still much more backward than the Chinese agricultural civilization, it is gradually on the road of development and progress.

Moreover, with the advanced civilization of China right next to them, teaching by example, the development of the grassland nomadic civilization was not very slow.

In this context, it is not so shocking to require nomadic people in a region to abide by basic laws that stipulate that those who kill will be put to death, those who injure will be punished, and those who steal will be punished, and to establish the most basic stable social order.

——Nomads are also human beings.

No matter how much they were denounced as "barbarians" by the Han people, they were still upright people after all.

Humans are naturally highly social creatures.

A high level of sociality naturally means a deep yearning for order, especially a relatively stable order, from the bottom of one's soul.

Because within a group or population, the strong are always the minority and the weak are always the majority.

An order that respects the strong and bases everything on the strong is not in the interests of the weak who make up the majority.

Therefore, a stable order must follow the principle of having the strong as leaders and taking care of the weak as much as possible.

How can that set of order take care of and protect the weak to the greatest extent possible?
The answer is: do not allow the strong to act recklessly and decide the life and death of the weak based solely on personal preferences.

From this perspective, the "new Han people" in the Hetao tribes have a very high acceptance of the three laws that stipulate that the murderer shall be put to death, the wounding shall be punished, and the theft shall be punished.

Because of these three laws, the nobles could not beat people for no reason, or even kill people to vent their anger;
Nor can you take away the wealth of herdsmen or tribesmen and take it for yourself just because you like it.

The strong still dominate, but the weak can also be protected and their personal safety can be guaranteed to a certain extent.

This is not a bad thing for the Hetao region.

But as nobles, the leaders of each tribe knew clearly in their hearts: Emperor Taizu of Han entered Xianyang first and made three laws, which settled the hearts of the people in Guanzhong.

To date, in just fifty years, the once ferocious Qin stronghold has become the most solid base and foundation of the Han Dynasty: Guanzhong!
Now, the Han people are going to make these three rules in Hetao again;

In the foreseeable future, we will continue to do this in Hexi...

"If it really works, then in a few decades, why would Hetao need tribal leaders like us?"

"I'm afraid that Hetao and Hexi will also become another 'Guanzhong' for the Han people, right?"

(End of this chapter)