Guide to traveling through the Northern Song Dynasty

Among the ruled classes in Western Xia, craftsmen must have the highest status.

There is no other reason, things are precious because they are rare, and the same is true for people.

Among the 200,000 people in Xingqing Prefecture, there are at least 10,000 Han craftsmen and their descendants.

They live a comfortable life in Western Xia, at least more comfortable than in the Song Dynasty. The Dangxiang herders may think of rebelling, but the Han craftsmen in Xingqing Prefecture will never rebel. They are far more loyal to Western Xia than the lower-class people of Dangxiang.

These Han craftsmen have more or less learned from their fathers that life in Western Xia is better than in Song!

Because most of their ancestors and fathers came from the Shaanxi Imperial Army.

The Western Army was the most capable in the Northern Song Dynasty, and the Shaanxi Imperial Army was the core elite of the Western Army. So what exactly are the Shaanxi Imperial Army like?

One third of them are craftsmen!

Carpenters, stonemasons, and blacksmiths are not enough. There are those who can dye cloth, embroider, and sing operas...

The "military officials" of the Northern Song Dynasty recruited such craftsmen when replenishing the imperial guards, and "each commander took one-third of the money" to engage in various production activities to make profits.

If you see a soldier of the imperial guards in the Western Army, there is a high probability that he does not know how to use a sword or a gun. His main job is to embroider with an embroidery needle.

Of course, the money earned must be handed over.

After a major defeat of the Song army, the Western Xia could capture countless craftsmen and bring the best of them back to Xingqing Prefecture.

There is a poem to prove it: Hesitantly ordered all the artists to compete to offer their skills and sing and play. The rest were cut off their heads and released, and they ran east with arrows dripping.

These four sentences describe the Western Xia's treatment of Song prisoners. Because there were too many captured Song soldiers, they were too lazy to take them all back to the Western Xia as slaves. Those with talent could be exempted from torture, so the Song army captives competed to perform, playing all kinds of music. The rest without talent would have their noses cut off and then expelled, and they were all scared to shit and urinate when they were released.

Such a scene did not happen in the late Northern Song Dynasty, but before Wang Anshi's reform!

When Li Renxiao was escorted out of the palace by the ministers and surrendered with his concubines and guards, the descendants of Han craftsmen in the city burst into tears.

Many of them were born in Western Xia and had no idea what the Song Dynasty and the Ming Dynasty looked like.

They only knew that being a craftsman in Shaanxi was miserable, working hard and enduring exploitation by officers. Life in Xingqing Prefecture was very good, and the status of craftsmen was much higher than that of farmers and herdsmen.

Li Renxiao heard the crying coming from both sides of the street, and was moved to wipe his tears and said: "There are still loyal people in the country, why are they destroyed in an instant?"

Li Renli was so ashamed that his ears turned red when he heard this.

Rela Gongji was thinking about his future. He had made enough money over the years and had countless money to bribe the Ming Dynasty.

The Xixia Imperial Censor was a Han Chinese. As the second-in-command of the Imperial Censorate, Rela Gongji had always enjoyed the actual power of the first-in-command.

"Ga..."

The city gate opened, and the monarch and his ministers stopped.

Bali Xinren, the Xixia envoy, walked out of the city quickly with the letter of surrender and knelt in front of the horses of Deng Chun and Li Yanxian.

Deng Chun smiled at the civil servants around him: "Please ask Mr. Zhao to take this."

Zhao Ding was already in his fifties and had been promoted to the left assistant minister of the Ministry of Revenue a few years ago. He was sent to Shaanxi this time to take charge of the logistics of various armies and to stay in Xingqing Prefecture as the governor.

The governor of the entire Xixia region was a transitional position. Five years later, Xixia would be renamed Ningxia Province.

Ningxia means to pacify Xixia!

These generals had just destroyed a country, Zhao Ding did not dare to steal the limelight, and immediately said with a smile: "The credit for destroying the country belongs to the generals, how can I, a civil official, come forward? General, please."

So the personal soldier took the small box and held it in front of Deng Chun.

After Deng Chun read it, he handed it to Li Yanxian.

After a while, Deng Chun said: "I, on behalf of the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty and the soldiers of the Ming Dynasty, accept the surrender of the King of Xixia."

Bali Xinren had been kneeling on the ground. Hearing this, he kowtowed quickly, then bowed and left and returned to the city.

After a while, Li Renxiao led the civil and military officials out of the city.

The little emperor knelt in front of the emperor of the Ming Dynasty facing southeast. The generals of the Ming Dynasty did not dare to accept this kneeling, and all lined up and stood beside him.

After the Xixia monarch and ministers knelt before the emperor, they turned around and knelt to Deng Chun and others.

Li Renxiao held the Xixia national seal and handed it to Deng Chun respectfully. This seal was given by Zhu Guoxiang. There were several other seals with different functions, which were temporarily held by the eunuchs, and Li Renxiao handed them over one by one.

Prime Minister Li Renzhong lost too much blood and is still lying on the hospital bed.

Li Renli handed over the household registration book of Xixia on behalf of the prime minister. The specific household register was too complicated, so only the general list was handed over on the spot, which was considered a process.

Privy envoy Wang Shu was currently at Keyi Gate, and Taiwei E Luotai handed over the Xixia military register on behalf of the military.

Immediately afterwards, Xingqing Prefecture Yin Zhang Gongfu also handed over the corresponding documents.

The generals of the Ming Dynasty just passed these things over, and soon all of them were handed over to Zhao Ding.

"Long live the Ming Dynasty!" Deng Chun shouted.

"Long live the Ming Dynasty!"

"Long live the Ming Dynasty!"

One army after another followed the shouting, and the roar of hundreds of thousands of troops was like a tsunami, which frightened the Xixia monarchs and ministers one by one.

Li Renxiao took off his crown and his dragon robe.

The Xixia civil and military officials also took off their hats and clothes and handed them over to the Ming army soldiers, and they no longer had the noble status they had before.

Deng Chun, Li Yanxian and other generals led their troops into the city from different gates.

The Xixia monarch and his ministers lost their hats and coats, and were dejected and tied up with their hands behind their backs. Although it looked very embarrassing, for the monarch and his ministers of the fallen country, this situation was already very decent.

If they dare to defend Xingqing Mansion, they will be treated differently after the city is broken!

Of the hundreds of thousands of troops, only 50,000 entered the city.

Among them, 30,000 troops are fully organized, while the remaining 20,000 are extremely disorganized.

Because those who saw it had a share, all generals had to go to the city to experience it. The 20,000 troops were improvised by the generals. You bring a few hundred, and I bring a few hundred. They are all elites under my command, and there are a particularly large number of officers.

The people of Xingqing Mansion were frightened, but they soon felt relieved.

Since the people who entered the city were all elites, they were strictly disciplined and committed no crimes, and no robbery, killing, or arson occurred.

This is also the benefit of Xianguo's surrender. If the battle was to attack the city by force, the scene would not be so harmonious.

Each department knew their tasks before entering the city, and now they were executing them in an orderly manner.

Some were responsible for collecting the garrison armor, some ran to occupy the palace, some ran to occupy the warehouse, and some ran to occupy the city wall...

"Pick it!"

Deng Chun pointed to the door of Xixia Palace.

Not only must the forehead be removed, but all prohibited items in the palace must be removed and escorted to Luoyang to be handed over to the court. For example, dragon chair and the like.

After bringing the Xixia monarchs and ministers back to the main hall, Deng Chun and Li Yanxian smiled and said, "Mr. Zhao, please invite me."

The dragon chair was being dismantled, and a team of soldiers brought the chair.

Zhao Ding moved a chair and sat under the dragon chair. Several major generals also sat down, while the Xixia monarchs and ministers knelt on the ground.

Zhao Ding introduced himself: "My surname is Zhao, my given name is Ding, and I am named Yuanzhen. I used to hold the position of Zuo Shilang of the Ministry of Household Affairs, and served as the general logistics officer of Shaanxi during the expedition to Xia. His Majesty the Emperor has decreed that after the extermination of Xia, it will be changed to the Ningxia Governor's Mansion. I served as the governor of Ningxia until the establishment of Ningxia Province..."

"Greetings to the governor!" Xixia monarchs and ministers quickly kowtowed.

Zhao Ding continued: "Before I left the capital, His Majesty read a poem: How did Xia Song rise, Han Qi is not surprising. The dragon and tiger chariots in the Sichuan are still talking about military aircraft. Is there any descendant who wrote this poem? In the palace?"

As soon as these words came out, Zhang Gongfu, the governor of Xingqing Prefecture, was paralyzed with fear.

Zhao Ding asked again: "Does Zhang Yuan have any descendants in this palace?"

Zhang Gongfu bravely walked out of the procession on his knees and said: "After the sinners, Zhang Gongfu, please bow to His Excellency the Governor."

Zhao Ding said: "The emperor has an oral decree that for the descendants of Zhang Yuan and Wu Hao, all men over the age of twelve shall be killed, and women over the age of fifteen shall be given to unmarried soldiers as wives. Those over the age of fifty are exempted from punishment. Boys and girls must be Their surnames were changed and they were taken to different provinces to be raised separately. All the property of the two families was confiscated!"

Zhang Gongfu was completely paralyzed. He couldn't even kneel upright when he was lying on the ground.

Zhang Yuan and Wu Hao were both down-and-out scholars in the Northern Song Dynasty. They deliberately changed their names to these two bad names in order to touch Li Yuanhao's porcelain. They wrote poems and wrote poems everywhere in Xixia, which soon attracted Li Yuanhao's attention, and then assisted Li Yuanhao to fight against the Northern Song Dynasty.

If that were the case, it would actually be understandable.

Zhang Yuan actually regarded destroying the Song Dynasty as his lifelong ambition. He wrote poems to ridicule the ministers of the Northern Song Dynasty in Haoshuichuan, which was full of corpses of Song soldiers. The poems were full of resentment and pride. He used the corpses of countless Song soldiers as a ladder to finally become the Xixia Prime Minister.

Even when Li Yuanhao wanted to negotiate peace with Song Jun, Zhang Yuan stood up and firmly opposed it.

When Zhang Gongfu was dragged out, Zhao Ding continued: "Search brother Richard's property. His family members will be treated like the descendants of Zhang Yuan and Wu Hao!"

"The property of Ren Dejing will be inspected and the family members will deal with it as usual. Ren Dejing's daughter, due to her special status, will be temporarily taken to Luoyang to await her fate."

"Each wealthy family in Xixia must report their property truthfully, especially the amount of farmland and pasture. Once it is found that they have concealed their information, they will be punished according to the above examples."

"The Ningxia Governor's Mansion was under military control for the first three and a half years, and then under civilian control for the next two years. Five years later, Ningxia Province was established."

"Take them all and lock them up..."

The Xixia aristocratic families were extremely wealthy. Their property not only came from their own people, but also a lot of it was stolen from Shaanxi.

Is it okay if you surrender?

Several groups of soldiers rushed into the main hall and dragged all the Xixia monarchs and ministers to the prison.

Countless civil and military ministers have regretted it. They surrendered and still did this. If they had known it, they would have fought against the Ming army!

In the empty hall, only the civil servants and generals of the Ming Dynasty were left.

Li Yanxian said amusedly: "If the governor does this, rebellions may break out in the next few years."

"Then we have to rely on the generals," Zhao Ding explained. "Your Majesty's intention is very simple, which is to completely rectify the land of Xixia. Break the bones of those wealthy families, especially the tribal chiefs, and divide their fields. The pasture is for the common people. If it is not managed now, the power of those chiefs will grow again in twenty or thirty years. How can the government collect taxes? "

Deng Chun asked: "We want to station heavy troops in the hometown of Xixia?"

Zhao Ding said: "Thirty thousand garrison troops, twenty thousand field troops, and their families will also be moved here. They will be allocated the most fertile land to take root and multiply firmly in Ningxia. These troops will mainly be deployed from Shaanxi, which will no longer be a border area. , the cabinet and the Ministry of War decided to reduce the number of troops in Shaanxi."

Li Yanxian smiled and said: "This is easy to handle. There are many Shaanxi soldiers outside the city. Just let them stay and send their families back later."

"This will trouble you generals," Zhao Ding took out an official document from the Ministry of War. "It contains specific garrison locations and the corresponding number of troops. Some civilians will also stay and move their families. In the next two or three years, there will definitely be a rebellion. Come on, take the opportunity to kill another group of people! This year’s battle is not the end, it’s just the beginning.”