warring states careerist

Chapter 915 Unbelievable

Many days ago, a large army passed by the Qichun Society.

During the period of stationing here, Qiu committed no crimes, and even distributed some cane sugar to the children of the village community to eat. Before leaving, some soldiers named "engineers" helped the village community dig drainage ditches.

People in the village community are both familiar and unfamiliar with this army.

Strange because such an army has never been stationed here.

It is familiar because of the women in this army wearing witch costumes. Some men and women in similar costumes have come here, giving them some food seeds, and teaching them some healing herbs.

This kind of shaman costume is the costume of the Mohist healer and priest, and it is easily recognizable by the fusion of the sacrificial costumes of the Huaiyi and Chu people.

There are a lot of witches in Chu State, and many witches are doctors in the village community. The more backward the place, the status of women is slightly higher, because it is a remnant of a long time ago.

When the army left, the people in the village were quite disturbed.

Because this army is very good people, although the language barrier, only a few people can communicate with them, but the attitude is kind.

It is also because many young and strong members of their village community have been recruited and participated in the battle, and the target of the battle is the army that passed here not long ago.

This army is very good, and they are good people; but the object of the battle is the relatives of their own village.As a result, they are quite uneasy, looking forward to victory to live a good life like those songs sung by those in the army who can communicate with them; and worrying that their relatives will die on the battlefield.

The sun and the moon are unknown in the village, and outside the village it was more than [-] days after the uprising in Zhucheng, and people from the village community were offering sacrifices and praying for blessings in front of the community.

The society is the god of the land, the original place of worship for each village.

This kind of blessing is not done casually.

After the reform of the state of Qin in later generations, the king of Qin fell ill. Some people from the village community bought a cow and killed it as a sacrifice to pray for the king of Qin.

So Qin Wang said: They violated the law, although the original intention was to love me.But I can’t not punish them just because I love me, because they may not love me in the future, so I have to rely on power and the law, which is long-term, whether they love me or not, I will abide by it, so I punished the village community twice according to the law Leather money.

However, Chu State is still far away from the reform at this time. Even if the previous king of Chu changed the reform, it would only be those places near the capital, and it would not be able to effectively govern here.

The men, women and children of the village gathered here. Instead of following the season, they slaughtered a dog and prayed for blessings under the leadership of the village elders.

One prayed that the young people in the village community would not die in battle; and one prayed that the wonderful world that the eccentric army and the people they trusted in witch costumes said would come true.

Halfway through the sacrifice, someone suddenly shouted, "They're back!"

The astonishing shout shocked everyone in the village. Following the sound, they saw more than a hundred people walking towards this side, and they were the people from their village.

Next to the people from the village commune, there are seven or eight people carrying muskets. They recognize them. Although they didn’t recognize them 20 years ago, over the years, muskets have gradually become the equipment that soldiers need to practice. surprise.

Those carrying muskets were obviously members of the army that passed by before, and their special military uniforms were obvious.

I only saw someone in the crowd say something to those who went out from the village, and then they dispersed.

The sacrifice that was going on will not continue, anyway, the dog can be eaten at night.

Those whose family members came back were elated, and those whose family members did not come back were weeping. This is the most obvious thing.

And those who did not come back included the master of the fiefdom and the slaves around the master, and it was not known whether they were dead or what happened.

In the open space of the community, a woman stroked her husband's arm wrapped in white cloth and asked, "What's wrong with your hand? Wang Shangxing, did you lose or win?"

The man with the white cloth wrapped around his arm had a strange expression, and it took him a long time to say: "From now on... there will be no king."

Although the village community is closed, people are not fools, and they can still tell the difference between having no king and changing the king.

Hearing this, everyone was not too surprised. The distance between the king and them is very far. Besides, changing one today and another tomorrow is not as long as the master of the fief.

But where did the king go?Why is it gone?is dead?What's the matter?
The soldiers who came back said: "20 days ago, we retreated with the army. We retreated to a place and were surrounded. The soldiers of the Mohists were riding horses. The gentlemen did not rush away. I heard that the city of Zhu was captured. , there is no place to retreat."

"At night, the opposite party sang songs, all in Chu language, and everyone could understand them."

"Some sang, and some preached the great victory. They said that if the way out was cut off, the king of Chu would be defeated. They also said that they would grant land to the people and ban labor labor on public land..."

"With the singing, we discussed fleeing. We hid in the woods while it was dark, thinking about going to the opposite military camp the next day."

"I went to the Mohist army camp, had food and drink, and asked us to gather together according to the village. As a result, I soon heard that the king surrendered."

"We listened to people's preaching for a few days in the camp, listened to some food, and selected some strong people, we can come back."

In the eyes of these soldiers who fled that day, a big battle seemed commonplace. There were so many people who fled that night when they were besieged, and in fact there was no large-scale battle at all.

After hearing this, the crowd didn't care where the king went, but cared about the words of "granting land and banning labor on public land", and asked in amazement: "Is it true?"

The soldier pointed to the Mohists who were following him and said, "Really, that's what they said. They said they wanted to divide all the fiefdoms of the gentlemen."

The old man in the village community asked suspiciously: "Those people are not scholars? After the gentleman's land is divided, what do those people eat? Didn't you hear it wrong, are you re-enforcing the land to someone else?"

This has always been the case. The mu tax system was implemented decades earlier in the Central Plains, but in Chu this system was only implemented in some reformed places in Jianghan.

Originally, stone and bronze were used for labor, and the production tools were placed here. It was impossible to collect land taxes in kind, and the only choice was to exploit land rent for labor.

This is a simple cost issue. Under the feudal system, the backward productivity level and insufficient grassroots officials make it impossible to effectively collect taxes in kind.

It is better to directly distribute the land and population to the nobles and nobles, and adopt the public land labor system.

All ethnic groups had a primitive village community era, and the remnants of the clan village community was the public ownership of land. This remnant, combined with the feudal system, could easily form a labor rent system.

Sishang has now begun to levy currency taxes instead of rents in kind; some cities and vassal states in the Central Plains have also begun to collect rents in kind and cloth taxes, while labor rents are still implemented in more remote areas.

Labor rent has many disadvantages, but it is most suitable under the level of productivity in the remote areas of Chu.

Its biggest shortcoming is the problem of fleeing. They dare to govern their own interests after completing their official duties. Labor in public lands and enlistment of feudal lords are all free of charge, and they are better than their own land.

That is to say, farmers do not have iron or muskets in their hands. Even though there is a large area of ​​wasteland, there are too many wolves, insects, tigers and leopards and they need to eat salt, which makes the cost of fleeing too high.

Under such circumstances, everyone in the village immediately became excited when they heard the news of exempting public land labor, redistributing land, and granting registration land.

This is a long-standing tradition in Yitian. There is no king in the world. The land does not belong to farmers, and farmers only have the right to use it.

And because of the backward farming technology, the land must be properly fallowed. The tradition of the village community is to redistribute the land every few years, but it does not include the gentlemen's land.

If everyone is not surprised about the division of land, then the rest of the matter will be much simpler.

"Have you heard how it was divided?"

The people in the village community asked repeatedly, and the soldiers who returned from the village community said: "I heard that. We will measure the Yitian and Jitian uniformly, and separate the upper and lower fields, one Yitian and three Yitians, etc."

"After the reclaimed land is divided equally, a part of the uncultivated land will be added, each with [-] mu."

"After seven years, everything can be bought and sold. Within four years, only the tax on reclaimed land will be collected, and the tax will be one on ten. After four years, the tax on reclaimed and abandoned fields will be collected."

"Men will serve at the age of seventeen, regardless of military service, and only serve three years. Three years of service, life-long exemption, if there is a call, daily payment. Those who do not serve, the land will be harvested."

As far as this is concerned, the people in the village already don't quite believe it.

The tax is not high, a tithe, and within four years only the existing land reclamation tax is collected. Compared with the various labor services in the past, it is really heaven and earth.

And what they didn't believe the most was that after the [-]th, they only needed to serve for three years, regardless of military service, which was simply unimaginable.

Serving this kind of thing has existed since ancient times, and everyone has long been used to it.But this kind of thing is the scariest thing.

To fight today, you have to serve; to build a city tomorrow, you have to serve... All these, plus the labor for the owner of the land, made it difficult for everyone in the village to bear it.

If it is possible to be exempted from military service after three years of service, then it is really a government of benevolence and righteousness.

It is not yet known if this matter is true or not, but the land of the fief owner is there. You only need to see whether the land is divided or not.

The tithe tax has banned the previous public land labor, and it is no longer necessary to undertake labor such as horse logging and logging that is not included in the service period. Not to mention the tithe tax, if it can be done as said, it will be eight One tax and five one tax are both acceptable.

(End of this chapter)