King of Song

Chapter 432

The Yellow River is the mother river of the Chinese nation and the birthplace of Chinese civilization.

Since the period of the Three Emperors and Five Emperors, the common people have lived on both sides of the Yellow River.Fertile land, humid climate, and convenient water sources have created this rich land.

The people lived a stable life, and the dynasty gradually prospered.Along the banks of the Yellow River, powerful dynasties were bred one by one. The main territories and political centers of the Zhou, Qin, Han and Tang Dynasties were all in the Yellow River Basin. This is the best proof.

During this period, the Yellow River was really a mother river, raising countless children along its banks.But people often only know how to take, but don't know how to return, or they don't understand sustainable development.

The population of the fertile Yellow River Basin is increasing, and more land needs to be reclaimed to feed them, and the ecology is gradually being destroyed.Coupled with the construction of houses and palaces, deforestation, war damage and many other factors, the ecology of the Yellow River Basin has been seriously damaged.People at that time did not know how to govern, so the problem became more and more serious.

The banks of the Yellow River are mostly loess areas with loose soil. Once the vegetation is damaged, it is easy to cause soil erosion.As more and more silt enters the Yellow River, floods in the Yellow River also appear.

The sediment is silted up, the river bed is getting higher and higher, and the river channel is getting narrower and narrower. The flow is fine on weekdays, but when there is heavy rain and the water of the Yellow River surges, floods will occur.The river cannot discharge the flood in time, and the flood can only find a place to vent itself, so the Yellow River burst.

The first serious breach of the Yellow River in history occurred in the Eastern Han Dynasty. At that time, the Yellow River breached and flooded the Yangqu area for more than [-] years. Yan, Henan and other prefectures were mostly disturbed by floods.

In the 12th year of the Han Dynasty, Emperor Ming of the Han Dynasty promoted Wang Jing and sent hundreds of thousands of civilians to rule the river.Wang Jing surveyed the terrain, excavated hills, built water gates, and built embankments more than a thousand miles long from Laiyang Wuqianchengkou to divert the river and Bian.River water intrusion.

One year later, on the second day of April in the 13th year of the Han Dynasty, the river canal was completed. From then on, the Yang Canal was able to carry water in Anliu. Avoid larger river troubles.

It has to be said that Wang Jing's contributions are great, not only benefiting the people of the Han Dynasty.In the next thousand years, the people on both sides of the Yellow River are enjoying his grace.

Since King Jingzhi of the Eastern Han Dynasty ruled the river, the Yellow River entered a rare "safe flow period". During this period, there were basically no large-scale floods, and the people in the Yellow River Basin were finally spared from harm and benefited from the Yellow River.It is precisely because of this that in the subsequent confrontation between the Southern and Northern Dynasties, the Northern Dynasties were able to unify the Southern Dynasties.The reason why the Sui and Tang Dynasties were able to unify the world, the national power was strong, and the people lived and worked in peace and contentment also benefited from the help of the Yellow River.

However, it is precisely because of this that the Yellow River Basin has become a densely populated and active area for thousands of years. The degree of development has continued to deepen, and the ecological damage has become more and more serious.Floods in the Yellow River are also accumulating day by day, and will break out one day.

Unfortunately, the Song Dynasty caught up!
Since the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, the Yellow River has been flooded, but only after entering the Song Dynasty did it begin to burst out intensively.During this period, Huang He was uncharacteristically, no longer as gentle as his mother, but a raging beast.Since the first time in the first year of Jianlong, the Yellow River breach has become commonplace.

From the first few years to one decision, to the subsequent one-year decision, two decisions in three years became a folk proverb at that time.The Yellow River burst continuously, which brought great disasters to the people of the Song Dynasty.As a result, when the Yellow River is rarely calm in a certain year, historians will rush to leave the words of congratulations "Hening this year" in the annals of history.It can be seen from this that the Yellow River flood has harmed the Northern Song Dynasty to what extent.

Every time the Yellow River floods, countless farmland houses are submerged, and countless people are displaced and miserable.Needless to say, the imperial court reduced the tax revenue as a result, but also spent countless money and food for disaster relief and governance of the Yellow River.Therefore, countless manpower and material resources are expended.To a certain extent, the Northern Song Dynasty was poor and weak. There was no reason for this. The Yellow River almost dragged the Northern Song Dynasty to death.In particular, Bianjing, the capital of the Northern Song Dynasty, was on the bank of the Yellow River. The flood of the Yellow River directly threatened the safety of the country and became the most serious disaster in the Northern Song Dynasty.

However, the emperors and ministers of the Northern Song Dynasty did not seem to be very attentive to the management of the Yellow River. They often just repaired the headaches and treated the head and feet, and did not consider the radical cure.It is precisely because of their passive sabotage that the already serious floods of the Yellow River accumulated and broke out again, which led to an even more terrifying thing - diversion!
The biggest damage caused by floods is breaches and diversions. If it is just a breach, it doesn’t matter as long as it is blocked, but diversions... a river that is flowing peacefully suddenly diverts in other directions, which affects too many things.Disaster for the whole country along the old and new rivers!

During the Northern Song Dynasty, especially during the reign of Renzong, the Yellow River was like a naughty child, and diversions were commonplace.

In the first year of Renzong Jingyou, the Henglong section of the Yellow River on Jingdong Road burst, and the flood that burst out swept away countless people, animals, crops, and houses, directly crossed the boundary of Damingfu, and then turned north.Although the Song court tried its best to repair the dam, it was still useless. It was futile and did not play any role.

It was a tragic beginning, and floods have been frequent since then.In the following decades, the Yellow River will never be peaceful again...

This is not a big deal, since then, the sixth day of the sixth month in the eighth year of Renzong Qingli sounds extremely auspicious.The Yellow River broke its embankment again at Shanghu, the capital of Chanzhou, and the breach was nearly one mile wide. The big waves emptied, and the water was surging, and the rolling yellow water flowed directly to the land of Hebei.

After these two breaches, the Yellow River completely changed its course, and the river diverted to the north, passing through the east of Neihuang in Henan, the west of Daming in Hebei, crossing the Hebei Plain, merging into the Yuhe River, and then entering the sea through the Jiehe River.

It is precisely because of this that the fertile land of Hebei was completely devastated by the flood of the Yellow River.The rich fertile fields disappeared, the people were displaced, and the people were in dire straits.The entire land of Hebei is about to become a Shura hell for thousands of miles. It is self-evident that the Song Dynasty paid a terrible price.

Furthermore, it was mentioned earlier.Because of the loss of the Yanshan barrier, the Song army could only rely on the Tangbogou River for defense on the Song-Liao border in Hebei.When the silt-filled Yellow River came northward, the ponds dug by the Song army were gradually silted up and lost their defense function.This is a major event related to the national defense of the Northern Song Dynasty, life and death.

The Yellow River flood has threatened the foundation of this country's survival!

At this point, governance of the Yellow River must be on the agenda.The court of the Northern Song Dynasty was not completely helpless. They also thought of many ways to control the river and put them into practice.

But a problem arises, river governance is not a pure problem.There is no small matter in the court, and it is impossible for everyone to work together on any one matter.As far as river control is concerned, because different plans involve the interests of different people, the courtiers have been arguing endlessly and have been unable to come up with a unified river control plan.

After four years of chattering, hysterical, and unconvinced quarrels for the sake of their own interests, the ministers finally found that the best time to manage the Yellow River was wasted in this way.During these four years, the Yellow River was rarely stable, which can be said to be the golden age of river governance.

However, due to quarrels over various plans, construction was delayed until the Yellow River broke its embankment at Guogukou, Guantao County, Daming Prefecture, and everyone came to their senses, but it was too late.After five months of hard work, the breach was closed, but at a very painful price.

However, the officials who went to inspect reported that the silt accumulation in the waterway was getting thicker and thicker, and the water surface would overflow the dam at any time and threaten to collapse again.This time Emperor Renzong couldn't sit still anymore, he was really wronged.The Northern Song Dynasty paid for the ecological destruction of the Yellow River Basin in the past thousand years, but he had to pay for the mistakes of previous generations of kings in river control.

After the emperor personally supervised, the efficiency was naturally extraordinary, and soon there was a river control plan.Prime Ministers Fu Bi and Wen Yanbo presided over it personally, after a long time of selection from various plans, they finally came to a conclusion.They recommended to Emperor Renzong the "river into the six pagodas" proposal proposed by Li Zhongchang, who was an official of the river canal department.

Li Zhongchang proposed to excavate the Liuta Canal from the Shanghu breach to draw the Yellow River East to the Henglong old road.It can slow down the disaster at the embankment breach of Shanghukou, and easily block the breach.Once successful, it can become a permanent water diversion channel of the Yellow River, so that the main channel can pass through the flood peak safely, and there will be no more breach floods.

Once the plan was put forward, it was approved by Emperor Renzong.Jia Changchao, a former prime minister who sentenced Damingfu, proposed the "return to the old way" but was abandoned.

Ever since, the Northern Song Dynasty accumulated a large amount of manpower and material resources to gather at the Liuta River to solve the flood of the Yellow River.After hearing the news, Ouyang Xiu, a famous official at the time, immediately wrote a letter to oppose it, but in the end, nothing came of it, and the method of entering the Six Pagodas was still implemented.

The Liuta River was excavated and dredged, and the Yellow River breach at Shanghukou was also blocked.The Yellow River seems to divert the flood and flow into the sea according to the expectations of the gentlemen.

It's a pity that they overlooked one point. The Yellow River is so surging, how can a Liuta River hold it?Although there is the old course of the Henglong River of the Yellow River, the riverbed has become higher and higher due to siltation. If the renovation is not complete, the flood discharge effect will be very poor, the water flow speed will be greatly slowed down, and the pressure on the Liuta River will undoubtedly increase greatly.It is a pity that Liuta River, as a small inland river, does not have such a capacity and flood diversion capacity at all, and the result can be imagined.

A very dramatic scene appeared. On the night when the Shanghu breach closed, the Yellow River broke its embankment again here.The project of entering the Six Towers of the River, which consumed a lot of manpower and material resources, ended without a problem. It completely failed with the regret and helplessness of many people.However, the water of the Yellow River is still surging, ravaging the north, so countless people have suffered.

(End of this chapter)